Ben Fritchman, John Hockema, and I did a Big Day in Koochiching County yesterday. Shorebirds and migrant passerines were largely absent, nocturnal birds were especially quiet, and conditions were wet and windy, but despite that we found a respectable 122 species thanks mostly to finding lots of breeding forest birds. Some of our highlights are listed below:
Spruce, Ruffed, and Sharp-tailed Grouse - Had nice observations of both male and female Spruce on Toumey-Williams in separate locations. Good looks at the Ruffed between the 2 Spruce observations. Saw the Sharp-tailed sitting low in a willow along 217 a few miles east of Littlefork. Black-billed Cuckoo - 1 on Toumey-Williams Great Horned Owls - 1 heard on 71 about a mile north of Big Falls, 1 seen flying across Toumey-Williams, and nice looks at a fledgeling sitting on a snag just before the entrance of Franz Jevne State Park 8 species of flycatchers/kingbirds - Yellow-bellied and Olive-sided singing in good numbers along Toumey-Williams and an Olive-sided in Big Falls Philadelpia Vireo - in the woods near the Littlefork sewage ponds (which also had numerous swallows of various species and several Bobolinks present Black-billed Magpies - in Big Falls, on CR 101, and Hwy 11 Boreal Chickadee - on CR 86 north of CR 32 Connecticut Warbler - several singing along Toumey-Williams with additional observations on Fiero, CR 101, and CR 86 As fantastic as Pine Island State Forest (Toumey-Williams and associated roads) is for birding, this area is in jeopardy. The Subsection Forest Resource Management Plan for Pine Island and other state forest land of the Agassiz Subsection calls for a *significant* increase in the cutting of lowland conifers (which the paper industry is VERY hungry for right now) and an overall strategy of drastically reducing the age of lowland conifer forest in the Agassiz Lowlands. This might be good for the industry, but there is no good way to spin it for the lowland conifer-dependant birds of Pine Island State Forest. Parts of it are difficult to read, but you can see the management plan at this link (at least the graphs are pretty accessible) from the DNR website: http://files.dnr.state.mn.us/forestry/subsection/agassiz/agassizlowland_SFRMP_strategicdirection_standselection02_25_08.pdf and you can see the stand list at this link: http://files.dnr.state.mn.us/forestry/subsection/agassiz/agassizlowlands_SFRMP_7YearStandList_AppendixA.pdf. The stand list is pretty easy to read--simply look at the cover type, acres, age, and prescription. -- Shawn Conrad www.itascacnfbirding.com ---- Join or Leave mou-net: http://lists.umn.edu/cgi-bin/wa?SUBED1=mou-net Archives: http://lists.umn.edu/archives/mou-net.html
