Yesterday was the last day of three days guiding a client from Maryland. The weather yesterday was gusty with winds from the west. There was a lot of intermediate snow showers through the day and in a nut shell it was a tough day to find birds. We started out in Sax-Zim Bog and tried in vain to look for Great Gray Owls in several locations and came up with no sightings. I feel there were two reasons for this, the weather conditions and deer hunting traffic in the bog. But we did find a small grouping of 5 Sharp-tailed Grouse at the lek location off Poplar Rd or south of intersection of Arkola Rd/52 & Stickney Rd. The grouse were huddled around the pump house that looks like a old out house located in a large mowed hay field. Heard a lot of White-winged Crossbills flying over us in the bog and saw several flocks of Snow Buntings. In a few open fields we found Rough-legged Hawks hunting but other than that not a lot of bird diversity.
So we headed to Duluth and began our afternoon at Park Point. We witnessed the large migration of eagles migrating right over Park Point and like Karl Bardon mentioned in his earlier post about the raptor movement at Hawk Ridge, we also saw a lot of Rough-legged Hawks moving over Park Point and we spotted one adult Goshawk. We heard both Red and White-winged Crossbills flying over Park Point Recreational Area along with redpolls We also observed large numbers of Pine Grosbeaks feeding on the flowering crab apple trees in the park as well. Today: I went back to Park Point to photograph the Pine Grosbeaks and while doing so, I observed both species of crossbills flying over Park Pt. along with some redpolls. Saw a Northern Shrike and heard probably the same two Bohemian Waxwings that were reported yesterday by Shawn Zierman. There are still some juncos and Tree Sparrows in the park along with some robins and some Snow Buntings. Mountain Bluebird: While walking along the main road photographing Pine Grosbeaks, I met Allan Meadows from International Falls who inform me of a Mountain Bluebird that was reported to him by either Shawn Zierman or Kim Eckert who were also photographing/ birding in the park. I relocated the bluebird across the main road from the public restrooms foraging for insects. Peder Svingen met me at Park Point along with Larry & Jan Kraemer. We spent a lot of time observing and photographing the male Mountain Bluebird as it spends a lot of its time on NW area of the ball field or across the road from the public restroom. As a side note after I text Karl Bardon about the male Mt. Bluebird at Park Point, Karl text me back to say that a Mt. Bluebird just flew by Hawk Ridge! With the strong winds the last two days from the west, I wonder how many more Mt. Bluebirds are around or other western strays? Good Birding Mike Mike Hendrickson Duluth, Minnesota MikeHendricksonGuiding.com Sax-ZimBog.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
