Another year gone by and another year of birds to look back fondly on. 2015 began slowly, as I spent very little time out in January and February. With a relatively warm March, things thawed out a bit more quickly than normal at Rapids Lake. There was some early push of waterfowl into the area through mid-March, but the bulk did not occur until the more normal time in late March and early April. With the lack of snowfall over the previous winter, there were not the normal spots for waterfowl to land in flooded farm fields so numbers were generally not exceptional. I thought waterfowl numbers were good at Rapids Lake for the months of March and April particularly Greater White-fronted Goose, Snow Goose, Tundra Swan, Ring-necked Duck, Lesser Scaup, and Common Merganser. As for other birds during March and April, most species arrived when expected and numbers were not exceptional. Bald Eagle numbers in March were outstanding though with a cumulative total of 651 for the month. Rusty Blackbird numbers were good as well with a cumulative total of 111 over March and April. While May was a good month(hard not to be), migrant numbers were a little disappointing compared to the outstanding Mays of 2013 and 2014. It was generally better than May 2012, though, which was also a warm spring. The summer months yielded typical numbers of local breeders. After what seemed like a poor summer 2014 for Grasshopper, Savannah, and Vesper Sparrow their numbers seemed normal this year. Little habitat meant few shorebirds this past summer. Without the habitat, I am not comparing shorebird numbers to the past few seasons. Over the entirety of 2015 I saw 16 shorebird species. I did not spend any time during the spring or much during the fall searching out shorebirds. The August thru November period are my new high-water mark for the fall season. Beginning with some early warbler arrivals and higher numbers in August, bird numbers and variety stayed consistently good into November. During the fall I had 27 days where I saw 10 or more warbler species. Of those I saw 10 warbler species on 2 days, 11 warbler species on 5 days, 12 warbler species on 3 days, 13 warbler species on 4 days, 14 warbler species on 4 days, 15 warbler species on 2 days, 16 warbler species on 5 days, 17 warbler species on 1 day, and 19 warbler species on 1 day. Compared to this spring in May I saw 12 warbler species on 1 day, 13 warbler species on 2 days, 14 warbler species on 1 day, 15 warbler species on 1 day, 16 warbler species on 4 days, 17 warbler species on 2 days, 18 warbler species on 1 day, and 20 warbler species on 3 days. Of the 2723 warbler that I counted and identified this fall 1257 were counted at Rapids Lake MVNWR, 895 were counted at the Minnesota Landscape Arboretum, 564 were counted at Carver Park Reserve, and 7 elsewhere. For the year I saw 216 species in Carver County with 193 at Rapids Lake, 154 at Carver Park, 113 at the arboretum, and 120 elsewhere in the county. Below are some of the cumulative seasonal counts for 2015.
Warbler total counts (spring // fall) Blue-winged Warbler 69 // 8 Golden-winged Warbler 23 // 46(new high fall total) Brewster's Warbler 0 // 1 Tennesee Warbler 183 // 280 Orange-crowned Warbler 4 // 116 Nashville Warbler 75 // 272(new high fall total) Northern Parula 8 // 7 Yellow Warbler 329 // 49 Chestnut-sided Warbler 28 // 144(new high fall total) Magnolia Warbler 39 // 60 Cape May Warbler 2 // 1 Black-throated Green Warbler 12 // 9 Yellow-rumped Warbler 122 // 724 Blackburnian Warbler 11 // 39(new high fall total) Pine Warbler 1 // 1 Palm Warbler 39 // 36 Bay-breasted Warbler 1 // 17(new high fall total) Blackpoll Warbler 24 // 9 Bay-breasted/Blackpoll Warbler 0 // 1 Cerulean Warbler 4 // 0 Black-and-White Warbler 22 // 81 American Redstart 318 // 266 Prothonotary Warbler 31(new high spring total) // 2 Ovenbird 21 // 44 Louisiana Waterthrush 1 // 0 Northern Waterthrush 22 // 47 Connecticut Warbler 1 // 1 Mourning Warbler 4 // 20 Common Yellowthroat 211 // 365 Wilson's Warbler 29 // 33 Canada Warbler 8 // 44(new high fall total) Other species total counts (spring // fall) Olive-sided Flycatcher 1 // 10 Yellow-bellied Flycatcher 0 // 2 Alder Flycatcher 14 // 15 Willow Flycatcher 4 // 4 Least Flycatcher 67 // 99 Blue-headed Vireo 5 // 22 Philadelphia Vireo 0 // 16 Golden-crowned Kinglet 63 // 118 Ruby-crowned Kinglet 86 // 204 Veery 3 // 3 Gray-cheeked Thrush 7 // 4 Swainson's Thrush 24 // 13 Hermit Thrush 9 // 25 Wood Thrush 9 // 1 Fox Sparrow 103 // 197 Lincoln's Sparrow 6 // 52 White-throated Sparrow 144 // 849 Harris's Sparrow 2 // 10 White-crowned Sparrow 8 // 29 John Cyrus ---- Join or Leave mou-net: http://lists.umn.edu/cgi-bin/wa?SUBED1=mou-net Archives: http://lists.umn.edu/archives/mou-net.html
