For me, the highlight of the past few days has been the shorebirds! I’ve always particularly enjoyed watching them scramble along a beach or a breakwall, even before I began to seriously tackle the notoriously difficult challenge of learning to distinguish one peep from the next. Today I finally caught up with one of my [...]
One incredible aspect of fall migration here at Whitefish Point that makes it so unique is the annual passage of thousands of Red-necked Grebes. According to Behrens and Cox’s Seawatching: Eastern waterbirds in flight, the Point “is the best site in North America for Red-necked Grebe, with numbers that dwarf those counted at all other [...]
As we approach the end of the summer owl banding season, things have remained relatively slow, but fairly steady. We had begun to wonder if the owls were going to trickle down to the end of their summer movements when the night of the 18th produced a pretty unexpected surprise. We banded six Saw-whets, five [...]
It’s hard to believe summer in the UP is already winding down, and fall migrants are here! It seems like just the other day that a Mississippi Kite zipped by me on the final weekend of the spring hawk count. In fact, for some species fall migration has been well underway for some time. Though [...]
We unfortunately don't have a whole lot to report. As expected, this has proven to be a down reproductive year for Northern Saw-whet Owls and they have been very slow recently. The adult Saw-whets came to a screeching halt on July 18. Juvenile Saw-whets have continued, but at a trickle. Thankfully, we are also catching [...]
