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A Bad Case of Falcon Fever!
The mystery falcon soon after it was first sighted.Three weeks ago, I was up in the Indigo Hill birding tower with our friend Nina who was visiting from the southwest corner of Ohio. We were chatting as we watched birds zip through the trees, and across the sky. It was not yet peak fall migration, but there was still enough to look at that our conversation kept getting interrupted by birds that required a glance or two before an identification could......
Gray Birch: Bird Magnet
A male Baltimore oriole stops by one of our gray birch clumps.We planted some gray birches (Betula populifolia) on our southeastern Ohio ridgetop farm about a decade ago. Julie was the one who wanted birches specifically, since they reminded her of the New England woods where she'd spent her college and post-college years. Being an artist, she loves birches for their visual appeal: pale bark dotted with black, bright green leaves that turn golden......
Haiku for a Pre-dawn Grosbeak
Last day of summer"Eek" like rubber sole on woodWillow bough your st......
Philly Vireo Invasion
Fall provides the best birding on our farm in southeastern Ohio. And the middle weeks of September are the peak of fall passerine migration. Among the birds we see more regularly in the fall than spring is the Philadelphia vireo. This morning, when the sun started warming the birch trees in our yard, the foliage came alive with foraging warblers and vireos. By far the most numerous species was the Philly vireo.Several birds (there were at least 10......
Giant Things at the County Fair
In our county here in southeastern Ohio, we have a wonderful county fair each Labor Day weekend. Among the many things we look forward to seeing there, aside from the funnel cakes, the elephant ears, the corn dogs, the bloomin' onions, the cotton candy, the lemon shakes, the sausage sandwiches, and the bologna sandwiches, is the giant inflatable sheriff's deputy. It's not just a Giant Thing, it's a giant thing that can walk around and gesture to......
Scenes from the Midwest Birding Symposium
As the just-finished 2009 Midwest Birding Symposium was about to start, the Lakeside businesses were putting out the welcome mat. It seemed like the entire Lakeside community was happy that the birders were invading.The Hotel Lakeside is a grand old gal, and once again she hosted the majority of our attendees staying on site. Golf carts, the best mode of transport in this gated community, were purring along every street, moving MBS attendees from......
Preparing to Launch the MBS
We are deep into the final approach to launching the 2009 Midwest Birding Symposium. It all started with a van full and trailer load of stuff we needed to haul from southeast Ohio to Lakeside, Ohio, on the sunny south shore of Lake Erie. My BWD van was not happy about its heavy load. The rear end dragged a few times. And so did the van's.Not much clearance, so we drove very carefully up route 250, through Amish country, stopping in Wooster, waiting......
Join the ABA
Birding with the ABA in Utah.If you are a bird watcher who enjoys the company of others who share your interest in birds, I suggest you consider joining the American Birding Association. The ABA, as birders call it, has undertaken a new initiative to attract members and they are offering some incentives: namely a new lower price and a cool birding T-shirt.Click on the icon above for the inside scoop. I plan to renew my ABA membership at the Midwest......
Two Upcoming Birding Events
In the tower during The Big Sit!There are two birding events I'm really looking forward to this fall.The first is next week's Midwest Birding Symposium held in Lakeside, Ohio. Bird Watcher's Digest is one of the hosts (with the Ohio Ornithological Society and the Lakeside Association) for the event and we're expecting 800+ bird watchers there for a weekend of fun, birding, and bird-brain enhancement.In a single 24-hour period it is feasible, at the......
The Church Owl
Rosy wash of sunset leavingtrees back lit in silhouettethe village church tower like an owlwhose hunting has not started y......
Birding at Cley
The famous west wall at Cley, where many a vagrant was ticked and many a twitch ended in a dip.On the Monday following the British Birdwatching Fair, David Tipling, my kind and generous host in Holt, took me birding at Cley, the famous bird watching hotspot in Norfolk. I'd known about Cley for years and had recently finished Mark Cocker's excellent book "Birders: Tales of a Tribe" which depicts Cley as the epicenter of the U.K. bird watching scene......
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