[wisb] Crazy past 36 hrs.from Winnebago to Green Lake Co.

From: paul bruce <rdjn560birdcrazy@xxxxxxxxx>
To: wisbirdn@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Date: Tue, 31 May 2011 22:20:05 -0700 (PDT)
      Hey everyone ----  Planned ahead from the Town of Algoma,  the birding 
(and fishing) of the day was rather productive, more so on birds than fishing. 
 So what happened, Tom, was quite peculiar, not just for yesterday, but also 
today(?).   I'll get the half-off-topic out of the was first.  While fishing, I 
 took a cast with my spinner towards some weedy area and out of somewhere came 
a dragonfly, or so I thought, but was actually a hummingbird attacking it. How 
crazy was that!?  But then today  ANOTHER situation happened:  Fishing  from 
the shore at Menominee Park I casted out a large Yellow Mr. Twister, and what 
should fly along and collide with it at the precise moment was a drake 
mallard.  The duck landed in the water, the bait still attached to it somehow, 
I gradually reeled it in hoping not to hook the bird and extract the hook, but 
it took off and amazingly the bait went soaring out and landed on the shore. I 
reeled in the rest
 of the way only to find very few feathers, in fact, just a tuft of down 
remained on it.  The drake flew up on to the grass and shook it all off and 
waddled away.  Now, go figure, 2 "bird meets bait"  situations in 2 days.  How 
totally bizarre is that?    So anyway, the real birding theme here.
      I suppose this was a Big Day, in a way,  I gathered just 77 species from 
Winnebago Co to Green Lake Co. and 2 of the biggest sps. of the day went to 
Tufted Titmouse, singing for a good 20 minutes at the east shore's boat landing 
of Little Green Lake, and then along County K, I think it was, it runs 
East/West, Tom, in case you wanted to know, a Black-billed Cuckoo flew out of 
some shrubbery out in the open, which I rarely ever see cuckoo's do.   Got all 
3 large raptors, (osprey, TV's and an eagle)  got 6 flycatchers: Great Crested, 
phoebe, pewee, least, kingbird and Yellowbelly.  Hardly any good warblers, 
aside from yellowthoat and yellow, a lingering Blackpoll was heard an seen at 
the folks house.  They also have nesting chickadees for the first time ever in 
their wren house;  they may have a nesting pair of Red-belly woodpeckers right 
in their back yard, they were seen 2/3rds up into one of their aspens.  A 
lingering pair of Ruddy
 Ducks were present.  Got a few gnatcatchers, bluebirds as well.  Got an 
out-of-habitat spotted sandpiper, heard, then found in a cultivated field.  And 
another real strange thing.  Remember how I mentioned that I had NO 
yellow-headed blackbirds at all on the count day?  I was at this HUGE marsh 
they call Uihlein (   hey, that's my study area!) and on that May 21st,  I  
DID  NOT  GET  ONE SINGLE Y -H Bbird,  and then, just Monday morning down on 
the dock while I'm fishin' again, what should I hear to my east, but a 
Yellow-headed Blackbird !!!!  How frustrating was that.  Jeez, hey, talk about 
frustration, I had an incident Tuesday a.m......well, you tell me how you'd 
feel?  I take the kids to school and then buzz over to Menominee Beach, to 
check on the turnstones, WITHOUT my binocs, since I was too tired and sunburned 
from Monday's outing, I forgot to take them out of my back pack.  So I got 
there, saw a couple distant T-stones along
 with another sandpiper!!!  Not a dunlin this time, there was no belly patch, 
it was something else, assuming a sanderling.  So I flew home, got the binocs, 
flew back to the beach, only to find the entire beach totally void of birding 
activity and 2 park crewmen standing right there,  holy  $# ! &  was I fumed.   
Went back later in the morning, found more humans there.  This sandpiper 
sighting got totally botched.  
    SO,  these are my latest in sightings and commentaries.  Didn't figure this 
would be lengthy, but I hope you enjoyed my encounters.
    (This is for Tom) --  I had also visited Twin Lake, the bigger and another 
lake to it's west, wondering what things have you seen that were worthwhile in 
these areas?  
     Paul Bruce, Oshkosh




####################
You received this email because you are subscribed to the Wisconsin Birding 
Network (Wisbirdn).
To UNSUBSCRIBE or SUBSCRIBE, use the Wisbirdn web interface at: 
//www.freelists.org/list/wisbirdn
To set DIGEST or VACATION modes, use the Wisbirdn web interface at: 
//www.freelists.org/list/wisbirdn
Visit Wisbirdn ARCHIVES at: //www.freelists.org/archives/wisbirdn
[wisb] Crazy past 36 hrs.from Winnebago to Green Lake Co.

Other related posts:
