Steve Thiessen, Pat Ready, Jim Schwarz and I went on a southwest Wisconsin
jaunt today. We were dismayed at how foggy it was most of the way down Hwy 151
to Eagle Point Rd., although curiously the low areas were relatively clear and
on the higher spots, the trees were coated with frost - strange. Fortunately,
our first stop was one of the low points.
The lock and dam at the end of Eagle Point had open water below it, but zero
birds, so we headed for Bluff Rd. We cruised down to the deadend to the south,
which was very birdy. A Carolina Wren was loudly vocalizing and put on quite a
show for us near the last house before the railroad tracks. There were many
other common birds there, including around 60 Mourning Doves in a tree, a Brown
Creeper, and what Steve thought might have been a Winter Wren that dove into a
clump of yews and eluded positive ID. There were a couple of E. Bluebirds near
the intersection with Eagle Point Rd., and farther north, the great feeder
setup at a farmhouse was loaded with birds. We had a couple of Fox and a few
White-throated Sparrows, many Juncos including a couple of Oregon-types, and
eventually a single male Purple Finch joined the crowd.
By that point, the wind was picking up and the sun was burning off the fog,
which was precipitating out as fine snow. We had hopes for a good raptor day,
which turned out to be the case. Before heading north, we checked out the
housing subdivision along the river on Plum Hollow Rd. Despite finding a lot
of birds going to feeders and hanging out in the shrubby areas along the RR
tracks, we couldn't find our hoped-for Eurasian Tree Sparrow, but we did come
up with a Swamp Sparrow skulking around next to a house.
After a brief, unproductive stop at the Fenley Wildlife Area on Bluff Rd, we
headed to the uplands and went north to Lancaster. After a lunch stop in
Fennimore, we began to work back east. As we had hoped, there were many
raptors out and about. On the day, we had around a dozen each of Am. Kestrels
and Rough-legged Hawks, probably twice that many Red-tails, and maybe three
dozen Bald Eagles. We finally found a perched Golden Eagle up on a ridge at
the end of Studnika Rd. off County G southwest of Muscoda. We were rather
disappointed to not see one soaring today, despite all the Baldies in the air.
Our last stop was the Arena Boat Landing, where we had a nice adult
Red-shouldered Hawk on the south side of the road along the creek. It flew
from one tree to another, giving us great looks at the field marks. A nice cap
to a raptor-y day.
Peter Fissel
Madison WI
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