[wisb] Re: Spark birds
- From: Alex Stark <thearctictern@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: bgsloan2@xxxxxxxxx
- Date: Tue, 24 Jan 2012 18:27:28 -0600
I wasn't going to jump in...but why not?
In 2006 I went on a field study trip through UW-Platteville to
Churchill, Manitoba. Besides the game birds, I had zero previous
interest in birds. While in Churchill we saw all three scoters in a
day, nesting Short-eared Owls, Whimbrels, Hudsonian Godwits and so
much more! One day we saw two white blobs in a pond through the fog.
After belly-crawling through the tundra for a quarter mile we had two
Tundra Swans sitting on their nest! After that once in a lifetime
experience we walked another quarter mile right into an Arctic Tern
colony. That's when I found out how territorial Tern's are (by being
bashed in the head while running away!) and I was hooked for life!
Alex Stark, Prairie du Chien
On Tue, Jan 24, 2012 at 6:04 PM, B.G. Sloan <bgsloan2@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> I've been interested in birds for as long as I can remember. Like several
> other people have mentioned on WISBIRDN, I have multiple spark birds:
>
> * My first clear memory of a winged creature was not a bird, but a bat. I was
> only 2-3 years old at the time, but I distinctly remember my dad chasing a
> bat with a tennis racket through our Victorian house on the bluffs on the
> Iowa side of the Mississippi River.
>
> * My first clear recollection of a bird involved a Ruby-throated Hummingbird.
> My parents had a trellis with vines that had flowers that attracted hummers.
> I remember idly sitting on the back steps watching the hummers when one of
> them landed on a branch. I don't remember exactly what I thought, but it was
> something along the lines of "Hummingbirds have legs?" For some reason I
> thought they were perpetually in flight. I was probably five years old.
>
> * And I also have a memory of being freaked out by the caterwauling of what
> was probably a Barred Owl near our lake vacation home in Walworth County. I
> was 7-8 years old, at most, and my dad tried to explain that it was an owl,
> but I was convinced it was a ghost or banshee coming to take me away. Didn't
> sleep very that night!
>
> * My first true birding success was as a 9 or 10 year old. I'd read about
> pishing in one of my uncle's hunting magazines. Eventually I tried it out.
> Got a faint response from a Northern Bobwhite. With more persistent pishing I
> drew the bobwhite out of a cornfield and into the barnyard of my
> grandparents' central Illinois farm. Didn't realize until much later that it
> was unusual to find a bobwhite in that area.
>
> * I also have fond memories of my son Zack's ability to torment Northern
> Cardinals and White-throated Sparrows with his whistling. He could do
> whistles that didn't really sound like these birds' songs, but that would
> drive them crazy. I remember watching with amazement as he drew agitated
> males from these species within a foot of him. He was maybe 10 when he did
> this.
>
> * But my true spark bird has to be Wild Turkey. Like I said, I've been
> interested in birds for a long time. But I didn't get seriously into birding
> until a flock of turkeys invaded my neighborhood in Urbana, IL in late 2004.
> I spent many hours in the field observing their behavior, started to research
> birds, joined birding listservs, and keep lists. I eventually wrote the
> following op-ed piece about these turkeys in a Thanksgiving issue of the
> local paper: http://bit.ly/cDEHIU Since then I've been fortunate enough to
> have turkeys within walking distance of home in two other locations:
> Bloomington, IN, and Milwaukee. Don't see them very often on the east side of
> Milwaukee, but I know that they are there. :-)
>
> Bernie Sloan
> Milwaukee
>
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>
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