Back in 2016, I had what was a successful birding year, and looking back on that year today, I'll say it was probably the best year I've had as a birder. In midst of having a great year, the birding hobby always brings birds that get away from us too. Tracing back to 2016, there were a handful of those birds that got away from me. The goals that I set for myself and met during 2016 outweighed missed birds, but eventually those missed birds catch up with us too. When all is said and done, we want to see as many birds as possible. Missed species don't do anything but prompt the idea of future birding trips. I'm sure every birder reading this can relate! One of the birds that I didn't succeed on the way I wanted to in 2016 was Kirtland's Warbler. Over the years, Kirtland's Warbler has been one of the world's most controversial species. It faced the brink of extinction as it's numbers dropped rapidly, but after being listed as endangered for a very long time, it's population has rebounded, and the bird is now listed as near threatened. While Michigan hosts what is likely 95% of the Kirtland's Warbler population, there are small populations elsewhere. One of the elsewhere's is Adams County, Wisconsin. In 2016, I made a trip to Minnesota and I went with Josh and Evan Wallestad on a 5.5 hour, one way trek to Adams County to try for Kirtland's Warbler. During that trip, we didn't think that Kirtland's Warbler searching would be as intense as it was. The severity of the search didn't really come from Kirtland's Warblers, but rather from people protecting Kirtland's Warblers. In 2016 the bird was still protected under the endangered species act, and with Wisconsin's population being one that is on a much smaller and sensitive scale, the population was constantly monitored by nest watchers and wardens. My birding party that ended up consisting of six (Josh, Evan, Gordon, Chris, Setophaga, and me) had rules delivered to us multiple times about looking for the birds.
1. Don't go into their habitat.
2. Stay on the road.
3. Don't use any methods of increasing your chances of seeing birds.
4. Don't pass information along to anyone if you do have a sighting.
5. Let us take your names and license plate numbers.
The Kirtland's Warbler security was something that we laughed about and were also frustrated with. We had no plans of doing anything to violate the rules and had every intention of staying on the road. We thought that one visit from a warden or worker would be enough, but three or four visits with the same process was crazy. It seemed just as strict as airport security. Despite what I mentioned, in the long run I really appreciated the steps they were taking to protect a bird that was critically endangered at one point in order to give the birds space to increase their population. They didn't know us as human beings, and they wouldn't truly know our intentions when it came to searching for birds. But searching for Kirtland's Warbler on that trip was difficult. In 2016, I wrote a post about that trip, called a War To See A Warbler. This post will be a sequel to that story. A link to the first 2016 story is right here below, and it's quite the story. I encourage you all to read the first story first, it should give the current story more meaning.
If you read the original post, you'll know that we stood at the exact same spot for an entire morning, listening to a male Kirtland's Warbler singing away throughout the time we spent standing there. What we got that day was a heard only bird. I count heard only birds on my life list because I think that hearing a bird sing or call is great way to validate it's presence in the wild. For something as awesome as a Kirtland's Warbler, a bird that is solely diurnal, it did seem lame in ways to have it down as a life bird as a heard only. In 2020, seeing a Kirtland's Warbler and getting some photos to go along with it became the biggest goal of my birding trip, which falls under my current blog series here-Northerly Treks. For me to pull of sightings, I would most likely have to go on a very, very, long trip!
In order for 2020 to be a successful one to observe Kirtland's Warblers better, I had to make a choice. As I would be stationed at Gretchen's cabin for most of the trip, in northwest Wisconsin at the town of Spooner in Washburn County, I had to decide between two trip options. One option was to go three hours south of Spooner to Adams County and look for suitable habitat for birds, as well as try for birds near where I did hear one singing in 2016. The three hour drive didn't seem very long, but I envisioned myself looking for Kirtland's Warblers visually for hours. It crossed my mind that I would likely have to go to Adams County more than once if I wanted to have good views of a bird. There's always that chance of getting lucky too, but I was favoring the consideration of what was more obvious. On eBird, any sightings of Kirtland's Warbler is also hidden from public output for Wisconsin data. There's no way to see where the latest sightings have been. One has to find their own birds, or know somebody who might be able to help them out. A limited population in a place that seemed to still be heavily monitored by wardens and nest watchers had more cons than pros when it came to this 2020 trek.
My other option was Grayling, Michigan. As I said earlier, most of the world's Kirtland's Warbler population breeds in Michigan, especially in the northern parts of the Lower Peninsula. Unlike Wisconsin, Michigan has it's Kirtland's Warbler observations in eBird as publicly viewable. Because Kirtland's Warbler was delisted from the endangered species list and with most of the world population of the bird breeding in Michigan, I guess that's a pretty good reason! The eBird resource is an incredible tool at all times, and by studying maps I realized that Kirtland's Warblers are all around Grayling. There were lines upon lines of locations for the bird along what seemed to be four very productive roads and long stretches of each road that held populations. The roads were just southwest, northwest, and east of Grayling. By looking in my book, America's 100 Most Wanted Birds, I turned to the Kirtland's Warbler page and sure enough, Grayling was mentioned as one of the best places for chances. Tours for Kirtland's Warblers occur almost daily for the birds in years not marred by Covid-19. Although tours are given at times, it seemed to me that one would have just as good of a chance birding along one of the several productive roads. Looking at the odds for Grayling, that was the place I wanted to look for them most. The downside to Grayling was that it would be about a 9 hour, one way drive from Spooner. When I figured that the likelihood of having a hard time with sightings in Adams County was high, the choice of Grayling, Michigan became more and more suitable. And there probably wouldn't be people checking up on me roadside multiple times to explain rules. Grayling equaled Kirtland's Warbler freedom baby!
You all are probably wondering why there are pictures of these young pine trees everywhere to start off this post. For one reason, this sequel post has to resemble the first post in ways. During the first post, those young pine trees where all we looked at it, it seemed. Those are young stands of red pine trees. The other reason is that is a snapshot of the habitat for Kirtland's Warbler. For the bird to thrive, they need young stands of jack pine forests for breeding and nesting. On rare occasions, they can be found in young stands of red pines, such as the area where we looked in Wisconsin. I'll reiterate that young jack pine forests are the dominant habitat for breeding birds. Most Kirtland's Warblers will ignore an area that has trees ten feet or taller, and it seems like they prefer trees four to eight feet in height. The first time I looked at the habitat, I thought it was crazy. When Josh, Evan, and I dipped, we were frustrated and I said, "No wonder why it's endangered, it likes weird living places". The young jack pine habitat brought a new dimension for birding for me, and it not only supported Kirtland's Warbler, but plenty of other species too. When it comes to the habitat, it is one that can fade quickly. The fading habitat over the years took a toll on the warbler's population. When the population rebounded, strong efforts were made by people to bring the species back to get to the point where numbers are at today. There are controlled burns in jack pine forests to create habitat for the bird on a regular basis, and there's nothing jacked up about that!
After a few days of thought in early May, I decided that the long trek to Grayling would be my best bet with the Kirtland's Warbler adventure. Yes, it was a long nine hour drive, but getting great looks at the warbler in their famed, Michigan setting, would be the classic way to enjoy them (one that every birder should enjoy). During that time hotels in Michigan had staying restrictions due to Covid-19. Birding was something that was obviously not in the essential category, which was completely understood. I was told that they could take a reservation, but it wasn't to be guaranteed until the Michigan governor's next order. Michigan was also not allowing any dispersed camping on forest lands, which was another hard thing to work around. Dispersed camping is something I do all the time. The Adams County option was a decent Plan B if Michigan didn't work out. But a few weeks can make a big difference. A lot of restrictions were lifted in certain parts of Michigan, including Crawford County that harbors Grayling. I was able to make a reservation to stay at a hotel on the nights of May 31st and June 1st. It was exciting and the major planning beyond what was researched already would be finished up. I wondered what the "war" would be this time to attempt at seeing the Kirtland's Warbler, North America's rarest regularly occurring warbler.. Would there be strict rules I wasn't anticipating? Would the birds sing their heads off near me but out of sight? Or would it be getting to Grayling? After all, I had never driven a nine hour route before in a one way direction-not even close...
I woke up at 4:30 A.M. in the morning on May 31st, said bye and see you later to Gretchen, and hit the road for Grayling, Michigan. When I plugged in the directions on my phone, I simply thought, "wow, what a drive this is going to be". I'll be in Grayling around 4 P.M., give or take a few spots.
The drive was one that I enjoyed from the start, it was beautiful. I did many incidental eBird checklists all the way. When I crossed into Michigan after about three hours of driving east from Spooner through the rest of Wisconsin, it was great to get a state lifer. The incidental eBird checklists increased in Michigan. Before the trip, I made my own travel guides where I'd make links to eBird hotspots or target species that I was targeting. I'd put links down in emails and forward them to myself to use later on species or locations. For example, I made a Kirtland's Warbler guide for the Grayling area where I would copy and paste dozens of links from eBird checklists for directional use and so on. Another guide I made were birding locations about halfway in between Spooner and Grayling. I anticipated that I would spend an hour or two at a birding location and call it "halftime" during the trek. When I got going, I really got going. I decided I didn't want to stop unless it was for gas. I wanted to get to Grayling, check in, and start looking for Kirtland's Warblers immediately.
Fun on road trips comes in different ways. Tracing back to the Kirtland's Warbler trek in 2016, I remember Josh, Evan, and I stopped at a McDonald's along the way. Evan didn't like how quickly his french fries went, and I joked with him that it would be cool if McDonald's allowed french fry refills. When the Wallestads dared me to ask the front register, I couldn't say no because of how hard Evan started laughing. "Hey man, can I get a refill on fries", I asked. With Evan laughing as hard as he was, it was worth it, and the McDonald's employee thought it was funny too. He realized how funny Evan thought it was too and didn't give me a new order of fries, but played along with it. One fun thing I did on this road trip was sample music. In nine hours, there's time for a lot of that. My rental truck had tons of channels, tons, arranged by genre. I found this station I really enjoyed, Channel 37, a hard rock station called Octane Radio. When music came on that I liked, I took a screenshot of the track information to look up and play later. Since, I've found some new bands that I like, and heard some music from bands I already do like that I hadn't heard previously. I also bought an audio cable to play Amaranthe from the truck via my cell phone. The sound system of the truck was bomb, and Amaranthe has never sounded better! With a combination of doing that and enjoying cool scenery, the ride was smooth.
Once entering Michigan I drove through most of the Upper Peninsula from west to east. A lot of the route came from Highway 2, which goes along the shore of Lake Michigan. The scenery was fantastic, and while I thought about getting out a few times to bird for a few minutes and enjoy the scenes more, I kept going towards Grayling. At this point, my body started to feel weird from all the sitting and driving. Most of the time, I like to move around. I hoped that that would be the biggest challenge of the trip-all the driving. When it just got past the 7th hour of driving on my trip, the traffic slowed down on Highway 2 as it merged onto the Interstate-75 as it dipped south and would head into the Lower Peninsula. The slowdown was due to a toll payment at the entrance to the Mackinaw Bridge, with Mackinaw City shortly to the south. This bridge goes over what is close to the dividing point of Lake Michigan and Lake Huron for about four miles. Driving over the large body of water was truly impressive. Once I got past this point, Grayling was "only" another 1.5 hours away, and I would get there right around 4 P.M. Because of my limited stops, my complete route would take me about 9.5 hours since leaving Spooner.
At this point, I couldn't wait to get to Grayling. My body couldn't wait to move around either. I started to get sick of everything vehicle related, and after what seemed like forever, I finally pulled into the hotel I was staying at in Grayling (which was a nice hotel-Ramada by Wyndham Grayling Hotel & Conference Center). I checked in, and immediately went about ten minutes to the east of the hotel to start looking for Kirtland's Warblers. It was awesome to me how close the locations were to the hotel.
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| Gotta love how the bird is mentioned |
I turned onto a road called Staley Lake Road, which by studying eBird maps, seemed to be the best spot for finding the warblers. The road had some taller stands of pines during the early stretches, but I knew that it wouldn't last for long. I stopped about a mile down the road, and got out close to a marked spot to where I knew the trees started to get smaller. In the early minutes, I had a great look at this Nashville Warbler.
When I bird, I really like to park a vehicle and explore an area by foot. After parking, I walked north for a while on Staley Lake. Although there were some young jack pines, I didn't hear any Kirtland's Warblers singing right off the bat. I decided to walk further south from where I parked. When I walked past a hill that had some taller pines, I looked ahead and could see acres and acres of appropriate habitat for Kirtland's Warblers. There were large stands of young jack pines on the west side of the road, and some of the stands continued to the east side of the road too.
I figured that I was in an excellent place for the bird and then my suspicions were confirmed when I heard a Kirtland's Warbler start singing! I stopped and listened. The first Kirtland's Warbler had a second Kirtland's Warbler countersinging with it. I picked up pace and walked toward the songs. The more I listened, the more I could tell that one of them was just ahead of me and right up the road. During the next minute, it seemed like the bird got closer and closer. I stopped right by the spot where it was singing from, and almost right away, I had looks of a male Kirtland's Warbler. The long trek was already guaranteed a success!
The Kirtland's Warbler moved rather slowly and didn't appear to be in a rush. It started to give me some really good looks while it sang away. As I looked at it through my binoculars, it also pumped it's tail pretty rapidly. More like nonstop. The tail pumping behavior is a trait that is also shared by Prairie and Palm Warblers, and with these birds, it's key and regular part of their behavior.
At first I couldn't believe I had a Kirtland's Warbler in front of me, but after the long drive, it was great to be rewarded so quickly. This particular Kirtland's Warbler was very cooperative along the road. His song resembled a positive, explosive, and cheerful phrase, almost as if he was giving the young jack pine stand it's own set of forest life as compared to what a mature pine stand would have.
Looking around at the young stand of pines that was in front of me and realizing how far I came on this trek to see a Kirtland's Warbler and how far Kirtland's Warblers have come on their trek for recovery was worth a mental celebration for a few minutes. The "island" of small trees in front of me that I had to myself for the time being were replicated by many more elsewhere.
Here are a few videos that I took of the bird singing. On one of the videos, the bird popped up to an awesome perch, and I couldn't resist taking more pictures. You can hear the camera going off.
Staley Lake Road had a few vehicles come by here and there. No one stopped to ask me what I was doing. One guy drove slower when he saw me, and then he kept going. It seemed like he could've been a birder and I got the vibe he was about to talk to me but didn't. Freedom was a great part of birding for Kirtland's Warblers in Michigan. The male continued to forage close by to me and give me the looks I had been wanting. Heck yes.
In 1851, this warbler got it's name from a respected naturalist named Dr. J.P. Kirtland, because it was collected for what appeared to be for the first time on his land. It wasn't till later that it came to the light that the first specimen was actually collected near the Bahamas by Dr. Samuel Cabot in 1841. Want another quick fact about the bird? Kirtland's Warblers arrive on their Michigan breeding territories in early to mid-May and most depart south for fall migration before mid-September. They are thought to migrate quickly to their wintering grounds, most of which are in the Bahamas. I'm reading and learning further about this bird by reading more of their chapter in the book, America's 100 Most Wanted Birds. The authors also suggest that maybe the bird should be named Cabot's Warbler, or maybe after a feature that really suits the bird for what it depends on for it's nature, such as Jack Pine Warbler. I bet Cabot wanted to beat the crap out of Kirtland.
The male that was in front of me continued to give me killer views. I took turns with taking pictures and getting binocular views. Further in the stand of young pines behind him, I could hear several of his neighbors continuing to sing his same song. I didn't have a chance at seeing any of them.
After the bird went down and out of sight, I decided to listen to the other Kirtland's sing, and continue south along the road to hear a few more of them singing. I also decided to leave Staley Lake Road for a little while to see some of the surrounding area. A freaky thing happened when I accidentally backed the truck into a patch of thick sand. I got stuck on the initial back up. After having to reverse the truck and having to go over the sand again, I backed up beyond the sand, and slammed my foot on the pedal. The going was slow, but luckily, the wheels inched out of the sand. I about had a heart attack, and I didn't want to deal with a stuck vehicle. With the amount of people I did see driving down Staley Lake Road here and there, I have no doubt I'd have a kind person come along to give me a nudge. I left the road briefly to check out some ponds in Grayling, and then I came right back and would spend the last two hours of daylight enjoying the area of Staley Lake Road. On an eBird report that I read for the area, a guy claimed that dusk was good for seeing Eastern Whip-poor-will and American Woodcock, and I also saw that the area was productive for Upland Sandpiper. When I came back, I took a one mile hike to explore Staley Lake itself. The road was rough and too sandy for most vehicles to drive on, but Staley Lake was a peaceful lake that was tucked into it's own valley-like scenario. It couldn't be seen unless one hiked directly down into it.
I waited until dusk and as it got dark out I got my first, but certainly not great, visuals of Eastern Whip-poor-will. This picture sucks, but I did get to watch it for a minute while it vocalized.
I also stumbled across this young porcupine, a neat sighting to have.
Things got fun when I heard my lifer American Woodcock not far overhead, exclaiming an attention-grabbing, but nasal, "peeiinttt! peiiinttt!". The calls didn't seem far above me, and when I looked up, I caught sight of the woodcock flying around. It held it's body in an odd way while it fluttered in the air with quick wingbeats. The American Woodcock is an odd and long-billed "shorebird" that is very hard to find visually during daylight. It is most likely to be found among dead leaves on forest floor and along field edges. The best chance to see one by day is found by pure luck or by flushing a bird. The call of the Woodcock that I was hearing sounded a little similar to that of a Common Nighthawk, but by listening to the two, they also sound pretty different. I managed to get a recording of the Woodcock giving it's calls, listen carefully to hear it. Hopefully someday I will find one of these odd, but neat, birds in the daylight.
Once it got dark, I was tired and went back to the hotel with my mind going off. I had what I thought would be a difficult decision to make. After getting Kirtland's Warbler as quick as I did and as awesome as I did, I was thinking about leaving Grayling at 5 A.M. the next day, June 1st and slowly going back to Spooner. My reason for that was that I did have a camping trip in mind for multiple days across northern Minnesota. Leaving Grayling June 1st would give me a suppose-able head start. On the other hand, I questioned if leaving Grayling that soon would be absolutely necessary. I was gonna be tired after the day I was already having, and another day of at least nine driving hours would leave me to start off that Minnesota camping trip as being exhausted too. The hotel was awesome to be at when I got back, and after a good night's sleep, I woke up on June 1st and decided that I was going to spend another day in Grayling. When I got up, I was not up to preparing to get on the road for hours, again. I ordered some breakfast from the service at the hotel, and ate it in my room. It was awesome! And after that, I got ready and decided to go right back to Staley Lake Road. What I was up for was to study and learn about Kirtland's Warblers more. I wanted to spend a few hours of the morning with them before exploring more of Crawford County. After I made the decision, I knew it would be the right one. If driving 500 miles for one bird, you gotta enjoy it as much as possible. Good morning, Staley Lake Road.
I drove a little further south along Staley Lake than I did on the previous night and parked. There was great, young, jack pine habitat further along this stretch and I wanted to cover it more during the first hours of morning, which is always the best time of day for birds. I would walk north for about a mile, and end up covering the same grounds that I did in the previous night. It felt great to be back at this Kirtland's Warbler spot, I was in a good mood and I was pumped. There were signs up along places of the road, saying not to go into the Kirtland's Warblers' habitat, and if it was done, there would be punishable fines. However, there were several convenient walking paths that went right along younger stands of Jack pines. This feature was awesome. After I was ready to go, I heard my first Kirtland's Warbler of the day sound off near one of these side trails. The bird ended up being a little distant for views, but it was fun to listen to it. And I walked down the trail for a quarter-of-a-mile. Nashville Warblers are also pretty common in this habitat.
I decided to shoot a quick video during this walk along the jack pine stands.
Here is one of the signs talking about the importance of giving the Kirtland's Warbler the space it needs. The warblers need the dense stands of these young pine trees, and looking into them, they certainly are dense. By looking at and evaluating the stands from the outskirts, I came to a conclusion that I wouldn't want to enter the stands if I was allowed to. They are thick, and bushwhacking through them would be uncomfortable. It looks like it would be miserable, and on top of it, there's no doubt that they would be full of ticks. By walking through a stand, it seems like it would be easy to cause damage. It would also make someone look really doofy. Most pine trees are tall, and people should be shorter than most pine trees. It's the way it should be. If I was driving by a young stand of pine trees and saw someone out in the middle of them with their head towering over the trees, I think I'd laugh and say, "look at that dork out there".
After the first Kirtland's Warbler, I walked north up the road to where I would hear more and more of them. A medium-sized bird flew in with quick wingbeats while in flight and it had an odd appearance. Right away I knew it was an Upland Sandpiper, another odd "shorebird" species that is freaking awesome. It landed on a snag near the road, and it was a welcome addition to my young Michigan bird list.
After the Upland Sandpiper, the sea of young jack pines I was walking near came alive with the song of Kirtland's Warblers. I decided to walk north from where I parked for about a mile, and it would take me to where I birded on the previous night of May 31st. In this stretch that wasn't even a mile, I detected at least 13 Kirtland's Warblers. Most of them were singing males, and most of them were on the west side of the road. At one point I stopped and listened to three different males singing at once, and it made me think that these warblers have territories that are fairly small.
Here are some more recordings that I took of the warblers singing.
In the early going, I wasn't having much luck with seeing the warblers visually, despite the fact that their songs were constantly going off. As I kept going, I came to the spot where I had success the previous night. I heard what was probably the same warbler near the road. It didn't take me long to get another awesome visual. Note: I just read that these birds breed in loose "colonies" so it does explain the close proximity of singing males in accordance with one another (A Field Guide to Warblers of North America).
With the exception of singing males, most Kirtland's Warblers forage very low or on the ground. These birds are ground nesters, and they require sandy soil and dense cover for nesting. Most of the jack pine stands that they nest in have small openings in them. These warblers also act very tame, and don't have a lot of fear when they are near people. In my observations, I certainly sensed that from the birds. The male that I had didn't seem alarmed by my presence, but deliberately went where he wanted to go as if I wasn't there.
While the male was foraging in front of me, I heard a call note that I also heard some of the previous night that I knew was a Kirtland's Warbler call note. While I didn't pay as much attention to it the night before, on this day of June 1st I did. The note is pretty deep and rich, and sounds like other warblers who give similar call notes, such as an Ovenbird (a call note I was hearing lots of in Wisconsin). While I had the male in view in front of me while I was standing on the road, I got the vibe that the call note wasn't coming from him. I tuned in on the call note and watched very carefully where it was coming from, and a female Kirtland's Warbler popped out, almost certainly his mate. She lacked any black in her face, and had more scattered streaking across her underparts. I found her to be awesome too, but she was more secretive and stayed very low to the ground. At one point, I almost got off a good photograph of her, but I missed her by a tenth-of-a-second. This blurry shot was all I got.
Looking up and seeing the male still close by was alright too!
Seeing a pair of these birds was awesome, and it gave me a short insight into the life of a pair of this species. In 1974 and 1987, and the stretch of time in between, the Kirtland's Warbler was in serious danger. During surveys of it's population, only 167 singing males were detected throughout their entire range during those two years. The threat of extinction was a reality upon the bird. They faced the constant danger of not only losing habitat, but they were also regular victims of Brown-headed Cowbird parasitism. At times, Brown-headed Cowbirds had invaded close to 70 percent of Kirtland's Warbler nests. Extensive plans were put in place that started in the 1980s to attempt in restoring the populations of Kirtland's Warbler. Brown-headed Cowbirds were removed in numbers annually from the key habitats (hopefully they were shot down), and controlled burns in jack pine forests, as well as new plantations of habitat has helped birds recover. Even though there was a low count of 167 singing males as recently as 1987, that count kept getting better and better and was at roughly 1,300 singing males (approximately 2,600 birds total) in 2003 and 2004. And today, the Kirtland's Warbler is now removed from the endangered species list! The numbers now are estimated to be 2,300 pairs, which remarkably has doubled the recovery numerical goal that was set in place. Here's a few more of my the Kirtland's male who became my buddy.
There were other birds around too. They included Canada Goose, Eastern Kingbird, Red-eyed Vireo, Veery, Field Sparrow, Eastern Towhee, Ovenbird, and Rose-breasted Grosbeak, as well as this Brown Thrasher.
When I got done at Staley Lake Road, I left feeling great about staying in Grayling longer. After two more hours in Kirtland's Warbler city, I would explore Crawford County further. That will be next on Northerly Treks. Throughout the day, I drove through more Kirtland's Warbler habitat areas en route to different birding locations. I really liked the different signs that were in place along the road. At the end of the day, I would hear another Kirtland's Warbler at dusk along an entire different road that also has great habitat.
Alright, just a few more of the buddy.
The Kirtland's Warbler is a bird worth protecting. While my first trip to Wisconsin to try for this bird was a "War to see a WARbler", this trip to Michigan wasn't the case. I'll admit this post is poorly named. The only war was getting to Grayling, Michigan and eventually, driving back for another 9 hours. Call it a fun war. In order to get some things in life, you need to work hard to get to them. This experience was worthy, and one I simply earned by driving for hours and hours. Getting Kirtland's Warbler filled an important hole for my ABA birding. Whether or not I make it back up to Michigan anytime soon, I do know that I spent four to five hours with great observations of this species.
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