Wrapping Up Minnesota

I've gotten behind on here everyone.  There have been some epic stories and birds that have been told and seen as of late.  But first, I need to wrap up my trip to Minnesota that took place this past June.  It was one of the funnest birding trips that I have been on, and the trip still has two more stops that I am going to include on this post.

On my last day in Minnesota on June 14th, Josh and I went to Sibley State Park, which was my second visit to the park on my trip.  Steve Gardner took me to the park on my first full day in Minnesota, and on my last full day in Minnesota, Josh and I decided to explore the park extensively.  This visit provided a great chance to see some of the key birds that entertained us throughout the trip and study them more, as well as find a few key species in the area.  When we got out of the vehicle, this female Yellow-bellied Sapsucker greeted us.

And for only the second time on the trip, we had visuals of a Ruby-throated Hummingbird.  This one was a female.

Least Flycatchers sang and called in a few spots along the Sibley State Park trails.  The song isn't much you know, "Tri-bick".

A cooperative Field Sparrow popped up while we were watching the Least Flycatchers and our attention shifted to the sparrow.  Throughout the trip, the song of this bird was commonly heard in many of the locations that we visited that had open habitats.

When we came along the edge of a pond and were by tall grass and marsh, this Swamp Sparrow provided us with amazing views as it sang away.

Swamp Sparrow habitat usually means that there is a Common Yellowthroat nearby too...

I think Scarlet Tanagers follow Josh around.  Because a pair of them showed up.  Josh and I spent the next twenty minutes enjoying the first big highlight of our trip.  And of course, I'll always remember this phenomenal bird as my 500th life bird!  I'm not gonna say much else about SCTA, because pictures are worth a thousand words..

Josh and I heard a Blue-winged Warbler near the parking area upon starting time at Sibley.  Things got even better when we heard a second Blue-winged Warbler who had a female with him.  Range wise, Josh and I were observing these birds in the western-most limits of their range.

Sibley State Park has a good habitat variety.  Josh and I went through some open woodland, lake, marsh, brushy edges, fields, and then of course, dense woodland.  We heard a bird singing, "Teacher, teacher, teacher", which is the distinctive song of the Ovenbird.  It was close to the road we were on, and we walked a few steps off of the road to find and observe the singing Ovenbird.  This is a bird I love, and it's also very bizarre for a warbler.  It walks along branches as well as the forest floor.  I'll never forget that when I heard this bird and started looking for it, I caught it's movement as it was walking back and fourth along the long branch it was singing on.

We then took some time to watch, observe, and listen to this neat warbler.  The sight of it walking on the branches was my favorite.

Josh then found a vireo nest and a Yellow-throated Vireo to go along with it!

It wasn't much longer after the vireo sighting that a storm had started to move in and would fill up the rest of the day.  Josh and I had to bail, which would complete the birding from the last day.  Back at the Wallestad's house, Melissa made one of the best steak dinners I've ever had in my life.

This now brings us to June 15th, when I would fly out of Minnesota and back into my heat-filled Phoenix.  There was a spot in Minneapolis where Josh and I stopped at to search for a few red-morph Eastern Screech Owls for a few hours.  I've wanted to see a red ESOW for T.O.B.Y. badly, but the two hour search at the park we were at came up empty.  However, there was a fantastic consolation when this Pileated Woodpecker decided to land in front of us.  I'll present a few pictures of the Woodpecker while I wrap up this incredible vacation and birding trip.

The trip was outstanding for birding and my total count for life birds added was 26 species!  When I was asked about how many lifers I would get before the trip took place I predicted 20 at the very most.  It's always good to underestimate and be completely wrong.  The trip saw me not only bird in Minnesota, but in North Dakota and Wisconsin too.  Those life birds were: Yellow-throated Vireo, Scarlet Tanager, Great-crested Flycatcher, Acadian Flycatcher, Least Flycatcher, Veery, Wood Thrush, Blue-winged Warbler, Sedge Wren, Field Sparrow, Chimney Swift, Ring-necked Pheasant, Bobolink, Red-headed Woodpecker, Yellow Rail, Henslow's Sparrow, Le Conte's Sparrow, Upland Sandpiper, Gray Partridge, Cerulean Warbler, Whooping Crane, Ruby-throated Hummingbird, Golden-winged Warbler, Eastern Towhee, Kirtland's Warbler, and Eastern Whip-poor-will.

My top 5 favorite life birds on the trip were:  Scarlet Tanager, Red-headed Woodpecker, Upland Sandpiper, Cerulean Warbler, and Whooping Crane.  Had we had seen a Kirtland's Warbler visually, then that bird would easily be in the top 5 for the trip.  My very favorite bird for the trip however was Short-eared Owl because it was a key addition for T.O.B.Y. as well as my second ever observation of the species.

A huge thanks goes out to Josh, Melissa, Evan, and Marin Wallestad for everything on the trip.  Thank you to Sandy Aubol for the Short-eared Owls and North Dakota experience.  Thank you also to Josh's buddies Steve Gardner, Garret Wee, and Setophaga Kirtlandii for helping us find birds and good birding locations.

This trip to Minnesota has covered many posts here on my Blog, and this post is finally the concluding post.  I hope you all have enjoyed reading about this trip and the wonderful bird life that Minnesota, North Dakota, and Wisconsin have to offer.  This is the 13th post, and for a quick summary, the complete lists for the posts covering this trip have been:

1.  Toby Goes to North Dakota
2.  Surpassing 500 Life Birds
3.  Empids and Thrashers and Warblers, oh my!
4.  Stepping into Kandiyohi County
5.  Lake Elizabeth and a Restored Prairie
6.  Birding Grand Forks and East Grand Forks
7.  You Should Go Up Land to Felton
8.  A Partridge in a City Field
9.  An Eastern Warbler I Had Always Wanted to See
10.  Necedah
11.  The War to See a Warbler
12.  Birding Minnesota by Day and Night
13.  Wrapping Up Minnestoa

As I close, this is hopefully only the beginning of me visiting the East more and birding it more.  It was a blast and writing about it has been a blast too.  Stay tuned for an upcoming post regarding a few adrenaline rushing birds back here in my home county of Maricopa County, Arizona.

An Eastern Warbler I Had Always Wanted to See

The North Dakota trek was a tiring one and a long one, but it was one that was worth it.  Six life birds came out of the trek as well as my main Short-eared Owl target for the entire trip.  Once I made it back to the Wallestad's home on the night of June 11th, we had some preparing to do for our next trip.  The upcoming trip would take us into the heart of central Wisconsin where there are some epic birds to go along with some epic birding locations.  Josh and I were mainly thinking about two endangered birds that we could land on our life lists, the Whooping Crane and Kirtland's Warbler.  As both would seemingly require some luck to see, Josh and I did some studying before we would leave on June 12th for both species.

Once June 12th came, Josh, Evan, and I left early to start our 5.5 hour drive to Wisconsin.  Yes, the trek was long and you rarely see three dudes last for 5.5 hours straight without getting out of the vehicle and doing something cool.  That was solved when we went for a 1.5 hour birding outing at Carver Park Reserve in Carver County, Minnesota.  If you remember back to the first day of the trip, June 9th, we made a stop at Carver for nearly an hour.  That first visit here saw me lifer with Sedge Wren and Field Sparrow.  And now I was hoping to lifer on an extremely cool bird, in fact, this cool bird is an eastern warbler that I had always wanted to see, the Cerulean Warbler.  We were thinking about trying for the Cerulean Warbler on the first day on June 9th, but because Falls Creek State Natural Area was great and took up a lot of time, we didn't have time for the Cerulean search.  As the conclusion to that, Josh came up with the alternative of looking for it on June 12th while en route on our way to Minnesota.  With this alternative, it made more sense.  It was early in the morning, and the bird along with many other birds, were likely to be more vocal.  Josh, Evan, and I arrived at Carver Park Reserve at 7:35 A.M. and started to walk towards where someone had seen and heard a Cerulean Warbler.  The location was along a bike trail through Carver Park Preserve, and it was just southwest of a lake in the area.  We felt like the warbler wouldn't be too hard to locate if we found the right habitat.  Josh was telling me during the morning about the Cerulean Warbler's main habitat preference, which are thick deciduous forests highly made up of oaks that fall on hills and slopes.  As we got to the area of the sighting, Josh looked up the trail and pointed out some habitat ahead of us that looked good for Cerulean Warbler.

I've read that Cerulean Warblers can be very tough to see and that they really cling to the treetops.  One such example that I heard of this was that people would wait for hours to catch a glimpse of this warbler.  They would even take blankets with them to lie and the ground and look up for a good chunk of the day before the warbler would finally come into view.  I was hoping that we wouldn't have to wait too long.  As we approached the habitat where there were many oak trees on a hill along the bike path, I felt good about our chances.  These oak trees weren't tall to the intimidating degree, and a moving warbler wasn't going to be too difficult.  Minutes after getting into this area, the Cerulean Warbler sounding off, giving it's distinctive buzzy song.  Sibley describes it as, "tzeedl tzeedl tzeedl ti ti ti tzeeeee....".  This song is high in pitch and it was awesome to hear the bird!  At first it was well back in the woodlands, and then it moved a lot closer.  And before we knew it, it was then above us!

Cool looking warbler, huh!?!  The Cerulean Warbler is distinctive, and the females are distinctive too.  This male here is easily identified by his solid white underparts, dark blue breastband, white throat, sky blue back and head, and two white wingbars.  Josh, Evan, and I all took every advantage that we could to get good looks and pictures of this epic warbler.  It's a great feeling to look in your field guide with a relaxed mindset and see that awesome bird like the Cerulean Warbler and want to see it for years, and then to enjoy it live on a trip like this and to enjoy it by hearing and seeing it sing in front of you.

Josh and Evan were just as excited about the Cerulean Warbler as I was.  Josh has seen this bird before, but hasn't had the views that this guy was giving us.

At 4.75 inches in length, the Cerulean Warbler is a very small warbler.

For several minutes, the male Cerulean sang above us in a smaller tree just off the trail.

While deciduous woods were on one side of the bike path, an open marshy field was on the other.  To our surprise, the Cerulean decided to majorly switch things up and fly into the marshy area a few times!  His blue back really stood out as he flew around in the open.  At one time, he even perched briefly on top of the grass and right as Josh and I tried to get a picture of his weird flight path, he flew back into the woods and into the oaks where we originally had him.

Trip wise, the Cerulean Warbler also came at a great time.  It was my 20th life bird of the trip.  When I told my friends in Phoenix about my trip, I said I'd be lucky to reach 20 life birds on the trip.  With Cerulean being the 20th and more targets to go, I guess I underestimated how many lifers I would get.  Getting warbler lifers is something that is great, and on this trip, lifer "slots" were filled in many different families.  As my lifer Cerulean flew into the woodland, he continued to be obliging for the three of us.

The Cerulean Warbler is now one of my favorite warblers.  I snapped away.  Heck, here's a few more!

Here's two pictures of Josh and Evan celebrating the warbler: one in front of the marsh the bird flew into and the other in front of it's appropriate woodland habitat.

As we started to work our way back, the Cerulean continued to sing in the woods above us.  What a great bird!

In addition to the Cerulean Warbler score, there were some other birds that were highlights for the Carver Park Reserve expedition also.

A Blue Jay popped into our path.  Although these birds are common, they can be challenging to see sometimes!

We then heard a Blue-winged Warbler singing.  For the second time of this trip, we had some awesome views of this species, which I lifered on during the trip's first day.  This second bird was very obliging, just like the Cerulean Warbler was.  Dang!

This Field Sparrow also popped up into close view.  It seemed to have a nest nearby.

A close up Tree Swallow was also pretty cool.

At Carver, other highlights among 40 species we had included a Common Loon vocalizing on a lake as well as flying over the area, Chimney Swifts, Eastern Wood-Pewee, Great-crested Flycatcher, Yellow-throated, Warbling, and Red-eyed Vireos; Sedge Wren, Eastern Bluebird, Gray Catbird, Brown Thrasher, Bobolink, and Baltimore Oriole.  It was a great 1.5 hours at Carver.  Thanks Josh and Evan!

After Carver, the trek to Wisconsin was officially underway.  Stay tuned...