Yellow-Crowned Night Heron Mason County 4/18/2022

   

    Yesterday Donna and John Haack found a Yellow-crowned Night Heron in Grant Township.  It is the first record of this southern bird in Mason County. Today with Brian Brosky guiding me by texts I got to the correct location on Nurnberg Rd, where I was fortunate enough to find another birder Joe Lipar, who was able to point me right at the seemingly glowing yellow crown of the wayward heron about 50 yards from the road.

  That's enough road birding.  Here's what has been visiting me at my house lately...

April 11 brought...

Belted Kingfisher

Ruby-crowned Kinglet

Peregrine Falcon

 On April 12 I saw...

Northern Flicker

Purple Finch

Flock of Scoters

Mostly White-winged but not always 
Black Scoter in yellow circle and Surf Scoter in the red.

And on April 13 the south wind brought the first of the year....

Northern Harrier

White-Crowned Sparrow

Brown Thrasher

As well as a Common Loon.

  So far for the year I've seen 95 bird species from the yard which puts me about 2 weeks ahead of last year when I didn't hit that total until May 1.

Surf Scoter at Ludington Harbor

  Only found one duck during my walk on the south breakwater this afternoon.  Turned out to be a female Surf Scoter.

Ludington Harbor Birds 11/16/2015

  Just a few birds at the harbor on a beautiful mid-November day.

White-winged Scoter

Bonaparte's Gull

Common Loon

Ludington Harbor South Breakwater 10/18/15

  Early this afternoon I ventured out to the south breakwater of Ludington Harbor.  On the walk to the end of the pier I only saw 7 birds on the pier itself, all Lapland Longspurs.

Lapland Longspur

First winter Lapland Longspur

  When I got to the end of the pier I scanned Lake Michigan and found a single Long-tailed Duck.

Long-tailed Duck

    A few minutes later I noticed a flock of 11 White-winged Scoters

White-winged Scoters

   Heading back in from the end of the pier I came across a Snow Bunting.

Snow Bunting

   Below is a Great Blue Heron taking on a good sized meal.

Catch of the day

Taking it to a more suitable location

Does this Carp make my neck look fat?

An ISO 2000 Weekend

   The Sun made a brief appearance on Friday but the ever present winds kept Lake Michigan in an angry mood.  Walking the south pier at Ludington Harbor was out of the question with waves washing over it all weekend.

 Sitting on a bench was not an option either.

Saturday saw the start of a warm spell at Ludington Harbor

    The north pier was navigable on Saturday that is if you didn't mind the sheet of ice covering the first 50 feet of it.  From the pier I was able to get a good view of some Horned Grebes.

Horned Grebe

  Out near the Lighthouse I saw a dark duck riding the waves.  Turned out to be a female Black Scoter.

Female Black Scoter

Lingering Cormorants

   Pine Siskins have taken over the yard of the house I'm renting, with a flock of 40 monopolizing the feeders,

It's not your turn.

Detroit River Red-necked Grebes and White-winged Scoters

       This afternoon at Dingell Park in Ecorse there were 15 Bald Eagles on the north side of Mud Island.  There were another seven on an ice flow south of the island.

 Although what I was really after was a Red-necked Grebe that Jerry Jourdan and Andy Dettling reported on Tuesday. I parked on West Jefferson and scaled the snowbank and walked to an area where I could scan the river south of Mud Island.   I initially spotted a Horned Grebe that caught a small Perch. I watched it dive and resurface as it rode the current down the river.

   Suddenly out of nowhere the coveted Red-necked Grebe popped up right in front of me.  It must have been right against the breakwall and out of my field of view as I stood just three feet from the rail.

Riding a wave with propellers almost out of the water 

     I later headed to Bishop Park in Wyandotte and relocated the flock of White-winged Scoters that Andy found at Dingell and Jerry observed from the Wyandotte Municipal Boat Launch yesterday afternoon.

Red-necked Grebe among Scoter raft

 In single digit temperatures this morning I searched for Red-necked Grebes at the powerplant in Erie, but all I found was a Horned Grebe.

  This Song Sparrow was feeding along the shoreline waiting for spring to arrive.

Belanger Park, River Rouge

Walked the Lake Erie shore for an hour and a half in single digit temperatures after work this morning.  Didn't see anyhing too spectacular but I did get a nice shot of an adult Bald Eagle.

  Went home and slept for a couple of hours.  Ran some errands and headed to Belanger Park in River Rouge.  Ended up taking over 900 photos of eagles, waterfowl and gulls.

Immature Bald Eagle

Screaming  Eagles

Female Common Goldeneye

Canvasback

Red-Breasted Merganser

Greater Scaup

Note female Goldeneye under water

Serrated bill

Splashdown

White-winged Scoters

A pair of Scoters

Glaucous Gull

Glaucous Gull

Herring Gull

  Despite the afternoon sun the temperature only rose to the mid-teens, the ice stuck to the feathers of the gull below.

Great Black-backed Gull

    Belanger Park is a couple of miles up river from Dingell Park.  There weren't as many eagles as there are at Dingell but they were much more active.