Birding in East Tennessee

  Kirtland's Warbler


Kirtland's Warbler just outside of Mio, Michigan - May 15, 2008


I'm back!  My blog is back too!  I recently took a round robin birding trip to Ohio, Lower Peninsula MIchigan, Upper Peninsula MIchigan, Winsconsin, Illinois, and Indiana.  The main birding trip was to get the bird shown above - the federally endangered and very habitat specific Kirtland's Warbler!  As you may have guessed, I was successful in the trip goal of seeing this life bird.  Many of you who know me, know that I was pretty nervous about our timing to visit their breeding grounds near Mio, Michigan.  Every book or research site I visited on the Internet told me that a guaranteed sighting of this bird would be after May 20 and before they left in the early fall.  Our day to find this bird was May 15 and May 16.  I was afraid that we would travel all the way from Tennessee to to upper part of the lower peninsula just to find the bird was running late this year.  Glad these birds don't read books! 
We found it on May 15!


Clay-colored Sparrow just outside Mio, MIchigan - May 15, 2008

Not only did we have luck with this bird, we also had great luck just down the road from this bird of another life bird - Clay-colored Sparrow!  On the same day about an hour later.  We actually heard this bird driving behind the Forest Service tour guide and doubled back after the tour was finished to locate it.  I will have more on this trip a bit later.


Clay-colored Sparrow

While I was gone on this trip, the Technobohemia site was hacked by some phishers and everything came to a screeching halt.  I was real surprised to find it down when I returned but our ringmaster has worked hard to get our blogs back up.  Everything in the blog world is back to normal and should stay that way!