Minnesota Valley NWR Visitors Center

Even though the weather was pretty bad last Friday I decided to do a bit of birding after work anyway. It had been raining or snowing all week and besides for a quick trip Wednesday after my shift at The Raptor Center I had been cooped up all week. Since it was still raining or sleeting or raining some more, I decided to go over to the Minnesota Valley NWR visitors center wher I could shoot pictures of birds at the feeders from inside instead of running around and getting my camera all wet.
It was pretty busy at the feeders but the low light made taking pictures difficult. Instead of taking pictures of many of the same types of birds that I have been photographing all winter long only in ugly gray light I decided to mostly just watch the action.
There where a couple of types of birds that I have not had the opportunity to shoot to much so far this year that I did take a couple of shots of like the male and female house finchs above.
There are also quite a few fox sparrows around right now. It is fun to watch them dig up old leaves and ground looking for burried treasure. Hmmmm I wonder if Jack Sparrow was a fox sparrow.

MN Valley headquarters 2-21

Winters in Minnesota tend to last a long time and can get some what depressing. Sure we have some cool winter birds but most of them are only in the northern part of the state. Down here, in the southeastern part of the state we mostly see the same birds through out the winter such as dark-eyed juncos, tree sparrows, crows, goldfinch, white breasted nut hatch,

downy and hairy woodpeckers
and northern cardinals.
But in the last couple of weeks of February I started to notice some differences on my frequent trips to the Minnesota Valley NWR visitors center. There have been some changes and some new visitors to the feeding stations that they maintain there. One noticeable change is that the goldfinches are beginning to get there color back. Goldfinches molt twice a year, once in the winter, into the drab olive color and once in the spring into the brilliant lemon color that most people identify with goldfinch.

A new visitor to the feeders have been house finches. Originally house finches were a resident of the southwestern US and Mexico but in the 1940s they were introduced to the eastern US. Since then they have spread and are now year round residents for most of the US, including most of Minnesota. I have not seen many around this winter and I have not seen any at the MN Valley NWR this winter, until now. Anther year round resident that has been noticeably absent until recently have been house sparrows. House sparrows were introduced to North America from Europe in the 1800s.
The most exciting new visitor has been a fox sparrow.
While I remember some reports on the list servers back in December about a fox sparrow at the MN Valley NWR I have not seen any in my many trips here. Fox sparrows are birds that we usually only see during migration. There wintering grounds are in the southeastern US where there is less snow making ground foraging easier. Their summer breeding territory is in the western US, northern Canada and Alaska. Spotting a migrating fox sparrow is usually a good sign that the spring migration has begun. Let's hope so, we can certainly use a bit of spring up here in the frozen north.

Carpenter Nature Center

On Tuesday January 15th I made a quick stop at Carpenter Nature Center between jobs to check out the feeders. I didn't have a lot of time, since I still had to get ready for my entertainment gig. There was a nice assortment of winter passerines visiting the feeders. The most exciting bird of the afternoon was the red-breasted nuthatch.
We seem to have more red-breasted nuthatches around this year then normal. There have been lots of people who have seen them at their feeders this winter but I have not been able to get many good shots of them so getting these pics made it worth skipping my nap, its a long day working 8 1/2 hours and then going out and working another 3 hours so usually I rest in between. Usually when I am out all that I find to take pictures of are the white-breasted nuthatch. There were plenty of those around too.

There were also the typical chickadees, juncos, tree sparrows, and northern cardinals.I also found a pair of house finches hanging out.Unfortunately I did not have enough time to check out the river for the harlequin duck or Barrow's goldeneye that have been hanging around. Guess that will have to wait for a future trip.

Christmas Eve at Carpenter Nature Center

Since I was in the neighborhood I decided to stop in at Carpenter Nature Center after I left Douglas Point on Monday. Even though they were in the process of snow blowing all of the side walks up by the buildings there was still a lot of activity. I saw most of the typical Minnesota winter birds like:

black-capped chickadee

dark-eyed junco

blue jay

and red-bellied woodpecker

There were quite a few finches around. I was hoping that one of them might be a purple finch but I had no such luck. The house finchs did look nice though with all the snow and red branches.

Bird Banding at Carpenter Nature Center

With the the holiday weekend coming I worked a couple extra hours on Thursday and came in early on Friday so that I could get an early start on my 3 day weekend. Since I was off early enough I decided to go to the Carpenter Nature Center to watch the bird banding that they do every Friday morning. The last time that I had the chance to be at Carpenter while they where banding I went inside and watched the banding and recording process. This time the weather was so nice that I decided to stay out and walk the trails. While I walked I spotted a few ruby-throated hummers near in the flower garden in the front of the nature center.

The hummers where very territorial with a lot of chasing each other over possession of the hummingbird feeder in the middle of the garden.

The new pool and landscaping is already home to a few frogs who were taking advantage of the sunny day.

Out in the fields the sparrows were sharing space with monarchs and dragonflies.

Over by the orchard I found this house finch dining.

While I walked the trails I took the opportunity to scout the banding nets. I found a few birds waiting impatiently to get out of the nets, and usually getting themselves more tangled, so I took their pictures and let the banders know.

They caught an american goldfinch.A nashville warblerAnd a black-capped chickadee.

While I was wondering I inadvertently ended up in a video that Sharon Stiteler, aka birdchick, was shooting. It was kind of funny to get home later that day and see myself on her blog. Here is the post with the video. I am the moron with the big camera.

With summer over I am not sure that I will get another chance to visit Carpenter while they band but I would certainly recommend it to anyone interested in birding. It is fun, interesting and the people at Carpenter are very friendly. For more information about carpenter check out their website http://www.carpenternaturecenter.org/