Birding Adventures at Minnesota Valley NWR

The final weekend in June I spent a lot of time in the Minnesota Valley NWR. I started out up by the visitors center. I spent a lot of time at the visitors center last winter. They have a large feeding station that attracts a lot of birds during the winter time. I prefer to photograph birds in their natural habitat over photographing them at feeders, however it is pretty difficult to find birds at frozen lakes and snow covered forests. The visitors center also has large windows in front of all of its feeder stations so that you can stay warm while getting close looks at a variety of birds during the winter.
During the summer I do not pay much attention to the feeders. Instead I am usually in the small field on the east side of the visitors center looking for butterflies and dragons. Each fall or spring they burn these fields down to promote new growth but this year things did not come back very quickly due to our late winter. So I did not find very many insects to photograph. I did find a couple of eastern bluebirds, that appeared to be nesting in one of the nesting boxes that are in the field, which posed for a few shots.

After checking out around the visitors center I decided against venturing down to the river, the trip back up the hill can be a bit strenuous when you are carrying a couple of cameras with large lenses, and decided to head down to the Old Cedar Avenue Bridge portion of the refuge. While I was preparing to go out on the trail, bathing in bug repellent, a bird flew low across the pond adjacent to the parking lot and perched on a low lying branch. I grabbed my camera and got off a shot before he flew off across the pond again in search of more insects. Even though I never got a good look at its breast, which is where many of the flycatchers have their field markings, I believe that it was an eastern phoebe, because of the dark head, white chin and black beak.

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.

First Redwinged Blackbird of 2008

Another common bird that I have begun to see for the first time this year are redwinged blackbirds. The first one that I got a pic of this year was at the visitors center of the Minnesota Valley NWR on March 24th.
This was one of a small flock that was hanging around the feeding station.
Later in the week, March 27th, I visited Wood Lake Nature Center and there were quite a few staking out their territories.
Most of the water at Wood Lake is still frozen, even so it looks like the spring migration has begun there also.

The Beginning of February at the Minnesota Valley NWR

February began with a nice sunny day. I stopped off at the Minnesota Valley NWR Visitors Center after work I was hoping to spot the sharp-shinned hawk that has been hanging around but he did not show up while I was there. I did take the opportunity to photograph some of the feeder birds though. The peanuts in this hanging feeder where very popular.
First the white-breasted nuthatch were fighting over them.
Then a downy woodpecker came in for his share.
The European starlings alternated between the peanuts and the suet feeders. Birds seem to naturally know when bad weather is coming. Right before hand you can usually find them gorging on protein and fat.
The birds were not the only ones out grabbing a meal while the sun was still shining. This little red squirrel was pigging out on seeds that had fallen to the ground.
It was a good thing for the squirrel that he was on the back side of the visitors center because when I left I found a red-tailed hawk perched out front. That red squirrel would not be very much of a meal for a hungry red tail but during the winter you have to take what you can get if you want to survive.

New Visitors to the Minnesota Valley NWR

After work on January 10th I stopped in at the Minnesota Valley NWR visitors center to check out their feeder stations. I do not usually like to photograph birds at feeders, I prefer to shoot them in their natural habitat, but in Minnesota in the middle of January it is really hard to find birds any where else. Besides there is a sharp-shinned hawk that has been frequently hunting at the feeder station through out the winter. While the feeders may not be the sharpies natural woodland habitat there is certainly no one at the refuge that is filling a feeder with juncos and downies to try and attract sharpies.

On this trip the sharpie was not around while I was there. Most of the usual southern Minnesota winter birds were around. I saw juncos, cardinals, tree sparrows, white-breasted nuthatch, plus downy, hairy and red-bellied woodpeckers.
There were also a couple of new arrivals that I have not seen in my visits over the past month or so. There was a large flock of European starlings. Starlings were fairly common in the fall but have been somewhat scarce lately. On most of the CBCs that I participated in this year there were always quite a few less starlings then I expected.Starlings are an introduced species in North America and are very competitive with native cavity nesting birds for nest sites. Because of this fierce competition many birders believe that starlings have contributed to the decline of these native species. This has caused many birders to feel some animosity towards starlings. However the other new arrival to the refuge feeder usually inspires even more animosity then the starlings.

The brown-headed cowbird is the only nest parasite that is common across North America. Cowbirds do not make any nest of their own. Instead the female lays her eggs in the nests of other birds who often end up raising the young cowbird. The female cowbird will often remove an egg from the nest before laying her own which reduces the number of offspring that the host bird will produce. The cowbird eggs typically incubate more quickly, 11 to 12 days compared to 12 to 17 days for the host bird, so the cowbird eggs hatch earlier giving the fledgling cowbird an advantage over the other birds in the nest. The cowbirds are usually larger then the host bird which also gives the cowbird fledgling an advantage. If the host bird discovers the cowbirds deception and removes the cowbird egg the cowbird will some times return and destroy the nest as well as any of the host birds eggs or chicks.

Many people consider both starlings and cowbirds pests however I do not agree. I do not consider these birds pest I consider them sharpie food. Hopefully I will get a chance to see the local sharpie do his part to control the population of both of these species.

Another sharp-shinned at MN Valley NWR

After work on Thursday I wanted to go out and do some birding but the skies were overcast and it was lightly snowing. Since I really wanted to keep my camera dry I decided to head over to the headquarters of the Minnesota Valley National Wildlife Refuge where I could watch the birds at the feeders through the windows. When I arrived around 3pm there was a small group of people there from the US Fish and Wildlife Service shooting some kind of video. They were setting up to do a shot, using the feeders outside the window as a backdrop, when the camera man pointed out that all of the birds that had been around the feeders earlier had left. I went over to take a look and he was right, the feeders were pretty much empty of birds. I began to scan the neighboring tree tops and it did not take long to find the reason for the empty feeders.
A sharp-shinned hawk was perched in one of the trees behind the feeders. I pointed the hawk out to the people who were filming who were very excited. The woman who was in charge, Valerie, was surprised that all the birds had left the feeder when the hawk arrived. She had heard that the small birds will freeze when a hawk is in the area. I explained that most of the birds probably headed for the brush when the hawk arrived and were now keeping low and still in the cover. Then I pointed out one downy woodpecker that had not gotten away quick enough and had been standing frozen for several minutes on the side of one of the feeder poles.
A few minutes later the sharpie took off and flew up over the building. I expected that all of the passerines would return fairly quickly but the feeders continued to stay empty. I looked at the downy, who had moved to the back side of the pole where it had again stopped moving, and determined that the sharpie was still in the area, possibly on the roof. Another minute or two went by and still no passerines came to the feeder. The downy decided to make a quick break into the woods and about 30 seconds later the sharpie flew back down from the roof to land on a branch right in front of the window.We were all pretty excited since this time the bird was up close and pretty much in the open. It was a good thing too, because with the cloud cover and shooting through the windows, to avoid flushing the bird, I had to open up my aperture to be able to get any descent shots. If the bird had been further away it would have meant even less light.

The sharpy stayed for around 5 to 10 minutes doing some preening and watching for a good meal. Since none of the passerines were around any more he finally took of over the building. I am guessing that this might be the same sharpy that I saw around Thanksgiving in the same area. Maybe I will stop by on New Years Day since this bird seems to likes to visit on holidays. I knew that the sharpy had really left this time because with in a minute or two the area around the feeders was bustling with bird life. There where a couple white breasted nuthatch.There were also quite a few northern cardinals.Both male and female.I spotted red-bellied, hairy and downy woodpeckers, like the one above. There were also black-capped chickadee, dark-eyed junco, American tree sparrow, and starlings.

Bass Ponds

I returned to the bass ponds in the Long Meadow Lake Unit of the Minnesota Valley National Wildlife Refuge. I have made several trips to this location over the past couple weeks in search of a descent picture of a belted kingfisher which I spotted there. This kingfisher is very wary and seems to move every time I am just about set up. This time however he flew to the top of a midsized tree and I was able to get some OK shots.

While I was there I got some shots of a great blue heron in flight,

A common sulfur butterfly,

and a group of turtles catching a tan on a log.

12 point skimmer

I returned to the Bass Ponds of the Long Meadow Lake unit of the Minnesota Valley NWR again yesterday after work. On my past visits I have spotted a belted king fisher hanging around the ponds that I have been try to get some descent shots of. So far I have only got some shots from pretty far away as he has been pretty ware and not allowed me to get close. This is typical for most of the kingfisher that I have experienced. I was not able to spot the kingfisher at all yesterday but I did manage to get some better shots of a 12 point skimmer then I did on my past trips.
I also got some more really good shots of goldfinch in the thistle bushes but since I have posted a lot of goldfinch pics lately I have decided that I will hold those and post them some time in the winter when some nice pictures of beautiful yellow birds will be a nice pick me up.

Green Darner

On Sunday July 29th I shot this picture of a female green darner dragonfly at the Blackdog unit of the Minnesota Valley NWR. Green darner are pretty easy to identify by the target like mark on the top of the head. You can see a little bit of the blue on the top parts of the target.
This green darner is a female. You can tell by the color of the tail. Male usually have blue tails where the female's tail is usually green or reddish-brown. She stayed in one spot and let me take quite a few photographs. I even took the time to switch between my 100-400 telephoto to my 100 2.8 macro lens. Maybe she stayed so long because her color blended so well into the bush which she was resting on. For more information on green darners and other dragonfly check out this site http://www.cirrusimage.com/dragonflies.htm

Balding Cardinal

Last weekend I visited the Louisville Swamp unit of the Minnesota Valley National Wildlife refuge. While I was walking down the Mazomani Trail I spotted something red fluttering around in the brush. I got a little closer, to get a better view, but I was confused by what I saw. It looked kind of like a northern cardinal, but it did not look quite right.

The face was missing quite a few feathers. I looked into this and found that this is not uncommon for northern cardinals. However there appears to be a debate as to why this happens. The common theories are that it is a normal molting cycle for some particular birds, mites or other parasites, or other external influences such as diet or disease. Here is a close up of the face area.

No one really knows the cause because there has not been much research done on the subject but here are some links to more information.

http://web.syr.edu/~bpburtt/Birds/Feb22-04.htm

http://www.hiltonpond.org/ThisWeek030701.html

http://www.birds.cornell.edu/pfw/AboutBirdsandFeeding/BaldBirds.htm

http://www.birdchick.com/2007/08/bald-cardinals-and-other-bald-birds.html

http://weekendshoot.blogspot.com/2007/08/scruffy-is-queens-crown.html

A golden Saturday afternoon

On Saturday I went out to check out the Long Meadow Lake unit of the Minnesota Valley NWR. I decided to go check out the bass pond area where I there was a lot of activity on my past visit. It was a gorgeous day with plenty of sunshine and temps in the mid 80s. There were a lot of wildflowers in bloom in the fields around the ponds.

Near the boardwalk that goes out over the southern bass pond I spotted an american goldfinch.

I sat and watch for about 15 minutes as the finch pulled seeds out of a pod.
He would strip the silky parachute threads from the actual seed
Then he would discard the threads and eat the seeds
Sometimes it is more fun to watch them eat the natural way then to eat at bird feeders.
In the same area there were several eastern tiger swallowtail sipping nectar from the blooming flowers.


Some of the swallowtail had some damaged wings.

I took some pictures of other birds and butterflies that afternoon but I will post them later so that I can keep with my gold theme for this post.

Birding and politics on a Saturday afternoon.

On July 11th I received an e-mail from the Minnesota Ornithologists Union about an upcoming rally at the Old Cedar Avenue Bridge on July 14th. The purpose of the rally was to show the state politicians, who were visiting the site, that they should help to fund a plan to replace the bridge. The bridge, which stretches across the Minnesota River, was replaced with a new bridge in 1979. It was closed to vehicular traffic in 1993 and to pedestrians and bicycles in 2002. As you can see by the picture below the bridge is in extremely poor shape.

So you may be wondering what an old bridge has to do with birding and the Minnesota Ornithologists Union, well this bridge extends through the Minnesota Valley National Wildlife Refuge. This bridge was used by many birders to get a great view of the Minnesota river flood plains and mud flats before it became unsafe to use.
Now politicians in the cities of Bloomington, who currently owns the bridge, and Eagan, which is on the opposite side of the river, as well as several state politicians have put forth a plan to tare down the existing bridge and build a boardwalk platform on the existing cement supports. The problem is that the estimated cost is $4.5 million. A large part of that cost is for the removal of the existing bridge which contains lead so that it can not be knocked down conventionally. So far the supporters of the plan have secured $1.3 million in funding but still have a long way to go. That is why 200 or more people of all types (birders, bicyclists, hikers, and families) showed up on the 14th to show our support for this great cause. At the program, which began at noon, they had speakers ranging from local and state politicians, leaders of bicycle groups, neighbors, and leaders from MOU, Minnesota River Valley Audubon, and Minnesota Audubon.

I arrived at the park at 8:30am and spent my time waiting for the speakers program on the trails birding. The Old Cedar Avenue Bridge is a part of the Long Meadow unit of the Minnesota Valley NWR. There are a total of 8 units in MV NWR which follow the Minnesota River and stretch from Bloomington in the north to Jordan in the south. I walked all the trails north of the bridge. As I started from the bridge parking lot I saw an american redstart who had just caught itself some breakfast.

As I continued on I spotted several goldfinch near the bass ponds, which was once used to raise fish for stocking Minnesota lakes. This one was pulling the seeds out of the pods of the wildflowers when a bee ran smack into his head. Boy did he give that bee a dirty look.

Near the same pond I also saw this ruby-throated hummingbird.

I also saw several sparrow, some green heron, and some great blue heron. Then I went to the south of the bridge to check out the small boardwalk which goes out to the lake. There I saw a couple of great egret as well as tree and barn swallows.

I also took a couple of butterfly pics like this one of a common sulfur
and this eastern comma which looks like it had seen better days.
When I was walking back off the boardwalk I was startled by a white tail doe. She just sat and watched me as I walked past about 4 feet away.
This was the only deer that I saw which surprised me because on my trips to Fort Snelling State Park, which borders the park in the north, I have seen plenty of deer. It turned out to be a great morning and afternoon. I got out, did some birding and helped lend my support for a good cause.