Birdfreak’s New Employee
March 24, 2007
Article in: Birding
He doesn’t get paid (except in dog food) but we’d like you all to meet our new Doberman, Arizona! (pictured with our dad)
He was dumped at a nearby airport and is about 1 year old. Today he went on his first birding trip and was infactuated by a low flying Canada Goose. We discovered a small but growing Great Blue Heron rookery but the distance was too far for a good photo. I am looking to take up digiscoping soon!
Illinois Birders Exchanging Thoughts (IBET)
March 23, 2007
Article in: Birding
Many states have an ongoing forum that birders report and read about birds in their state. IBET is a free group that anyone can join and add to, with just a few reasonable rules.
IBET has over 1200 members, making it the most widely used bird communication site in Illinois.
Positives of IBET
- Learn about new birding locations
- Up-to-date area sightings
- Rare bird alerts
- Archived reports
- Learn from other birders
Negatives of IBET
- Broadcasted sightings of nesting and rare birds, causing potential stress
- Lack of state-wide users; most are from the Chicago area
- Newer birders possibly not feeling post-worthy
IBET is a valuable source for birders, but could use improvement. IBET could benefit from a better format, such as a blog, or if it was integrated with eBird.
Severson Dells – Birding and Blog
March 22, 2007
Article in: Birding
Severson Dells Environmental Education Center is part of the Winnebago County Forest Preserve District and provides a lot of education opportunities as well as good birding. Nearly every month there are guided bird walks led by naturalist Phil Schwab. These are excellent for beginning birders and enjoyable for experts.
The education center is a converted deer lodge that has a small museum, library, and bookstore/giftshop that is open 8:00 AM to 4:30 PM, Monday-Saturday and 1:00-5:00 PM on Sundays. There are various areas to watch feeder birds from inside which is a great place in the winter – Common Redpolls, Purple Finches, Tufted Titmice, and Pine Siskins are some of the possibilities.
There is a self-guided, paved nature trail that takes you through woods, prairie, creek, and a pond. Spring migration and winter are excellent times to bird here. For up-to-date info, visit the Severson Dells Blog or the Winnebago Birding Guide
Boone County Conservation District
March 21, 2007
Article in: Birding
Boone County is one of the smaller counties of Illinois, bordering Winnebago, McHenry, and DeKalb Counties and the state of Wisconsin. Where it is lacking in size (only 281 square miles, about 1/2 that of Winnebago) it makes up for in good birding habitat and conservation efforts.
The Boone County Conservation District has created and maintained several excellent preserves, most notable the Kishwaukee Bottoms area and Spencer Park Conservation Area. Unfortunately, like too many counties, their website is not very informative.
Boone County has some excellent birding opportunites, including the virtually unknown Flora Prairie Nature Preserve and nearly anywhere along the Kishwaukee River. In fact, the Kishwaukee River corridor is a project we’ve been trying to get going. This river is one of the few “good” rivers left in northern Illinois.
Full list of Boone County Conservation Areas including map.
Winnebago Birding Guide
March 20, 2007
Article in: Birding
The Winnebago Birding Guide is an online bird-finding site that highlights the wonderful birding locations in Winnebago County. This county has done a wonderful job in preserving land but even so, some birds are no longer found here – most notably the Greater Prairie Chicken.
Currently there are 36 forest preserves, 1 state park, and several other notable protected sites. The Guide is a work in progress, but we are planning on doing quite a bit of work on it throughout 2007 and beyond.
Top 5 Birding Sites in Winnebago (unofficial)
- Rock Cut State Park
- Sugar River Forest Preserve
- Pecatonica Wetlands Forest Preserve
- Deer Run Forest Preserve
- Severson Dells
Flora Prairie Nature Preserve
March 20, 2007
Article in: Birding
I just discovered a small (as in only 9.67 acres) preserve in Boone County called Flora Prairie Nature Preserve. This preserve is one of the very few parcels of native prairie in Boone County and is most known for a native plant known as the wooly milkweed. This plant is state endangered but was last collected in 1946 by E. W. Fell, a well known naturalist who helped create a book about the plants of Winnebago County.
I have not visited Flora Prairie yet and am unsure if this is the location that the Illinois Ornithological Society was going to visit when they had their annual meeting in Rockford. There is another preserved area in Boone called Garden Prairie (not sure if that is the official name). I will be visiting both sites soon for photos and will try and get more info from NCIOS members.
The location of Flora Prairie is: southwest of Belvidere: 3 miles south of I-90 on Stone Quarry Rd., then 3.5 miles west on Poole Rd. A small parking area is provided just off Poole Rd. on the south side of the nature preserve. Topo Map
Bird Migration – Eastern Phoebe
March 19, 2007
Article in: Birding
Three days ago the first Eastern Phoebe of the year was sighted in Winnebago County at Blackhawk Springs Forest Preserve, a wonderful yet often busy birdspot. With Red-winged Blackbirds calling on nearly every country road fence post, Eastern Meadowlarks singing at Rock Cut State Park, it feels like Spring is finally here.
A cool fact about Eastern Phoebes:
In 1804, the Eastern Phoebe became the first banded bird in North America. John James Audubon attached silvered thread to an Eastern Phoebe’s leg to track its return in successive years. - Cornell Lab of Ornithology
Of course, in a few months Eastern Phoebes will be abundant but the first one of the year is always a pleasant treat. They winter in the southern U.S. and summer in all of Illinois.
eBird – Illinois Bird Sighting Checklists
March 19, 2007
Article in: Bird Conservation
eBird is the online birding checklist submission headquarters. Birders from all over the U.S. (Canada and elsewhere too) can submit their bird sightings through an easy to use form. This data can be used to develop trends in bird populations as well as to determine abundancy and dates when birds are at a particular location. The beauty of eBird doesn’t stop there.
Members (free membership is required) can use their collected checklists to create all sorts of meaningful histograms: location, time, particular species, etc. They can also use eBird if they are into listing: life, year, month, county, and location are all tracked and can be called up and downloaded.
But where eBird really pays off is when lots of birders use it. When many checklists are submitted from many different locations over a long period of time, real data can be gleaned. Here lies the problem. The number of checklists submitted is low compared to how many birders could be using the service. For example, from the first of the year to February 26, there have only been 492 checklists submitted for Illinois. This makes Illinois below the top 20 despite it being the 5th most populated state (and one with quite a bit of birders).
To help increase the data collected, we’ve vowed to promote this wonderful service to anyone we bird with locally. Our local bird club, NCIOS, of which we created the website for, now has its own eBird account. It is our hopes that we can convince our local birders to submit loads of checklists. We started this about a week ago and so far we’ve added 11 checklists.
We encourage all birders to try eBird out. It is pretty easy to use but might take a little while to get used to setting up locations. Once you have that ready, get those checklists going!
