I brake for Sandhill Cranes
Month: September 2007
Can Birding Ever Become “Mainstream”?
There are some activities that nearly everyone takes part in: backyard grilling, New Year’s Eve parties, politics, photography, music, sports, etc. Some might call these mainstream – activities that the majority of people partake in year after year no matter what their demographical makeup is. Arguably, birding is popular – there are several bird-only focused
Feral Cats
We just found a recent article about the famed incident between Texan Jim Stevenson and a feral cat. The Wall Street Journal retells the happenings of when Mr. Stevenson shot and killed a feral cat, a cat stalking endangered Piping Plovers. Now, if you are a birder, you know how bad feral cats are for
Mexico’s Collection of Thrushes
The Birdfreak Team has a fascination with thrushes, evident in the use of Veery as Jennie’s online name and the posts we’ve done previously on the blog. Illinois Migratory Thrushes Eastern Wire-Thrush Mexico has a fine selection of thrushes, birds that fall into the family Turdidae. Some of these are well-known here in the U.S.,
Look Into My White Eye
To round out the 3-day weekend, we spent a bit of time at a favorite local birdspot, Rock Cut State Park. Birds were EVERYWHERE, but picking them out of the dense leaves proved tricky, especially with thousands of mosquitoes biting away. Photography was also difficult, considering every time the camera went up, a new welt
Who was William Vincent Legge?
Born September 2nd, 1841, in Cullenswood, Tasmania, William Vincent Legge was an Australian ornithologist who founded the Australasian Ornithologists Union. He wrote History of the Birds of Ceylon in 1880, which is considered a valuable source of reference on Sri Lankan ornithology. The Legge’s Flowerpecker (Dicaeum vincens) was described by one of William Vincent Legge’s
Eastern Wire-Thrush
Pete Dunne’s Essential Field Guide Companion lists whimsical names for North American birds. The Eastern Bluebird he calls the Eastern Wire-Thrush. Today we headed out to a wonderful place we bird often, Oak Ridge Forest Preserve. We were hoping to catch numerous birds in their journey of migration. While we came up short on the