Review of Birding the Great Lakes Seaway Trail
September 30, 2009
Article in: Book Reviews
Birding the Great Lakes Seaway Trail: A Traveler’s Guide to the 518-mile Freshwater Birder’s Paradise Along America’s Byways in New York and Pennsylvania. Published by: Seaway Trail Foundation. Written by: Gerald A. Smith with chapters by Willie D’Anna, Jerry McWilliams, and David Semple; illustrated by Robert McNamara; Edited by Julie Covey.
1996 marked a special year for the lengthy stretch of Great Lakes shoreline that is the Great Lakes Seaway Trail:
- of the first 127 Important Bird Areas named by the National Audubon Society, 20% were along the Seaway Trail
- the Federal Highway Administration designated the Seaway Trail as an America’s Byway
Birding the Great Lakes Seaway Trail is the perfect guide for birding this scenic stretch. With 18 chapters segmenting the various birding portions of the trail, you can easily locate a specific location to bird or you can follow longer parts (or all of) the trail, birding along the way. The guide is color-coded to make it even easier to find each segment.
Among the segments are specific birding hotspots: state parks, hawk watches, banding stations, wildlife management areas, and more. An enormous amount of work went into producing this guide and the unique details could easily be a template for other bird-finding guides.
- Each chapter has monthly overall ratings indicated by a graphical display of raptor silhouettes
- Chapters are color-coded for what season produces best birding
- Detailed, colorful maps are included to pinpoint where each hotspot is located
- Important Bird Areas are indicated with an IBA icon
- GPS coordinates are included for each location
- Each chapter has a “calendar page” which highlights typical species to encounter by month; rarer or more significant species are highlighted
The individual hotspots are given excellent textual coverage typical of other bird-finding guides. We love how the beautiful illustrations are mixed in, providing additional visual appeal.
Overall, this is not only an efficient guide but raises the bar on bird-finding guides in general. The layout, design, and use of full color make it stand out and could garner appeal from more casual birders or budding naturalists as well as advanced birders.
Purchase Birding the Great Lakes Seaway Trail
Missouri Ruffed Grouse Conservation
September 29, 2009
Article in: Birding
The Ruffed Grouse (Bonasa umbellus) is a cool northwoods find for us in the Birdfreak world. Visits to our relatives in Park Falls, Wisconsin – the “Ruffed Grouse Capital of the World” – give us the opportunity to see not only the Ruffed Grouse, but other northern species such as the Gray Jay (a species that is becoming a “Veery nemesis”).
We look forward to “shooting” this game bird with our camera when we travel north. Since we cannot find this species in Winnebago County, Illinois I was surprised to find that they do have a more southern range…never really thought about it before other than “north of Rockford”. Ruffed Grouse are native in Missouri but had all but disappeared due to deforestation. Their current distribution is the result of reintroduction efforts by the Missouri Department of Conservation.
Ruffed grouse prefer young forests with many small trees or brush. Before settlement by Europeans, ruffed grouse probably inhabited forest edges and young forests created by natural disturbances such as lightning fires and tornadoes. Following settlement, grouse became more abundant as forests were cleared for homesteads and then later abandoned to regrow into young forests. – Missouri Department of Conservation
The Ruffed Grouse found in Missouri are red phase while in the north they are mainly gray phase. We look forward to adding this to the Missouri List.
Bird Photography Weekly #57
September 27, 2009
Article in: Bird Photography Weekly
Join in now on the 57th edition of Bird Photography Weekly!!
Help spread the word with these badges:
Copy this code to place this badge:
<a href="http://birdfreak.com/category/bird-photography-weekly/"><img src="http://birdfreak.com/images/bpw-sharing-logo-wide.jpg" width="225"/></a>
Copy this code to place this badge:
<a href="http://birdfreak.com/category/bird-photography-weekly/"><img src="http://birdfreak.com/images/bpw-sharing-logo-smaller.jpg" width="125"/></a>
Digiscoped American Golden Plovers
September 26, 2009
Article in: Photography
The following photos are digiscoped with our Swarovski Digiscoping Rig and are of one of the year’s few LIFE BIRDS. These American Golden Plovers were hanging out at a sod farm along a hidden gravel road.
Please note that the distance was far and the lighting poor but using high powered optics helps to manage workable photos when normally I’d get nothing.
Phriday Photo – Shooting at 400mm
September 25, 2009
Article in: Photography
Bird photography isn’t easy. It requires a steady hand and a lot of patience. And a big lens helps a lot!! Here Birdfreak is shooting with the Canon 100-400mm image stabilized lens.
New Birder Experience – Bird Club Field Trip
September 23, 2009
Article in: The New Birder Experience
There’s nothing quite like a local bird club field trip. It is a great way to talk birds with fellow birders and help find birds as a group. This past Saturday we participated in the first of the season’s NCIOS bird club field trip. Oh, and I happened to be the leader.
We headed out to the Jane Addams Trail located near Freeport, Illinois. This nearly 13 mile trail runs north/south from the middle of nowhere to the Wisconsin border. It is an old railroad right-of-way turned into a multi-use trail that connects with at least three other major trail systems (some of which are still being developed).
The walking is easy and the path is accommodating for a group of birders but the vegetation including large trees is close to the trail edges and gives a bit of a claustrophobic form of birding for a non-narrow trail. Thus, getting everyone on a bird was difficult and many of the sightings were fleeting as the birds crossed back and forth and disappeared.
Birdfreak {left} and Adam talking cameras
We did manage several wonderful sightings: Sandhill Cranes flying closely over, two Philadelphia Vireos, a Yellow-bellied Sapsucker, a Cooper’s Hawk chasing Cedar Waxwings, and two soaring Bald Eagles. We only managed one warbler, a female American Redstart.
Cedar Waxwing
Stacia had a wonderful time despite the flurry of mosquitoes and the under-performing birds. The Bald Eagle sighting was especially cool since I’ve been promising we’d find one in the area. These types of hikes (with or without me as the leader) are perfect for newer birders. Birders in our area (and most everywhere) love to share knowledge and help others learn. I’m still surprised when people look to me to know bird sounds or identify a bird by a photo but I always love to share what I know. The quickest way to help a new birder is just to pour your brain out and together enjoy all natural observations.
Trail Map
