Day 5: La Crosse to Madeline Island
Sunday 6 July 2014
82 °F
Today my mom picked me up from my aunt and uncle and we drove up from western Wisconsin to Madeline Island, a beautiful island in the Apostle Islands chain in Lake Superior north of mainland Wisconsin (we took the ferry across from Bayfield). We will remain here a week and I will be birding (while battling the swarms of ferocious mosquitos found here) everyday while my mom teaches with her friends at the Madeline Island Music Camp.
The birding here is like nothing I have ever done before because Madeline Island is in the "boreal" or "north woods" region of North America, and most of the birds found here are radically different from the species found, say, in the "temperate" climate like that of the Chicago area or western Wisconsin.
I saw a few nice birds along the drive, including my first COMMON LOON of the year, a family of SANDHILL CRANES, and a hunting EASTERN BLUEBIRD.
Once we arrived at the island in late afternoon, I went for a short birding bike ride and found some other nice species including the ones pictured below:
CHIPPING SPARROW:
FOY (first-of-the-year) WINTER WREN (fledgling):
The star of the afternoon and the bird-of-the-day, in my opinion, was this beautiful male BLACK-THROATED GREEN WARBLER who posed very nicely (with a grub in his mouth) for this photo:
It was a great day, and I am excited for more of this different type of birding for this coming week!
Good birding,
Henry
World Life List: 674 Species (no life birds today)
50 species:
Canada Goose
Mallard
COMMON LOON (FOY--seen on drive up)
Double-crested Cormorant
Turkey Vulture
Red-tailed Hawk
Sandhill Crane
Ring-billed Gull
Herring Gull
Rock Pigeon
Mourning Dove
Chimney Swift
Ruby-throated Hummingbird
Hairy Woodpecker
Northern Flicker
Eastern Kingbird
Warbling Vireo
Red-eyed Vireo
Blue Jay
American Crow
Common Raven
Tree Swallow
Northern Rough-winged Swallow
Cliff Swallow
Barn Swallow
Black-capped Chickadee
BROWN CREEPER (bird of the day)
House Wren
WINTER WREN
Eastern Bluebird
American Robin
Brown Thrasher
European Starling
Cedar Waxwing
OVENBIRD
Common Yellowthroat
American Redstart
Yellow Warbler
BLACK-THROATED GREEN WARBLER
Chipping Sparrow
Song Sparrow
WHITE-THROATED SPARROW
Northern Cardinal
Indigo Bunting
Red-winged Blackbird
Common Grackle
Brown-headed Cowbird
House Sparrow
American Goldfinch
Blue-gray Gnatcatcher
