September 8,
2012
Hi All,
Here is my second banding
report of the season for the
weekend of September 8, 2012.
On Friday,
September 7th, I got a call from Gail Buhl, who is the Curator of
Education Birds (my old job) down at The Raptor Center, wondering if I might be
able to transport a Barred owl up north for a release. She would have Erin Manning, who is the Curator of
Education Birds (Gail’s old job) at Wolf Ridge Environmental Learning Center,
meet me at my land near Knife River, MN on Saturday morning and take the owl
the rest of the way up to Grand Marais, MN for release. After we got all those
connections made, I got a call that night, from my cousin Mary Schuster, saying
that she had found an injured Sharp-shinned hawk and needed to get it to The
Raptor Center. I told her she could bring it over to my house and I would give
it to Gail the next morning when I picked up the Barred owl. I met Gail at 5:00
am at the McDonalds near my place and picked up the owl. Then I surprised her
with a box containing the shin that Mary had brought over. In turn, Gail
surprised me with a little gift for my effort. The two most favorite flavors in
my life are Chocolate and Cherry. I always joke about how that is the way I get
my most important vitamin, “CH”. She had made some cherry preserves and some
tart cherry sauce from cherries picked from a tree in her own yard and gave me
a jar of each! Yippee Skippy!!! How nice was that?!!!!!
I met Rick and
Chuck at 7:15 am at the Burger King in Duluth for a quick bite and then got to
the land at 8:00 am to meet Erin from Wolf Ridge and transfer the owl. Todd had
come up the night before with Nick Vasko and they were already set up when we
got to the land. The owl left with Erin while Rick and Chuck loaded their stuff
into my mini-van and we went up to the main blind to get our rig set up. Nancy
and Trudi stayed home again this weekend due to other commitments. We put up
the nets and were ready to go at 8:45 am. Winds were blowing light out of the
southwest and the sky was partly cloudy. While we were setting up, Todd caught
a young male Sharp-shinned hawk and sent it up with Nick to have us band it. We
had our first bird of the day even BEFORE we were set up!
At 9:04 am a
young female Merlin came in fast and took a shot at “Lovey Dovey”, our mechanical
dove. Rick pulled the lure and we had our second bird of the day. Lots of
Broad-winged hawks started getting up all around us as the wind shifted to the
northwest and got stronger. We started catching more shins and around 10:00 am
my friend Marc Rude stopped up to see us. Marc was once the secretary of the
Minnesota Falconers Association, but had moved to Florida seventeen years ago
to start a bed and breakfast in St. Augustine, FL with his wife Jackie and his
brother Matt. They sold the B&B last winter and moved back to Minnesota
this past spring. It’s great to have my old friend back! We caught nine more
shins with only one bounce out and at 3:50 a young Red-tailed hawk came diving
in from out over the farm. Chuck had worked with Avinet over the winter to
craft a new Dho-Ghaza net made to our specifications. This was our first season
using it, and this new net is proving to be very effective. We caught three
more shins before closing down at 6:00.
We got a total of 15 birds and 2 bounce outs on
Saturday.
13 Sharp-shinned hawks, 1 Red-tailed hawk and 1
Merlin.
At 6:30, Marc, Rick, Chuck and I headed over to the
Lighthouse Restaurant for supper where I had my 46th (for those of you who are
counting) life-time hot meatloaf sandwich with fried onions, mushrooms and an
extra bowl of gravy. Marc tried one as well and then headed for home. Nick had
gone home earlier and Todd stayed back at the campsite to fix his supper on the
grill. When we got back to camp, Don, our neighbor from over on Homestead Road,
had stopped in to say hi. Todd kept the campfire small that night as the winds
were still blowing pretty hard out of the northwest.
On Sunday morning Rick, Chuck and I loaded into the mini-van
and headed to the entrance of the field where the main blind is located. When
we turned into the field we saw a skunk ambling down our path, coming straight
for us, with his tail up! I backed up fast and off to the side as he ran right
by us headed for the brush along the main road. Whew, that was a close one! We
drove up to the blind and got our rig set up and ready to go at 7:00 am. Todd
decided he needed to revamp his set up down on our land with a bit more mowing
and a better angle to his net set. So it took a little longer for him to get
his rig ready.
It was another beautiful day with clear skies and very strong
northwest winds. At 7:55 am, a shin that was out hunting the draw in front of
us saw the lure and came right in. Our first bird of the day was a young male
Sharp-shinned hawk. Two more shins came in within fifteen minutes, another
young male and a young female. The wind was blowing hard and we got two bounce
outs before another shin came in and took a shot at “Lovey Dovey”, pulled right
off and came into our net.
Around 8:30 am hundreds of Broad-winged hawks started
getting up all around us. For the last couple of years, the bulk of the
Broad-wing migration had occurred during mid-week while we were all back at our
“day jobs”. What a magnificent sight it is to see thousands of Broad-winged hawks
(with some other raptors mixed in) going up around us, forming huge kettles all
over the sky. Then as we watched, they broke out of the tops of each kettle and
streamed by overhead in incredible numbers. WOW!!!
We got three more shins and four more bounce outs as the
morning progressed.
At 10:30 am, Stan Tekiela pulled up in his nature center van
with eight birders on board. Most of them had been up to our blind many times
before. Stan is a world famous wildlife photographer and is the author of
several nature guides and wildlife books. We had four birds in hand for them to
release when they arrived. Two new birders came up with the group this year,
Gail and her husband, so they were given the honor of releasing two of the
shins, one each. We took loads of photos and I did my little raptor talk for
the group before we played the “guess the number” game to see who would get to
release the other two shins. The lucky winners got to toss the other two shins
to the wind before they had to go. They needed to leave our place around 12:30
so they could go up to Hawk Ridge before driving back to the Twin Cities that
evening. I walked down to the van with the group when they left and handed out
my usual packet to each member. I give them each a “Raptors of the Midwest”
identification sheet, a bookmark with one of my drawings over a list of the
thirty-one species of raptors in this area and a signed print of some of my
artwork. Then Stan surprised me by giving me a signed copy of his latest book
“The Lives of Wolves” and a deck of playing cards showing the trees of the
southwest. Thank You, Stan! He is such a knowledgeable naturalist; I always
learn a ton of nature facts while sitting with him and the overflow gang behind
the blind.
The migration had pretty much closed down by that time and
Chuck had to leave early, so we ended the day at 12:30 and went back down to
the campsite. When I got there, my good friend Jen Harner from Duluth and her
friend Walter stopped in for a visit. It is always great to see good friends.
We had a nice visit before I had to leave for home.
We got a total of 7 birds and 6 bounce outs on
Sunday.
7 Sharp-shinned hawks.
Total for the weekend was 22 birds.
1 Red-tailed hawk, 1 Merlin and 20 Sharp-shined hawks.
Grand Total for the year is 27.
Please
help hawks by supporting these organizations.
Keep
your eyes on the skies.
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01. Handing off the Barred owl from The Raptor Center to
Erin from the Wolf Ridge Environmental Learning Center at our campsite. She
took it the rest of the way up to Grand Marais, MN for release.
Second Weekend 2012.
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02. My favorite form of vitamin "CH". A gift
of Cherry Jam and Tart Cherry Sauce from Gail Buhl for transporting the Barred
owl up north for release. These were made from a cherry tree in Gail's own
yard.
Second Weekend 2012.
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03. First bird of the second weekend caught by Todd
before we were set up, a young Sharp-shinned hawk.
Second Weekend 2012.
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04. Rick and I checking out the shin from Todd.
Second Weekend 2012.
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05. Chuck banding the shin.
Second Weekend 2012.
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06. Chuck releasing the shin.
Second Weekend 2012.
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07. Young female Merlin.
Second Weekend 2012.
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08. This Merlin came in and took a shot at our
mechanical dove that Chuck named "Lovey Dovey".
Second Weekend 2012.
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09. Nice looking Merlin.
Second Weekend 2012.
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10. Chuck releasing the Merlin.
Second Weekend 2012.
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11. Chuck taking another shin out of the net.
Second Weekend 2012.
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12. Rick and Chuck holding a shin.
Second Weekend 2012.
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13. My good friend Marc Rude holding a shin. Marc came
up to spend the day with us.
Second Weekend 2012.
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14. Adult Sharp-shinned hawk.
Second Weekend 2012.
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15. Marc watching Chuck band the shin.
Second Weekend 2012.
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16. Adult female Sharp-shinned hawk.
Second Weekend 2012.
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17. Sharp-shinned hawk.
Second Weekend 2012.
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18. Sharp-shinned hawk.
Second Weekend 2012.
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19. Marc releasing one of the shins.
Second Weekend 2012.
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20. Young Red-tailed hawk, "Coming In" pose.
Second Weekend 2012.
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21. Rick and Chuck getting the Red-tailed hawk out of
the net.
Second Weekend 2012.
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22. Chuck banding the Red-tail.
Second Weekend 2012.
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23. Young Red-tailed hawk.
Second Weekend 2012.
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24. Rick, Chuck and Marc holding a young Red-tailed hawk.
Second Weekend 2012.
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25. Marc releasing the Red-tailed hawk.
Second Weekend 2012.
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26. Chuck and Rick holding three Sunday morning shins.
Second Weekend 2012.
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27. Two immature Sharp-shinned hawks showing size
difference between female on left and male on right.
Second Weekend 2012.
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28. Young Sharp-shinned hawk.
Second Weekend 2012.
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29. Young Sharp-shinned hawk with full crop. Many of the
shins we get still have food in their crop.
Second Weekend 2012.
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30. Young Sharp-shinned hawk with odd coloration of its
iris.
Second Weekend 2012.
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31. Stan Tekiela's group stopped by Sunday morning on
their way to Hawk Ridge.
Second Weekend 2012.
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32. Me doing a little hawk talk.
Second Weekend 2012.
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33. Two new birders in the group. Most of the others
have been up to our place many times.
Second Weekend 2012.
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34. Gail, one of the new birders, holding a shin.
Second Weekend 2012.
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35. Gail releasing the first shin.
Second Weekend 2012.
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36. Steve Slocum, a regular at our place, holding a shin.
Second Weekend 2012.
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37. A lucky winner of the "Number Game"
holding a shin.
Second Weekend 2012.
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38. The group releasing another shin.
Second Weekend 2012.
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39. A lovely birding couple posing with a shin.
Second Weekend 2012.
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40. The second lucky "Number Game " winner
posing with her shin.
Second Weekend 2012.
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41. The group "helping" her release the shin.
Second Weekend 2012.
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42. The blind "over flow gang" hearing about
Stan's nature adventures.
Second Weekend 2012.
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43. Stan giving me his latest book "The Lives of
Wolves". Great book, loads of info on Canids and lots of SUPER photos. Thanks,
Stan!
Second Weekend 2012.
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