…but it wasn’t on the mountain.
Yesterday (the 16th) morning Zach Gayk found a LARK SPARROW at Bete Gris and followed that up with the second state record of MCCOWN’S LONGSPUR! The count was quickly abandoned for about two hours as Skye and I went to check out these great finds.
Lark Sparrow
McCown's Longspur
The flight was good yesterday while we were counting though. We ended the day with just over 550 BROAD-WINGED HAWKS, 54 SHARP-SHINNED HAWKS, 19 BALD EAGLES, 18 RED-TAILED HAWKS, 6 PEREGRINE FALCONS, 3 COOPER’S HAWKS, 1 dark-morph ROUGH-LEGGED HAWK, 1 OSPREY and one ugly NORTHERN GOSHAWK, below.
Tail-less Northern Goshawk
Broad-winged Hawk by Skye Haas
More AMERICAN WHIT PELICANS flew through yesterday as well. Warbler and sparrow activity are also picking up on the mountain as well as in the town of Copper Harbor.
American White Pelicans over Brockway
Today started out fairly quickly with SW winds, but as the winds switched to the north, the flight really shut down. The day ended with 137 BROAD-WINGED HAWKS, 16 SHARP-SHINNED HAWKS and a smattering of RED-TAILS, BALD EAGLES, KESTRELS and MERLIN.
And finally, KRS was in the news again. You can read the article here:
Bird tallier gives talk
`Til next time-Max
Wow. Wow. Wow. Wow. Wow.
Hey Max – Nice article about you and the KRS on the front page of the Daily Mining Gazette. Keep up the good work! See you on Sunday if not sooner.
Very cool guys. Nice finds and, as usual, great photos!
The mystery bird sure looks like a gos to me– with that wide body, wide wings, stocky head, and that “come hither…. hey wait, where’s your neck?” look that excites the opposite sex so much. Yep, I’d go with gos.
Southern Wisconsin is sending you more birds and favorable winds. (Jon promises you a MK… I THINK he promised, anyway)
Best,
Mike
I saw that post in WI about the MIKI. Very exciting. Now it just needs to head a few hundred miles north…
It looks like an adult goshawk to me?
Jonah