A business trip this week actually netted me 3 lifers! I had to plug a hole on my team and visit 4 hospitals strewn across Illinois corn country. One was on the West side of Illinois and then I followed the string of hospitals clear across to the East side. Since there are no big airports I started in St. Louis, MO and ended in Indianapolis, IN.
My flight on Wednesday got me into St. Louis early enough that I was able to head to the Riverlands Migratory Bird Area which is just Northeast of St. Louis where the Missouri and Mississippi rivers meet. A quick look at eBird before my trip and I saw that Trumpeter Swans were plentiful here. I also saw reports of Lapland Longspurs so those were my two target birds.
When I got to the area, I decided to start out on the West side of the peninsula and loop my way around. There was miles of stubbly corn fields and everything was muddy and wet. Unfortunately the bird activity was almost nil. That is until I got to the entrance of the Big Muddy NWR. My first encounter was a nice flock of Horned Lark. I knew to find Lapland Longspurs a good indicator is nearby lark. So I combed through them but couldn't find any longspurs or even bunting.
Horned Lark.
Then I heard a noisy swan up above and tallied my first Trumpeter Swan of the day.
Trumpeter Swan - first of many.
Trumpeter Swan - no yellow on bills which is in contrast to the Tundra Swans back home which have yellow lores.
I was not sure what to expect, there were lots of reports on eBird, but I did not know how many people had gone to see them and dipped. So I was thinking I was lucky when I found a flock in a small flooded field. I soon found out that I would see hundreds.
The necks of the juveniles were much darker than the juvenile Tundras back home.
Big Muddy NWR - on the sign you can see Confluence Point - the area where the mighty Mississippi and muddy Missouri meet. The Missouri starts at a small lake in the Western side of Montana and the Mississippi ends of course down in New Orleans. So you basically have this huge river system crossing the entire USA. Its pretty impressive and there is an enormous amount of history coursing down these rivers.
I finally looped over to the East side of the park system and found a nice little lake with lots of activity.
Common Merganser.
Common Goldeneye.
After sifting through hundreds of gulls, I headed over the Audubon Visitor's Center to charge my iPhone and I was happy I did. There were hundreds of sparrows and finches flying around in the field overlooking the Mississippi right in front of the building. So while my phone charged I went for a nice walk through the fields. Much of the expected species: House Finch, Song Sparrow, White-crowned Sparrow.... Then I saw one sparrow that had me totally confused. Of course!!!! How could I have forgotten, St. Louis is home of an established group of Eurasian Tree Sparrows. What an idiot, I almost forgot to look for this specialty lifer.
Eurasian Tree Sparrow - this is the German version of the more common English House Sparrow. Whereas the House Sparrow took over North America and beyond very quickly, the German Tree Sparrow has not really spread beyond the St. Louis area. However there were tons of them here. I guess being surrounded by corn fields in seemingly all directions makes them want to stay put.
Speaking of which, I need to stop eating so much red meat. All these corn ag fields really got me depressed. Of course most of this corn is not even destined for our dinner tables, they are used for feeding cattle. So we are basically dumping tons of fertilizer on the depleted soils to feed our fixation on red meat. The fertilizer is leaching into the Great Lakes and other bodies of water and killing natural fish populations not to mention birds. The corn is used to feed cattle that are no longer free range. And the worst part is this part of the country was probably once beautiful. That being said it was a gray winter day so I was not seeing it at it's best. I guess some people like seeing corn fields but they just depress me. I have nothing against the farmers, I just wish that the average human demanded more variety in their diets and didn't just want to eat burgers and fried chicken. If we ate more diverse food, farmers would change their growing habits to include more natural produce and would be able to cycle their fields so they were not depleting the soils to the point where they need tons of fertilizers.
The river in front had Common Loons, Horned Grebe and some Bald Eagles.
Then I finally got a decent picture of an American Tree Sparrow. The lighting was horrible all day but I was not going to be picky.
I headed down to the end of the peninsula and hiked a short trail to the actual "Confluence Point". It was cold and hardly any birds so I did not linger too long, but it was nice to read the plaques and imagine Lewis and Clark paddling by in canoes or whatever.
An almost adult male Harrier.
Rough-legged Hawk - I got great looks with my binos but this species has been giving me a really hard time with photos. As soon as I got out of my car he took off. I think this was an immature light phase bird. Probably female. White speckling on back and shoulders, white windows in wing tips, light patch on rump and a light colored head.
Heavily cropped photo showing what is more of a belly band than the Red-tailed Hawk's breast band. Meaning the RL Hawk has a band that is generally lower down.
The bird finally perched but did not let me get very close.
Its a big hawk, quite a bit larger than a RT Hawk.
Finally the light was really starting to fade, as early as 3pm so I started heading out. As I passed the lake that I birded at earlier I noticed some very light colored gulls flying by so naturally I stopped.
Glaucous Gull!!!! This was a lifer for me. The bill was sturdier than Iceland and the bird was too light to be a Thayer's. Looks like a first or second winter bird.
Wait a minute, two of them??? The one on the left had a dark looking face, not sure if maybe he was a Glaucous and Herring hybrid?
Ok this is getting ridiculous, three of them!!! Bird on the left is probably a Herring. The three on right side of frame all presumed Glaucous.
Pure as the driven snow. Well almost. Thayer's can be seen here and maybe are more regularly but I could not make one into a Thayer's for all I tried.
If you would have told me I would be seeing Glaucous gulls floating next to Common Goldeneyes on my business trip I would not have believed you.
4 Common Goldeneyes.
This shows nicely the size and color contrast of the Glaucous and a Herring. The Glaucous is noticeably larger.
The three Glaucous sandwiched by presumed Herring Gulls. I need to get better at gulls but I am fairly certain.
eBird flagged my report since seeing three here is pretty rare.
Great times! I finally made it home last night. Good to be back in NC.
Now there is reports of Cackling Geese and Greater White-Fronted Geese in NC but I just don't have the screaming desire to drive 3 hours one way to see them. So Sunday I am going to take part in the CBC and have a nice walk on Lea Huttaf Island with my buddy Shun and I think Addison from Audubon.
Should be fun!
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