Dune adventure

Sonja, Celeste and I walked around Montrose Point today to investigate the aftermath of the Halloween 2014 storm. The shoreline has been altered by the storm, which included 20-foot waves on Lake Michigan and water washing over Lake Shore Drive in places. We spent some time in the dune area and discovered that some of the beach is gone. There's now a little arm of water extending into the dunes (above). Much of the area seen in the picture was a sandy beach previously.

During the storm, water washed over the pier and into this area. The arm of water extends all the way here right now. There were a lot of stones and debris left from the storm.

This photo shows the high water line and was taken very close to the previous photo. The water rolled the marram grass and its rhizomes into the clumps you see at right.

Water would have been washing right into this section of the dunes on Halloween, likely at a height above little Celeste. You can get a good look at the marram clumps here.

This area is part of the foredune and is typically very dry. You could see that water had washed away much of the sand and vegetation in this area.

This is one of my favorite views in the city, looking north to the high-rises of Edgewater. The cottonwoods are at the top of the highest point in the dunes. Water didn't quite make it to the trees, but it came pretty close.

Camping - Day 3 notes

*Swimming -- Despite a Great Lake at our doorstep, we never made it into the water at Wells. There is a swimming beach in the park, but it was small and rather uninviting. The best bet would have been the shoreline near our campsite, or even a plunge in Bagley Rapids, but it just didn't happen.

*Beer -- We arrived with a Chicago IPA--Revolution Brewing's Anti-Hero--as well as Bell's Oberon. Along the way, we purchased a six-pack of Blackrocks Brewery's 51K IPA, from Marquette, Mich., and Bell's Two-Hearted Ale. As the Two-Hearted label states, ideal for "Hemingway-esque" trips to the Upper Peninsula. We stuck with Whole Foods' 365 brand organic whole milk for the girls.

*Wildlife -- It was a thrill to hear and see two loons in Lake Michigan, right off our campsite. Also, we saw a bald eagle soaring above Route 41, near Peshtigo, Wis. Perhaps the most stunning sight of all was at least two dozen American white pelicans soaring over the city of Green Bay, which has a thriving breeding population. Fun.

Camping - Day 3

It rained overnight, and storms were in the forecast for Sunday. Would it be possible to take the tykes on a day hike featured in Falcon Guides' "Hiking the Upper Peninsula?" Actually, the prospect of getting away from camp chores, and getting in two Celeste naps in the car, was very enticing. It started raining just as we pulled away from camp for the hour-long drive to the trailhead. Celeste slept most of the way, and Sonja was eager to be in our backpack carrier on a hike. It stopped raining as we pulled up to the parking lot for Piers Gorge, where the Menominee River narrows to a couple hundred feet across, hemmed in by rock walls. The gorge harbors some of the best whitewater in the Midwest. The geography nerd in me loved that the river, and gorge, served as the border between Michigan and Wisconsin.

The out-and-back hike traverses rolling terrain for about 2.5 miles. Along the way there are four "piers," rock outcrops that lead to nice overlooks of the river. We also crossed two "troll" bridges, little wooden bridges over a pair of small creeks. White pines towered along the trail, some of the trees at least 2 feet across. The dense forest and damp conditions gave the gorge a Pacific Northwest feel.

After the hike, we drove to the mining town of Iron Mountain in search of lunch. We opted to go to a well-known pizza chain, one that encloses each of its locations with the same geometric red roofs. I honestly haven't been to one of the red-roofed locations in decades, but it proved a solid choice for the children and a nice respite after the hike.

All trip long we had discussed what we'd do if Sonja needed to use the potty in certain scenarios. We were stopped at a grocery store when Sonja volunteered that she needed to go potty. With Celeste in her car seat it seemed reasonable to stay near the car so I made the dubious decision to put the potty on the passenger seat. I then deposited Sonja onto the potty. She peed, yes, but getting down from the perch proved a challenge and some of the urine sloshed over the lip of the plastic commode and onto the passenger seat. I mopped up what I could but ended up sitting on a changing mat all the way back to the campground. Lesson learned.

It started to rain again as we approached camp, but we managed to stay dry. It eventually stopped raining long enough to make a nice fire, and we had hot dogs and mac and cheese again for dinner. Sonja and I went to a swing set in the evening and had ice cream at a nearby gas station -- Sonja opting for a sundae cone and a strawberry shortcake crunch for me.

Camping - Day 2

The next morning was chilly as Celeste and I had breakfast and made coffee. The mosquitoes were persistent so we re-lit the fire, which seemed to subdue the bugs a bit. We had soft-boiled eggs for breakfast, with French bread and butter. We set about dismantling camp before Celeste's first nap. By 10 or so, we were on the road--headed the 60 miles or so to Wells State Park.

We stopped for lunch across the border in Menominee, Mich. It was a lot windier there, right along Lake Michigan, but the temperatures were pleasant. There was a playground, and we spent a lot of time at the swings. We got lunch to-go from a little cafe-type place and ate on a blanket in a park along the waterfront.

Wells State Park was only about 20 minutes north of Menominee. Why Wells? I had a faint memory of passing by the park a few years ago and thinking that the section of Lake Michigan coast seemed very pleasant. While only 4.5 hours north of Chicago, it feels like the true north--conifers, birches, wetlands and rocky Great Lakes beaches. The whole setting resembles muskeg.

We lucked into one of the three best sites at Wells. The majority of sites at the park are in a crowded loop filled with RVs. We had reserved a rustic site perhaps a mile from the RV area. We pulled up to our site and encountered a group of friendly people playing bocce in the grass. The site was broad and grassy, with a nice view of Lake Michigan, about 50 yards away. There was a birdhouse in the woods, occupied by house wrens. We set up our things and took a walk down to the lake.

We were determined to have a better bedtime experience, so Kristin took Sonja to get ice cream back at the camp office around sunset. I rocked and rocked Celeste in the tent until she went to sleep. The strategy worked, though Celeste briefly stirred when we all went to bed.    

Camping - Day 1 notes

*Fourth of July -- You would think a public campground would be overrun with fireworks-crazy revelers on 7/4. One of the first things we saw at Bagley Rapids was a sign stating "Fireworks Prohibited in Campground." We did hear a fireworks display after sundown, perhaps from a nearby town. There were still a few fireworks late at night in the distance, but nothing that interrupted sleep (thankfully).

The working burner, on the left.

*A new stove -- We finally took the plunge and bought a two-burner propane camping stove. We were excited to use it on the trip. Some people may know that I've struggled with stoves in the past (see: MSR Whisperlite). So it wasn't a surprise when one of the two burners did not work on the new stove. To top things off, in perhaps a related issue, the fuel canister gushed propane upon removal from the stove.

*Wildlife -- The bird highlight of the day was an osprey over Highway 141 in Wisconsin. Ovenbirds were plentiful in the campground. There also were red squirrels and chipmunks. And it was fun to be far enough north to see ravens.

Camping - Day 1

Forgive this bit of navel gazing, but I haven't blogged for a while and wanted to capture a memorable trip with the kids.

Friday, July 4, dawned clear and cool in Chicago. The forecast was for mild temperatures and sun across the Great Lakes. We were preparing for a drive to northern Wisconsin, exact destination unknown. Still, the car was laden with camping equipment and other provisions for a family of four, including children ages 4 and 15 months. We had no room to spare in the car--a day pack rode at my feet in the passenger side.

The CRV, packed to the gills.

The ride out of Chicago was uneventful, without a stop until Manitowoc, well north of Milwaukee. Sonja's first comment of "I want to go home" came somewhere around Skokie on I-94--not a good sign--but Celeste slept well (it was her usual nap time). By 1 we were approaching our target destination: Bagley Rapids Campground, Nicolet National Forest, near Mountain, Wis. This is about an hour northwest of Green Bay. We were nearly there when we encountered a tangly detour and highway closure near Pound, Wis. We drove east to go west at one point, but soon were approaching Bagley Rapids. The terrain transitioned from farmland to forest along the way.

I had made reservations for two July nights at Wells State Park, in Michigan, sometime in May. The original plan was for a simple Lake Michigan circle tour. But plans changed and we ended up needing to leave July 4, one day before our Wells reservation, if we were to get a three-night trip in. We scanned for online reservations of campsites in northern Wisconsin and none were available. It didn't bode well for a small family looking for the ease of a reserved campsite and minimal driving. We didn't want to be driving vast distances in hopes of finding a site.

As we approached Mountain, we saw a small sign pointing to the south of the highway "National Forest Campground," three of the best words in the English language. ATVs, piloted by overly young children, whirred on snowmobile paths as we made our way toward the campground. We were relieved when we saw that a few sites would be available. In fact, we got a pretty site not far from the latrine and within earshot of the namesake rapids. We knew insect life would be one of the potential challenges of this trip, and we were indeed greeted by swarms of mosquitoes at our site. We applied bug spray to all of us and put on long sleeves. Soon enough, we had set up our tent and took a short walk to investigate the rapids.

Bagley Rapids, on the Oconto River

The girls adjusted to camping fairly well. We set up Sonja's potty in a clearing adjacent to our site. The mosquitoes were no fun. They massed in the vestibule of our tent, which we nicknamed Mosquito Garage. The girls slipped into and out of the tent quickly so as not to let any skeeters in. Sonja especially liked the tent and even spent some time alone reading a new Frozen book.

Celeste, table climber

Dinner was mac and cheese and hot dogs. Then the challenge of bedtime came. Kristin went in the tent with both girls near dusk. It was after their bedtime, and the long day and the thrill of camping did not encourage sleep. Both girls lolled about the tent--Celeste taking belly flops across piles of pillows and bedding. Sonja emerged from the tent at one point, and we talked about the moon, the fire and the stars. Finally, well after dark, the cries and queries from the tent slowed and eventually ended altogether.

Yard birds

Typical view from our back porch.

A few years ago on a spring evening, I parked my car on our Chicago street and walked toward the front gate of our six-flat building. As I stepped on the sidewalk, I heard a tittering sound that I hadn't heard since standing in a Wisconsin prairie years before. A shadowy form burst from the ground and vaulted over the wrought-iron fence that frames our yard. It was an american woodcock, getting ready to spend the night in the very urban environs of the Uptown neighborhood.

Yard birding in an urban area is a very arbitrary and incredibly rewarding experience. Once, while I was parking on another congested North Side street, a Virginia rail ambled between cars and passersby. It was my lifer Virginia rail, and I was nowhere near a wetland.

I've kept a yard list at my last two Uptown addresses. Our previous home was situated on a North-South street: Kenmore Avenue. Neither home has had a yard any bigger than about 500 square feet. But the Kenmore building seemingly yielded more warbler species in the proper seasons--perhaps they followed the treetops of North-South Chicago streets as part of their migration. We tallied nearly 50 species in our five years at the location. Every year, almost to the day, we could count on a yellow-bellied sapsucker in a poplar that was clearly visible from our front window. It became a gratifying rite of April to see this bird.

For whatever reason, perhaps the East-West orientation, the yard list at our current home has taken longer to build. I decided that any bird seen or heard from the property would be counted as a yard bird. This opened up some great possibilities, including standing on our back porch and seeing birds from quite a long distance. That's resulted in peregrine falcon, black-crowned night-heron, great blue heron and some waterfowl. The total stands at 48, the last species a budgie on a frigid day--the bird likely an escape.

I still have a few target species--blue jay, common grackle, red-winged blackbird, fox sparrow, sandhill crane to name a few--but there's something fun about the low expectations and randomness of Uptown yard birding. Which will be the next new species? Probably not a Virginia rail.

Current list below:

American Woodcock

Canada Goose

House Sparrow

Rock Dove

American Robin

Northern Cardinal

Peregrine Falcon

American Kestrel

Chimney Swift

European Starling

White-throated Sparrow

House Finch

Mourning Dove

Ring-billed Gull

Black-crowned Night Heron

Dark-eyed Junco

Yellow-bellied Sapsucker

Chipping Sparrow

Killdeer

White-crowned Sparrow

Common Yellowthroat

Swainson's Thrush

Great Blue Heron

Brown Creeper

Black-capped Chickadee

Mallard

Gray Catbird

American Goldfinch

Ovenbird

Veery

House Wren

Common Nighthawk

Ruby-crowned Kinglet

Least Flycatcher

Eastern Wood-Pewee

Double-crested Cormorant

Yellow-rumped Warbler

Song Sparrow

Black-and-white Warbler

Golden-crowned Kinglet

Palm Warbler

Yellow Warbler

Eastern Phoebe

Cooper's Hawk Hermit Thrush Downy Woodpecker American Crow Budgerigar (likely escape)

In writing

A few weeks ago, I had a few moments late one night and tried to summarize some recent thoughts on birding. I submitted the story to the Chicago Ornithological Society, which printed it in its July newsletter. Below is the text of the story. The funny thing is I did hardly any birding in the six weeks after the story until today when I was able to get in a pretty good day at Montrose (peregrine falcon, semipalmated sandpiper, semipalmated plover and sanderling the highlights). 

Birding…with children

By Bob Dolgan

Four years ago, before children, I had all the time in the world to go birding. But I didn’t. I played golf. I went backpacking. I biked on the lakefront path. Then I had children, and I actually started birding more.

I’ve birded since I was 8 years old, but it took having children to sharpen my priorities. The limits of nap schedules and early bedtimes ensure that. I’ve come to the conclusion that I don’t believe in traveling vast distances to chase rarities. But I do believe in seeing special birds when I can. I don’t believe in chasing a bird solely for a list. But I do believe in keeping track of the birds I see and hear.

Birding is the one hobby my wife and I can easily still do with the kids. The pace and duration are vastly different now, but the result has been more outings than ever. Having Montrose nearby is helpful. When my daughter was six months old, she would wake early on weekends and I would put her in a Baby Bjorn. We could get to Montrose in less than 10 minutes. I remember clearly the first time she noticed the presence of migrating birds. It was a crisp fall day and American Redstarts were singing from a grove of birches. She turned her head back and forth when she heard their songs.  

None of these early trips were long, as feeding and fresh diapers beckoned, but as we well know, you can pick up a number of species in a short time on the lakefront. Since then, we’ve graduated to a backpack carrier, and binoculars are now dangling from around my neck again. My older daughter, Sonja, now 3, knows the names of several birds—red-winged blackbird, chickadee, pigeon and crow to name a few. Sometimes the carrier becomes less appealing, and Sonja wants to be held. Often I have stood with my daughter in one arm while holding my binoculars up to my eye with the other, scanning treetops. Occasionally I’ve missed a good bird because of these awkward positions, I’m sure, but simply being in the field is worth it.

Earlier this year, in January, I took a day off and went birding. With my second daughter due in April, I thought it might be the last chance I’d have to bird for a while. The outcome was a little disappointing—just 27 species—but I had some time to myself, time I wouldn’t have anymore come April. Then the baby came, I was on leave from work and we birded quite a bit. We recorded 12 lists in April alone.

My birding renaissance has extended into summer, too. My wife and I took the children camping nearby (Chain O Lakes State Park), a location that was close to a place where it was possible to see a lifer without driving far out of the way. Growing up in Northeast Ohio, my odds of seeing a Black Tern were slim. So we stopped off at a site on the way to the state park. Both kids were sleeping when we pulled up to the location. Thanks to the magic of eBird, the terns were right where they were supposed to be. I watched three flit through the air above a marsh. We were back on the road before the kids even woke up. Another success birding…with children.

Good year

Montrose Dunes

It's hard to think about the first six months of birding in 2013 without thinking about our baby girl. Her birth April 8 had an interesting effect on the family birding patterns, though not what you might think. The year started with a trip to Door County that yielded several great birds and a couple of lifers. I took some time off at home around then, too, but managed only one full day of birding the Chicago area. Sure, species counts are limited when birding in January in the Midwest, but I was disappointed with the 27 species I saw on my big day. Then we had Celeste, and that's when things started getting interesting. In those fragile early days, we actually birded quite a bit--I submitted 15 checklists in April. The sparrowing was great--I saw 11 sparrow species in April. The return to work in May, though, made finding time to bird more difficult. May saw only eight checklists submitted. The warbler species tally was just 14--in one day it's very possible to see more than 14 warbler species at Montrose.
Overall, this spring's weather was more normal than 2012, when trees leafed out early (making birds hard to see) and the early warm fronts threw migration patterns out of wack.

I have 117 species on my Illinois 2013 list to date. Spring migration is the top opportunity to build a list, but birds can still be added with a few strategic trips. Last weekend, we went to Illinois Beach State Park. It's not far (about an hour), and we had never been there before even though it's pretty much the only natural Great Lakes beach/dune habitat in the state. I knew we had a shot to see some typical Midwestern birds that had escaped us at Montrose. And we did: belted kingfisher, eastern bluebird, eastern meadowlark and tree swallow were all added to the list. Then we added a goody: a Brewer's blackbird in the juniper-covered dunes.

We may do some camping in coming weeks and can look for more Illinois breeding species then. And there will be opportunities in fall migration, too. But the sightings will become more scarce as fall ends and winter approaches.

Opening Door

The Door Peninsula of Wisconsin extends dozens of miles north into Lake Michigan from near Green Bay, Wis. Until last month, we'd never been to this idyllic part of the world. The peninsula is part of the Niagara escarpment that rings the western Great Lakes. So even while we were on the same lake as flat, sandy Chicago, the rocky coastlines and bluffs felt a million miles away from home. 

We chose Door County for a winter getaway unintentionally. I checked into rentals in Wisconsin, hoping to stay close to home, and Door County offered the most options. Then I found a cabin in the tiny Gills Rock community, at the northernmost tip of the pleasant peninsula. The dramatic location was too much to resist. 

In this mild winter, we didn't see snow until we were halfway up the peninsula at Sturgeon Bay. We continued northward on dark, winding, two-lane roads until we pulled up to our cabin at midnight on a Friday. The cabin itself was interesting--a restored mid-19th-century cabin that turned out to be very comfortable and (thankfully) well-heated. 

We didn't realize until dawn that Lake Michigan was in plain view, across the street from the cabin. We woke to a beautiful snowfall on morning No. 1 and the temperatures began to plummet. I knew there was a chance to see some winter Wisconsin bird specialties, and within a few minutes we saw a flock of white-winged crossbills in the trees between us and the lake. A life bird! We did a little exploring that day including a trip to Ellison Bluff County Park, where we saw a beautiful sunset (above). 

On Day 2, we traveled south to Egg Harbor only to realize that most of the shops and restaurants in the quaint Door towns were closed for the season. Still, we saw a good bit of the area and another life bird--a flock of Bohemian waxwings in berry trees along the side of the road in Fish Creek. This variety of waxwing, which lives in the Arctic half the year, is larger than cedars and has a rusty undertail. We also stopped at the tiny Pioneer General Store, the nearest grocery to us.

The temperature was below zero when we set out on the morning of Day 3. We drove around the peninsula and listened to the inauguration festivities. We explored the east side of the county, which is lower in elevation and seemingly more remote. We crisscrossed farmland and saw a couple of other winter specialties--a northern shrike and a rough-legged hawk. We had passed a tiny sign for a Jens Jensen visitor center in Ellison Bay and decided to go back late in the day. Jensen designed a number of well-known parks including Columbus Park in Chicago, where we were married. We discovered that he had created a folk school, The Clearing, in Ellison Bay.  The site was meant to replicate his native Denmark, complete with a bluff facing the western afternoon sun.

We headed back to Chicago in the subzero temperatures on Tuesday and made remarkably good time--about 4.5 hours. It's comforting to know that such an escape is a half-day's drive away.

It's Caillou

To the writers of Caillou --

The episode shown on Sprout on 12 February 2013 at 6:30 p.m. Central time included a scene where Caillou woke in the night from a bad dream. Caillou's dad went to check on him, and Caillou said that he had a dream about a scary monster. If this wasn't enough, the next scene showed Caillou frightened by a shadow on the wall that he thought was a monster (it turned out to be a shadow of a dinosaur doll he had). This scared Caillou to the point where he went to Mom and Dad's room and asked to come to bed with them. The scene led to a sleepless night for the whole family.

The primary audience for Caillou is toddlers, and children under the age of 5 are highly impressionable. There are many thoughts, deeds and words that my wife and I hide from our daughter so that we don't "plant a seed" in her mind. For example, I would never come home from work and open a candy bar in front of my daughter. There's no doubt she would see the candy bar and immediately request a bite from the bar. I also wouldn't come home and ask my wife if we were going to the zoo the next day. The mention of the zoo would cause Sonja so much excitement that any change of plan would lead to a dramatic letdown. Finally, even if I thought say making cookies would be fun, I wouldn't mention it if there wasn't time or if we didn't have the ingredients. I'm finding discipline and restraint are two key tenets of parenting. 

There are good habits we are trying to instill in our daughter -- potty training, courtesy and patience come to mind -- that your program could model for young children. By showing this sleep catastrophe on your program, children now may think it's OK to wake their parents, complain of monsters and crawl into bed. Parents choose toddler TV programming and line the pockets of your advertisers. They also never have enough sleep. You can appeal to both children and parents by omitting the stuff that gives us nightmares.

2012 Year in Review: Tent revival

The year proved to be a camping bonanza after a lengthy period without sleeping under the stars. Our Mountain Hardwear tent literally fell apart at the seams in Michigan so we bought a Big Agnes four-person tent, complete with a "garage" vestibule that makes it look like a nylon igloo. Eager to use the new tent and spurred by the fun of the Michigan trip, we embarked on two fall one-nighters--the first to Apple River Canyon State Park and the second to Marengo Ridge.

Apple River Canyon is a series of bluffs and odd formations on a small tributary of the Mississippi River in Northwest Illinois. It's part of the namesake Driftless Area and offers a number of short hiking options. We dodged remnants of a recent hurricane and managed to get to the campground dry. Temperatures were comfortable in the 60s. Highlights included a Tennessee warbler in our campsite, a nice fall migrant to discover. We also had an apple tree in our site, complete with ripe apples, and were able to munch on a few. We took one hike, to Tower Rock, a pinnacle several stories up from the valley floor. We then had lunch in Savanna, Ill., where we watched barges on the Mississippi. We drove through Upper Mississippi NWR to Lock and Dam 13, typically a mecca for bald eagles, but not in the summer apparently. We did see lots of wood ducks and great egrets in the refuge.

Our final trip of the season was to Marengo Ridge, a McHenry County Conservation District site about 60 miles from Chicago. The campgound is perched atop a moraine with a nice view of the surrounding countryside and the Kishwaukee River Valley. We had a private site as the campground was only half full. It's really a terrific locale so close to Chicago. We again enjoyed staking the Big Agnes and managed to stay warm on a cold night in the 30s. The evening highlight was a great horned owl hooting, a nice addition to my 2012 Illinois list. We stopped at the Illinois Railway Museum on the way back the next day. We rode on a vintage Chicago streetcar; overall the museum was a lot of fun--it's massive and there's a lot there we didn't see. Our five nights camping in 2012, most since 2009, were fantastic.

2012 Year in Review: Rainbow warriors

In August we enjoyed some relief from the Midwestern heat by traveling to Hawaii. We stayed in West Maui, between Kaanapali and Kapalua. Maui is basically made up of two massive volcanic mountains protruding from the Pacific. The mountainside near our condo was shrouded in clouds, often with rainbows, too. We had great views of Lanai and Molokai from our complex's beach. Truthfully, West Maui is more developed than I would prefer, but we were near some spectacular natural areas, as seen above along the Kahekili Highway. We were able to do some paddleboarding, golfing and snorkeling, and we made a trip to Iao Needle, a rock formation near Kahului.

Birds were plentiful. We went to Kealia Pond National Wildlife Refuge, where we saw the rare Hawaiian stilt, wandering tattler, Pacific golden plover and a few more. I recorded a lifer tropicbird along the Kahekili Highway.

Hawaii is an amazing place, and I wish we had more time for hiking in some of the mountain areas or a trip to Molokini Crater. The other islands look very interesting, too. 

2012 Year in Review: Hot stuff

There was a lot to be nervous about heading into our trip to Van Buren State Park in Southwest Michigan in July. It would be the first camping trip in about two years, and we had a toddler in tow. It was a record summer for heat, and the forecast for our trip was daunting--multiple days in the mid-90s. 

We had booked our three-night trip months in advance. Van Buren is a popular spot--just two hours from Chicago in the popular Harbor Country of Southwest Michigan. So it wasn't a surprise that the campground was full. Our spot was on the fringe of the campground and didn't offer much in the way of shade. We set up our tent at the edge of a forest and nabbed some shade for the morning hours. The friends we were meeting there had a nice corner spot that largely was forested--we spent much of our time at their site.

The highlight of Van Buren is the beach, which is wide and sandy, at the foot of a steep dune. The water felt great every time we went in. My friend Cub parked a lawn chair in a small pop-up shelter. From the water, he appeared to be a light-beer-swilling monarch, overseeing his sandy realm from his beach hut.

The heat persisted for two days. Amazingly, a weak cold front moved through, accompanied by morning thunderstorms. It cooled everything just enough and we had a wonderfully cool morning to sleep in, and yes the toddler slept in, too. Even when the seams broke on our tent, we stayed dry.

All in all, it was a great trip. We explored the town of South Haven and drove past a number of u-pick blueberry farms. We got to know the scenic Blue Star Highway that runs along the coast north of Benton Harbor. The trip proved that it's worth going even in the worst weather conditions.

2012 Year in Review: Good coppice

In 14 years of going to the island of Eleuthera, I've always been as intrigued by the interior of the island as much as the famed beaches. The seashore is a lot of fun, for a number of reasons, but the scrubby interior has a great deal of interesting flora and fauna, too. So it was exciting to learn during our spring trip this year that the Leon Levy Native Plant Preserve recently opened within minutes of the home base of North Palmetto Point. The preserve, part of the Bahamas National Trust, features lengthy trails through the native coppice forest as well as mangrove wetlands and a medicinal plant garden. The highlight is a hand-constructed tower atop a hill that offers amazing views of the Eleuthera's interior and of the Atlantic Ocean. We saw several bird species on a steamy day including migrants like northern parula and northern waterthrush. The preserve is the only national park on Eleuthera, and a lot of planning and resources have gone into it. It's a great addition to a special island.

Good year

After nearly a year off, I'm back and ready to post on the blog occasionally. Driftless Area is now password-protected, too.

A few weeks ago, we finally saw the movie The Big Year on DVD. It's probably the most prominent movie ever made about birding. It's certainly the most expensive, reportedly costing $40 million to make. 

The Big Year features an all-star cast: Owen Wilson, Steve Martin and Jack Black. In seeing the trailers, I feared that the movie would strive to make fun of birders--an easy target to be sure. With a few small exceptions, that was not the case at all. In fact, the movie took care to portray birding accurately and kindly. That may have been why the movie was a big failure at the box office, grossing less than $10 million in the United States. 

Casting Wilson as a cocky, world-renowned birder was pure brilliance. Martin and Black were both subdued and likable as they chased Wilson around the country trying to keep up with his North American big year. The bit players were good, too, including Rashida Jones as Black's love interest and Brian Dennehy as Black's curmudgeonly father.

I remember some birders being dismayed when The Big Year came out. But it really does mostly get it right, any quibbles are nitpicks at best (would a whistling-duck really hang out at the top of a mountain?). I highly recommend The Big Year!

Western phoebe

I spent some time last week in San Jose, Calif. I went for a morning walk around the center of the city--the ninth-largest city in the United States. San Jose sits in a valley just south of the San Francisco Bay. The Guadelupe River flows through the center of town and is flanked by a recreational trail. The river is really no more than a creek in a little ravine lined with sycamores and other riparian trees. It was there, in the shadow of the headquarters of Adobe (above), that I saw my lifer black phoebe. The bird isn't uncommon in its range along the West Coast. Like the eastern phoebe, it spends time near bridges and branches hanging over streams.

Winter recess

While the hills never rise to more than about 1,100 feet, southern Ohio is quite rugged. The southeast quarter of Ohio is a sea of steep ridges and deep valleys. In a few hidden, idyllic spots there are high-walled gorges and waterfalls. Rarer are recess caves, huge sandstone overhangs carved by erosional forces. In winter, the area is made all the more spectacular by a coating of snow and massive ice formations. The flora is that of a much more northerly place, in some places hemlock-laden ravines stranded by the last glaciation. Above is Cedar Falls, the 50-foot high waterfall on Queer Creek, part of Hocking Hills State Park. A few miles away is Old Man's Cave, the largest recess cave in Ohio (top). The area has many hiking, backpacking and camping options. I recommend it in the off-season, when the crowds are away and temperatures are a bit cooler.

Annual report

It was a great birding year, starting with a late migrating american pipit at Montrose on Jan. 2. One thread throughout 2011 was my use of the eBird tracking tool. For no reason in particular, I embarked on a slow-speed chase to be one of the top 100 eBirders in Illinois. I fell short on my quest, ending up 113th with 119 species at the time of this writing. But I can count strange achievements like being the 73rd-ranked eBirder in the state of South Dakota, because of our week-long trip there, and 47th in the Bahamas.

I added seven birds to my life list: Bell's vireo, Henslow's sparrow, american dipper, upland sandpiper, mountain bluebird, plumbeous vireo and snowy owl. A snow-less winter, ironically, capped by a snowy owl sighting. Our trip to the Bahamas yielded a number of island specialities and a tally of 33 species, including LaSagra's flycatcher and thick-billed vireo--both common in Eleuthera but resident only on a couple of other islands.

The birding adventure starts over again tomorrow, starting at zero species for 2012. Should be fun.

Snowy haven

A snowy owl is a good reason to end a blog hiatus. Snowy owls are invading the Midwest this winter, with perhaps the largest surge in more than a decade. Two weeks ago, two were photographed at Montrose Point. I went out to search for them the next morning. I saw a couple of photographers who helped point me to an owl on the end of the fishhook pier. It was several hundred yards away, but I had an okay look at my first-ever snowy owl.

Then, this past weekend, an even better look. The owls had continued to hang around the point for days. We went Saturday afternoon. We didn't see the owls in the dune area, or near the pier. As we walked toward the beach house, a passerby said the owl was just ahead. Just a few yards away, the owl was sitting atop a light post in plain view. One needn't binoculars to make out many details. A small crowd had gathered, photographing the bird from every angle. Amazing stuff and a great way to cap an eventful 2011 of birding.