Whitewater

From the far side of the rapids, Kenn writes: We screen the comments that come in before they’re posted on the blog. Most of the comments are wonderful, all are appreciated, and we post almost all of them. One that we didn’t post came in from "Anonymous" a couple of weeks ago -- taking us to task for the fact that we hadn’t updated the blog since April 10th. "Why bother to have a blog, there in the ‘warbler capital of the world,’ if you never post to it?" It went on to imply that we must be pretty lazy, or worse, to fail to keep the blog rolling.

Gee, "Anonymous," we’re glad that you missed us. A lot has been going on here. The best analogy that comes to mind is that being here in northwestern Ohio in May is like a modified version of whitewater rafting. But instead of roaring down the river, the raft is tethered to one spot, bucking and pitching wildly while the whitewater rapids of spring migration come pouring around and under and over those of us who are clinging to the raft.

The Lake Erie shoreline in northwest Ohio -- specifically the area centered on Magee Marsh Wildlife Area and Ottawa National Wildlife Refuge -- is one of the best spots in North America to see concentrations of spring migrant songbirds, especially warblers. I wrote about this area in Birding, the magazine of the American Birding Association, earlier this year; you can read the article here. Every spring, hundreds of thousands of birds, and tens of thousands of birders, come pouring through this region.

Numbers of visiting birders had been growing in recent years, so this year we decided to hold an event to engage with them and try to enhance their experience. Wild brainstorming about it a year ago led to the formation of the BIGGEST WEEK IN AMERICAN BIRDING -- and it was big! For starters, it was a week that was eleven days long, May 6 through 16. It was hosted by five different organizations: Black Swamp Bird Observatory, Tropical Birding tours, Kaufman Field Guides, Ottawa National Wildlife Refuge, and Magee Marsh Wildlife Area (a unique partnership of a nonprofit, two for-profit companies, a federal agency, and a state agency). Of course, Kimberly and I represented two of the five partners, so we were kept busy! It was sponsored by a wide variety of organizations and companies, from Leica Sport Optics (Leica's Jeff Bouton gave many digiscoping demonstrations) to the American Birding Association. Sean Logan, the director of Ohio's Department of Natural Resources, came up from Columbus to speak at the opening ceremony, and U.S. Congresswoman Marcy Kaptur (in whose district the event took place) sent a letter and sent a top-ranking member of her staff to the opening ceremony as well.

Throughout the event, there were multiple field trips and birdwalks every day, many of them free of charge, led by skilled guides from Tropical Birding. Throughout the event, there were daytime workshops and evening programs held at multiple sites. I personally gave evening keynote talks on nine different nights! Throughout the event, we were doing constant updates on bird sightings via Twitter, making this the first bird festival to use this new opportunity. Throughout the event, and for weeks before and after, Kimberly was working 14 to 17 hour days, since Black Swamp Bird Observatory was the center for organization and registration for the event. Throughout the event, we had to stay on our toes, since Kimberly and I both wound up on radio or television or in the newspapers multiple times, talking about birding. And throughout the event (and before and after), I was keeping up almost-daily updates on weather, migration, and latest bird sightings, by way of another blog that "Anonymous" apparently didn’t know about (you can read it here) -- I wrote no fewer than 30 posts on that blog between mid-April and the end of May.

The whole 11-day event was a fabulous time, with lots of birds, lots of great friends to share the birds with, and lots of opportunity to introduce brand-new people to birding. My very favorite day, however, was Day 9 of our long week. I’ll describe that in a separate post.

Return to Ecuador

From beneath Winter's Lovely White Cloak, Kim writes: Okay, so practically the entire staff at BSBO is in Ecuador right now on a birding trip with our friends at Tropical Birding. Since I've been to Ecuador twice, I volunteered to stay here and mind the office so that our Board would approve the trip for the rest of the gang. I felt really good about my decision. The people at BSBO are among the finest individuals I have ever met anywhere in the world. They work incredibly hard for little or no pay, and they absolutely deserve this fabulous experience.

But...Today I'm kind of bummed. The Tropical Birding guides have been posting some of the birds they've been seeing, and I'd be lying if I said there wasn't a tiny part of me (okay, so it's a moderately large part) that's wishing I was there too. I thought it would help me feel better to take all of you along with me on a trip back in time to our visit to Ecuador in February 2006.

Caution...the trip I am about to relate to you was our honeymoon.
This post may contain mushy, lovee-dovee, who-ha, huggee, kissee, stuff.
You have been warned! ; )

Okay, first things first:
My favorite food of the trip!

I know, right! ewww... It's hard to believe that something that looks this repulsive could taste so, slurpy, sticky, messy good! It helps to know that Passion Fruit starts with the gorgeous, Passion Flower.


Okay, now let's travel to the east slope of the Andes mountains to visit,
Cabanas San Isidro.

The enchanted trail to Cabanas San Isidro

The cottages were simple and beautiful.
But, in spite of the "nature" of our trip, we didn't spend much
time indoors; not with all the birds to see!

Like this handsome male Collared Inca

Next it was on to the Guango Lodge.

Guanga isn't far from San Isidro, in fact, its run by the same family. But there's enough of a change in elevation between the two lodges to result in a different cast of avian characters. That was just one of the many remarkably fascinating things about Ecuador: a slight change in elevation results in a significant change in the flora and fauna.

And, what does Guango have to offer besides a lovely setting, great food, and Torrent Ducks in the stream below the lodge? THIS...

KA-POW!
After several heart pounding, eye-peeling, hand wringing, Kenn squeezing, praying to the gods of bizarre birds, minutes... the highly coveted and totally wicked-cool SWORD-BILLED HUMMINGBIRD shook up the the scene and all the birders gathered at the Guango feeders. I literally had to sit down when I finally saw this bird for the first time. It's like your brain can't wrap itself around the fact that super-stretched bill should belong to this tiny bird. It's nuts!

Well, actually it's flowers.
This flower to be exact...

The Sword-billed's bill shape makes more sense when you see this, doesn't it?!
This is the Datura flower, we encountered it in many locations during our trip. We found it at a range of elevations as well. Here's a closer look at this massively tubular botanical show-off.

Kinda makes you wish you had a 5 inch bill to jam up in there and
suck up all the goodies, doesn't it?! I'll bet it tastes like Tang.

Okay, let's leave Guango and head west back over the Papayacta Pass. We'll drive miles and miles on narrow twisting mountain roads, and eventually cross into the west slope of the Andes--where every inch of the terrain reminds you of what eyeballs were invented for--and arrive at the location where all my BSBO peeps are hanging out right now!

The stairway to heaven.

I'm convinced that Robert Plant must have visited Tandayapa Bird Lodge and the experience was so powerful that it gave birth to the famous Zeppelin tune.
This is where the BSBO staff is staying. They're probably sitting on the patio right now while swarms of hummingbirds entertain them.
Hummingbirds are definitely the stars of the show at Tandayapa.

Check this out! If you can ignore the irritating click of the camera's video action, listen to the sound generated by the sheer numbers of hummers...

The handsome, dashing, newlywed, Kenn Kaufman, on the patio at the Tandayapa Bird Lodge.

Cloud Forest + Tandayapa Patio + Hummingbird Feeders...
Mind = Blown!

This is the supremely adorable Booted Racket-tail. Funny story... During our stay at Tandayapa this very high-strung, totally bird-crazed woman who had obviously rarely ever traveled, kept calling the Booted Racket-tails, "Racketed Bootlegs." hahaha... This went on for several days before anyone had the heart to correct her. Much fun was made (I'm sure) at her expense when she wasn't around. pssst...It was me. I still call them Racketed Bootlegs sometimes. I'm such a dork! : )

Another of my Tandayapa favorites,
the breath-taking, Violet-tailed Sylph.

Now let's head for...The AMAZON!

Deep within the Amazon rain forest , the Sacha Lodge requires a long day's journey to get to, including a ride in a small plane from Quito to Puerto Francisco de Orellana, locally known as Coca, an "exciting" ride through the narrow and very busy streets of Coca, and a two-hour boat ride down the Nappo River.
Once you arrive, it takes all of about 4 seconds to know the effort it took to get there was worth it. ---WOW!

Just one of the featured attractions at Sacha is the Canopy Walk
From the Sacha website: A new and much anticipated addition to Sacha's activities is our 940-foot (275-meter) long canopy walkway. At approximately 94 feet (30 meters) above the ground, imagine exploring the rain forest up in the treetops! This sturdy walkway is fixed to the ground by three metal towers for stability, and offers an unbelievable opportunity to spot dozens of animals and epiphytes seldom seen from the ground. Thousands of colorful birds await to be spotted, and with some luck you might even follow along with troops of monkeys as they forage through the forest canopy. Taking a leisurely walk above the trees on this incredible structure, to emerge even higher on the top of the towers surrounded by an endless sea of rain forest, is an experience not to be missed, and as far as we know found nowhere else in the world.

And, here it is. Amazing, yes! But YIKES!

Kenn braves the stomach-churning heights of the Canopy Walk.

It looks scary, and it is! But, check out the view...

The biodiversity at Sacha is overwhelming.
On our first day we saw:

Lots of Squirrel Monkeys

This HUGE and crazy-weird caterpillar

One of my trip faves... This white frog. That is to say, it started out white! But, as I got closer to photograph it, it very slowly turned a dark salmon pink. Even our seasoned guide, Oscar, was trippin out over this thing.

First white...

And then pink...COOL!

This Three-toed Sloth was WAY out there, but I couldn't resist taking this really bad photo.

We heard what I consider to be one of the world's most beautiful bird songs.
I never did get a decent photo, but I did capture the magical song of the Musician Wren:

And finally...

During this trip, I was blessed with, perhaps, the single-most extraordinary bird-related experience of my life: a trip to visit Refugio Paz de las Aves, or Refuge of the Birds' Peace.

Angel Paz with Kenn

Angel Paz has become legendary for his ability to "speak" to the most elusive of forest dwelling skulkers, the antpittas. I could never begin to describe the religious experience of this place, and I never imagined that anyone else could, either. When we got back from our honeymoon, Kenn wanted to write about our experience with Angel in his column for Bird Watcher's Digest. Kenn is my all-time favorite nature writer, but I was hesitant. I honestly feared that no one, not even my Kenn, could capture and convey the magnitude of this experience.
---I was wrong.

When I read the column, I was transported. I trembled at the moment when the first Andean Cock-of-the Rock, indeed, ROCKED the forest with its insanely piercing call. I held my breath as the first Giant Antpitta emerged from the vegetation to snatch up Angel's wormy offering. I gasped at the site of this once mysterious bird, revealed. I wept at the remarkable gentleness of this simple man and his love for his mountain and his birds.
...and I fell in love with my husband all over again.

---read The Antpitta Whisperer
After the Spark, July/August 2006
Bird Watcher's Digest

Manuel, the Giant Antipitta makes his appearance:

If you love birds and nature and you have the desire to travel, then I hope that someday you will be able to experience Ecuador. The plethora of biodiversity will leave you feeling blessed and breathless. I can't wait to hear the tales from the BSBO'ers when they return!

Fabulous IMBD Weekend at Magee

Cape May Warbler: named for Cape May, NJ, but in spring it's far more numerous at Magee Marsh

From Oak Harbor, Ohio, Kenn writes: For a few weeks every year, northwest Ohio -- and specifically the Magee Marsh Wildlife Area, which is practically our back yard -- becomes one of the most popular birding sites in the world. Literally thousands of birders come here to witness the warblers and other migrants that concentrate in the woods along the Lake Erie shoreline at Magee and nearby sites. The action peaks on International Migratory Bird Day (IMBD), the second Saturday in May. This year the timing worked out perfectly, with a huge arrival of birds obvious on the morning of Friday, May 8th. The variety of birds in the area was even better on Saturday, and continued to be outstanding through Sunday and Monday. I seriously doubt that any of the thousands of visiting birders went away disappointed.

The Black Swamp Bird Observatory (BSBO) -- where Kim is Executive Director, and I’m a volunteer birding guru -- is involved, up to its ears, in this birding spectacle. That’s most of the reason why we haven’t been posting anything on this blog recently! The observatory’s office is located on the entrance road to Magee Marsh, and the observatory sponsors a series of web pages on which I and others provide detailed information on birding the area. When it’s May and the mobs of birds and birders are arriving, our days are packed from dawn to late at night.

Looking back on the IMBD weekend just past, it was about as full and as satisfying as one could imagine. I had predicted on the website that Friday would have a big arrival of migrants. Some people follow my predictions and actually take days off of work or school when I make such a forecast, so it was a relief to head out at dawn on Friday and find that, indeed, there were swarms of warblers darting through the trees at Magee. That morning I met up for a brief round of birding with Dave Rintoul from Kansas State, one of the listowners of BirdChat, the granddaddy of all birding listserves. Then I raced back to a phone for an hour-long radio show about bird migration with Fred Andrle from WOSU in Columbus. Then I put the final touches on a program about migration, drove over to Port Clinton, and gave my migration talk at 6 p.m., and then our band played from 8 to midnight, in a benefit concert for the Ohio Young Birders Club.

A male Blackpoll Warbler. The long-distance champion migrant of the warbler world. Every individual that we see in spring has already survived at least one round-trip flight to South America.


Of course we didn’t sleep much that night, because we had to be up at dawn for International Migratory Bird Day. The day was insanely busy. I would have estimated somewhere between 5,000 and 10,000 visitors in the general area, but the Division of Wildlife reportedly estimated closer to 15,000. Who knows? But there were more than enough birds to go around. With strong southwest winds, the warblers and other migrants were concentrated along the north edge of the woods at Magee, many of them feeding low for wonderful views. The photographers were having a field day, blasting away at birds that are usually elusive denizens of the treetops. Scores of beginning birders were being taken on birdwalks led by experts. (This year, through an arrangement with the tour company Tropical Birding, we have several world-class birders on the site, leading free birdwalks for BSBO every day until May 25.) Julie Shieldcastle and others from BSBO were putting on banding demonstrations, showing hundreds of people birds up close. It was an amazing and heart-warming extravaganza of warbler-watching.

A male Prothonotary Warbler, glowing like molten gold in the swampy woods

Back at the observatory itself, it was a whirlwind of activity all day. Kim was in her element, inspiring everyone with the magic of birds. Vic and Lois were serving up lunch to hordes of hungry birders, Robert from Time & Optics was demonstrating binoculars and scopes, Kevin from Wildside Tours and Iain from Tropical Birding were telling people about other birding destinations to consider, and Karen and Hugh and Judy kept things bouncing in the gift shop / book store.

The real hosts of the weekend, however, the warblers - - the wonderful, varied, active, colorful, beautiful warblers - - continued to show off all day Saturday, Sunday, and Monday, as the crowds of birders continued to arrive to admire these little feathered gems. The great thing for me is that the birds are so unconcerned about the presence of all these people. They continue to forage actively within a few feet of the birders, oblivious to the oohs and aaahs and the camera flashes. If they were bothered, of course, they could flit back into the thickets and be safely away from us, because birders don’t go off the boardwalk and into the woods. So the warblers are able to feed and rest and refuel for the next leg of their migration, and the watchers are able to appreciate these little wonders at close range.

And by the time the weekend is over, Kim and Kenn are also in need of rest and refueling! Late Saturday night, I found myself trying to remember whether IMBD stood for International Migratory Bird Day, or Insane Madness Bird Daze, or Insomnia Makes Birders Dumb, or Incrementally Maniacal Bed Deprivation, or just, I May Be Dead!

For more background on this entire phenomenon, see the website of the Black Swamp Bird Observatory (BSBO): http://www.bsbobird.org/

and the observatory’s birding pages: http://www.bsbobird.org/Birding/

And for another fine perspective, see the account by Kevin Loughlin of Wildside Tours: http://blog.wildsidenaturetours.com/ (hint: if you're on bird overload by now, Kevin also has photos from Friday night's rock concert)

Or this account by top Ohio naturalist Jim McCormac (go back to May 9): http://jimmccormac.blogspot.com/

Or the always-entertaining posts from Dave Lewis and his "Birds From Behind":
http://burdzbuttz.blogspot.com/

Special K

Kirtland's Warbler: the rarest songbird in North America

From Oak Harbor, Ohio, Kenn writes: In my previous post on May 30, I mentioned that I'd been making predictions for the migration throughout the Biggest Week In American Birding: checking to see what birds were around, watching the weather reports, trying to predict which days would have the biggest arrivals of migrants. For the first 8 days of the event, this was an exercise in mild frustration, because the weather patterns just weren’t lining up to produce any major migrant wave. We were seeing excellent diversity of migrants -- and the guides from Tropical Birding were making sure that everyone on the scene got to see a lot of different species. But the kind of day that we dream about in northwest Ohio, with migrants everywhere, the trees filled to bursting with warblers and others, just had not happened yet as late as Thursday, May 13.

Based on the weather forecasts, I had been predicting for days that Friday, May 14, was going to be a big day. There’s a certain amount of pressure involved in making predictions like this, especially if people take you seriously! I knew from conversations with birders that many people were planning days off from work, or playing hooky from school, based on my predictions, so I was really sweating it at dawn on May 14th. No matter how closely you study the weather forecasts, it’s always possible that the wind will shift unexpectedly and the predicted big day will turn out to be a dud. But as soon as I arrived out at the Wildlife Beach at Magee Marsh, just after sunrise on May 14, I could tell that this was a great day. Birds were everywhere. The place was swarming with catbirds, orioles, Least Flycatchers, and more than a dozen species of warblers. Silent flocks of Blue Jays were streaming overhead, while thrushes bounced around in the thickets. Anyone who came out on this day would not be disappointed.

I knew that the guides from Tropical Birding (and hundreds of other birders) would be concentrated at the Magee Marsh boardwalk, so I decided to work east along the Wildlife Beach to see what I could find there. I’d been birding the thickets and low trees of this area for a couple of hours, and was just about to turn around and head elsewhere, when I spotted a bird moving across an opening far ahead of me. Superficially it looked like a Palm Warbler, with tail-bobbing habit and all; and I had been seeing a lot of Palm Warblers out there. But something about the bird looked odd. I walked on up to double-check on it.

When I got to the spot, there was a Palm Warbler perched up in a low willow, and at first it seemed that must have been what I saw. But then I froze when I heard a distinctive birdsong from the thickets. A warbler song, but low-pitched and choppy and emphatic for a warbler.

Oh, yeah. Special K.

Kirtland’s Warbler is one of the rarest birds in North America. It was very close to extinction in the 1970s and 1980s, when its population dipped below 350 individuals. Thanks to a lot of hard work by dedicated conservationists, its population is now up over 3000, but that’s still a terrifyingly low number for a songbird. Kirtland’s Warbler nests mainly in a few counties in Michigan and winters in the Bahamas, and extremely few are seen in migration. Our area of northwest Ohio is the best place in the world to see migrating Kirtland’s, but even here the species is not seen every year. Some birders have been coming here for many years without ever seeing one.

But there was a Kirtland’s Warbler singing from the thicket in front of me, and there were hundreds of birders, maybe thousands, within a couple of miles of where I stood, because this was the Biggest Week In American Birding. And because it was the Biggest Week, we had made arrangements to get the word out quickly about rarities. I pulled the iPhone out of my pocket and quickly composed one of the short little notes that is fancifully called a "Tweet" in the service called "Twitter." I just tapped in this note:

"Kirtlands on Magee east beach 300 yards east of parking lot Kenn K"

And then I called Kimberly, who was, of course, at the Black Swamp Bird Observatory, the center of the action for the big birding week. At the registration tables at BSBO, we had a giant screen set up to display the Twitter updates, and as Kim answered the phone, my note about the Kirtland’s Warbler popped up on the screen.

If I’d had any doubts earlier about the value of using Twitter for the Biggest Week, those doubts evaporated as the word went out about the Kirtland’s. Out on the Magee boardwalk, out on the trails at Ottawa National Wildlife Refuge, over at the shorebird sites on Stange Road, cell phones beeped and birders read the text message about the rare warbler. Word of mouth spread rapidly from a hundred separate points. I had been all alone on the beach, but within minutes, a stream of birders began arriving.

Ever since I had heard the warbler sing I had been hanging back, staying well away so I wouldn’t risk scaring it before the birders arrived. But as the crowd began to gather, it became apparent that the bird was utterly unconcerned about our presence. It hopped about in the low sumacs and willows, sometimes disappearing into dense growth for a minute but more often coming out to hop on the sand in the open. As the birders gathered, a hundred or two hundred or more at a time in a wide semicircle on the beach, the Kirtland’s Warbler continued to perform like the superstar that it was.

At any moment, the Kirtland’s could have flown a hundred yards south into a closed section of the wildlife area, and it never would have been seen again. But it stayed, and stayed, out in the open. From the time I sent out my "tweet" about the bird at 9:17 a.m. until I finally left after 1:30 p.m., the bird was seldom out of sight, and my best guesstimate was that more than a thousand people came and had great looks at it. Other bloggers who stayed later in the afternoon estimated that more than three thousand people saw the bird! It was so obliging, often moving toward its admiring audience, that even people with little point-and-shoot cameras were able to take pictures, while more serious photographers filled up whole memory cards. Indeed, I suspect that this individual became the most-photographed Kirtland’s Warbler in history.

Swamped with visiting crowds at the Black Swamp Bird Observatory, Kimberly didn’t get out to see this individual; at the only times when she could have gotten away, she stayed to mind the observatory so others could dash back to the beach and see the bird. Of course, Kimberly has seen several Kirtland’s in this area in past years, starting before I ever moved to Ohio, so she was able to visualize the scene and vicariously share in the excitement. This Kirtland’s stayed the entire day, so that people arriving that evening were able to go out to the beach after 7 p.m. and see it. The following morning it was nowhere to be found; so it was a one-day wonder, as migrants often are. But for that one day, that one bird provided tremendous excitement for a lot of happy birders.