Not sure why birding is this way, but like shooting a basketball or playing a slot machine, the hits often come in bursts. (Is this not the true definition of mathematical chaos?). But after a several month drought of new county birds from May through October, I have now hit upon my 2nd county tick in 10 days. This time, I was out checking the ag fields of far NE Kent Co. for American Golden-Plover habitat, when I came upon a field freshly covered in manure and containing 6-10 inch high corn stubble. This field was absolutely awash in the standard open country species such as American Pipit, Killdeer, and Horned Lark. Mixed in were smaller #s of Snow Bunting and Lapland Longspur, and it really felt like an overall good spot for American Golden-Plover. But amongst the 20 or so Canada Geese were 5 swans. Now, swans in a muddy ag field are, in my experience, guaranteed to be Tundra Swans. And we have just now begun to enter the migration period for this species in Kent Co. So I assumed the birds would be so. But upon my first glances I noticed they were in fact a family group of Trumpeter Swans (!), 2 adults and 3 juveniles. This is the first observation of this species away from water and perched on the ground that I have ever made. Realizing the strangeness of the sighting I took extra steps to photograph and videotape the birds, and here they are:
5 comments:
Good find, Caleb! As an interesting side note, I saw the same situation (family group in an agricultural field) a couple of years ago down by the Battle Creek area.
By the way, what's your county total up to now?
Jon Vande Kopple
This is cool! Nice find...
237 I believe, Jonathan. See
http://ebird.org/ebird/top100?locInfo.regionType=subnational2&year=AAAA&locInfo.regionCode=US-MI-081
Interesting you've seen them in ag fields before...
Jon- check that, I am now at 241 with Snowy Owl, Goshawk, and Lesser Black-backed Gull, despite what eBird says. It's b/c eBird doesn't tally my Night-Heron sp. Trumpeter Swan was 238, not 237.
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