GGBA Birders in Wisconsin

By Carol Lombardi

We flew over perfect grids of Midwestern fields into Milwaukee’s early evening, excited to be part of Golden Gate Bird Alliance’s May birding trip to Wisconsin. Our guide Rich Cimino of Yellowbilled Tours was waiting at the curb before our luggage arrived. All logistics meshed, all gear was present and accounted for. Rich’s rented minivan was roomy with only four birders (ourselves, Rich, and Chris Bard), so everyone had a window seat and space to stow gear. We stayed at the Hampton Inn, Wauwatosa: Excellent staff, great breakfast, comfy rooms. Our first Wisconsin dinner that evening hinted at the robust cuisine we’d encounter all week. Boy, can you eat in Wisconsin!

Monday we were on the road at 7 a.m. in bright sunshine (after a generous breakfast, of course) for the drive to Horicon Marsh, which stretches some 10 by 4 miles and is accessed via several roads. Purple Martin houses near the Visitor Center hosted a dozen pairs. Several stops produced Yellow-bellied Flycatcher, Eastern Phoebe, Yellow-throated Vireo, Blue Jay, Sedge Wren, Eastern Bluebird, Gray Catbird, Black-and-white Warbler, Chestnut-sided Warbler, Palm Warbler, Bobolink, and Northern Cardinal in addition to plenty of birds familiar to Californians. Our casual posting of a pair of Black-necked Stilts inspired a query from e-Bird — they’re rare here.

Tuesday took us to Lake Park, a Victorian creation by Frederick Law Olmsted in central Milwaukee on the shore of Lake Michigan. Mature trees (plus a few bird feeders) lured a wondrous variety of warblers — Black-throated Green, Palm, Black-throated Blue, Chestnut-sided, Yellow, Blackburnian, Magnolia, Cape May, Tennessee. Many were easily and clearly seen from an overpass that put us halfway up their favorite pine tree and helped us avoid serious Warbler Neck-itis. We logged American Redstart, Red-eyed Vireo, Gray Catbird, Indigo Bunting, Pine Siskin, Chimney Swift, and Red-headed and Red-bellied Woodpeckers.

Local birders (befriended by Rich the week before) helped us sort through the second-by-second flybys. We found a Northern Waterthrush bobbing along a brushy ravine; an Olive-sided Flycatcher called for a “mar-tee-ni.” After lunch at the Italian grocery wonderland that is Glorioso’s, we visited the Riverside Park Urban Ecology Center, which is laboring to restore the stream nearby, and were rewarded with a leisurely look at a Solitary Sandpiper and a pair of Eastern Kingbirds.

Wednesday was our long-distance day: 100 miles to Portage for a look at French Meadow Marsh, then to John Muir Memorial County Park, site of John Muir’s boyhood home (yet to be developed), where a short hike added a Rose-breasted Grosbeak, several flycatchers, and a few ticks to our lists. Check your clothes twice!

Devil’s Lake Park was drizzly but productive: During our short walk uphill from the Visitors Center, we encountered Scarlet Tanager, Least Flycatcher, and multiple vireos — Yellow-throated, Warbling, and Red-eyed. On the bluff, we spotted Gold-winged, Blackburnian, and Tennessee Warblers in the mature trees around the nature center building. We peered at the International Crane Foundation’s caged pairs of exotic cranes in their enclosures and then observed a Whooping Crane meditating on her nest while her mate stalked crayfish in the pond.

A walk through the grounds yielded Orchard Oriole and Field Sparrow; we got a distant look at a Sandhill Crane on her nest in a nearby marsh. The Aldo Leopold Foundation Center ended the day with thoughtful exhibits inside and a pair of White-breasted Nuthatches feeding their brood outside. We got roadside views (through the windows) of warblers enjoying the obvious abundance of mosquitoes.

A half-hour drive north on Thursday brought us to Harrington Beach State Park, an excellent combination of campground, beach, and lakeside forest with creek. Its multiple environments produced a pair of Brown Thrashers by the restroom and a Veery in a culvert. American Redstarts bustled in the tall campground grasses, and Gray Catbirds posed on the lawns. Wood Ducks and Mergansers cruised the ponds in the forest, and an Ovenbird skulked along the creek. A walk on the windy shore brought us good looks at Ruddy Turnstones, Caspian Terns, and Bonaparte’s Gulls plus a good opportunity to study Common versus Forster’s Terns. The Ruddy Ducks and Lesser Scaup in Port Washington’s harbor suffered disarranged plumage along with the whitecaps. After lunch (elk burgers available) we stopped at a golf-course-turned-refuge-and-hawk-watch-site, where Eastern Phoebes patrolled the greens and Wood Ducks occupied a water hazard. In a nearby pond we scared up (literally) a Sora. We stopped our car for a small but fearsome Snapping Turtle, which stood its ground in the middle of the road. We escorted it to the roadside vegetation and watched it  disappear on an ancient reptilian mission.

Rain made our half-day Friday even shorter. After waiting out the showers in a hospitable Beans & Barley (a combination of Starbucks and mini-Whole Foods) in downtown Milwaukee, we returned to Lake Park to score a creekside Ovenbird and the familiar magnificent assortment (including a Blackpoll Warbler) in our favorite pine. The mystery bird of the day turned out to be a female Northern Parula. We rewarded ourselves with a four-star lunch at Barlotta’s lakeside restaurant and topped off the day with an authentic Midwestern Fish Fry dinner at Sullivan’s.

Saturday morning, Rich drove us to the Amtrak station for our departure to Chicago and points south, then dropped Chris B. at the airport. A cheerful and sensitive trip leader made for a thoroughly worthwhile visit to enjoy Midwestern birds!

————————————-

Join us next spring in Wisconsin! GGBA plans to sponsor more trips to Wisconsin (Mississippi Flyway) with Rich Cimino next May. For information, please email our volunteer Travel Coordinator Pat Kirkpatrick at patkirkpatrick14@gmail.com or her assistant Alexis Hummel at  avargas542@aol.com. For information on other out-of-town GGBA birding trips, see the Travel with GGBA page of our web site. Trips in the 2013-14 year will include Oaxaca (December 2013), Belize (February 2014), Northern Colombia (June 2014), Brazil (July 2014), Alaska, Ohio, Wisconsin, Oregon, South Texas, and Texas Hill Country. Details on these trips will be posted soon.