Looking Back to Late August – Part II

Posted on January 17, 2022 by Lisa Rest

There will likely be one more post from earlier in August, as I have discovered a few more interesting photographs. This exercise is somewhat inspired by creating temporary room on my hard drive for my most recent daily recordings with the indoor birds. Everything takes up so much space, it’s all a shell game.

I really like the photograph below, even though it’s not in perfect focus. Sort of tropical looking compared to the way things look lately…

A bee on a Yellow Coneflower…

I think Baltimore Orioles were already becoming scarce after breeding season.

I was surprised to find a very raggedy looking juvenile Blue Grosbeak in my photos. I am not sure I knew what it was while I took the pictures.

By the same token, I think the photographs below are of a juvenile Purple Finch and not the House Finch I reported to ebird. But since individual distinctions are so difficult to make, I don’t feel like updating my entry.

White Snakeroot and a Goldenrod Soldier Beetle below. I am glad I identified some of these species when I first reviewed them because I have forgotten most of them and look forward to relearning them this summer. The contrast between seasons is almost like what it takes to get acclimated to another ecosystem: I have to refresh my memory every year. That goes for a lot of bird calls I haven’t heard in a while too. But I am really looking forward to renewed confusion!

A Wild Indigo Duskywing and a Silvery Checkerspot below, which I will likely have to relearn to identify again. The butterfly at the top of the post is a Silver-spotted Skipper – which I have marked as “immature” thanks to some helpful lepidopterist on the Internet.

So, the Portage stream, as it was, all green and overgrown… and Canada Geese adorning another part of it.

Blue Dancer Damselfly of 2021 – the most common last year

It turns out I’m not completely done with last August, but first I must return with a long-anticipated trip to the lakefront Sunday, which will feature lots of ice. A reality check, so to speak.

Going Back a Bit – Now and Then

Posted on December 27, 2021 by Lisa Rest

Suffice it to say we are presently in the middle of a cloud. I took the little camera out this morning trying to capture it. The rain overnight and the cloud cover made the prospect of going for a walk in the woods less attractive than usual.

In the backyard, the cloud continued…

This is a perfectly senseless segue to some photos from July 31st taken at the Portage on the cusp of what would soon be the beginning of fall migration. The photos have been languishing on my hard drive and in the name of creating space I have archived them to storage. I found I had one photograph of a Big Bluestem that day in my backyard (below).

It appears to have been a suitably sunny morning at the Portage.

It was getting more difficult to find an Indigo Bunting still singing (above) and what was my last attempt to capture a Ruby-throated Hummingbird in the Monarda below.

A Chimney Swift…

Summertime flora…

Tall Bellflower, also at the top of the post

An elusive Gray Catbird in a mulberry tree…

As I recall there wasn’t enough water to support a lot of turtles last summer but here is one.

An Osprey flew over…

A young American Robin perched on the statue, getting its bearings…

Belted Kingfishers are not often easy to capture but I managed this one, a male.

Ah, dragonflies… a female 12-Spotted Skimmer.

The Portage pond, as it were, on the left, and the low level of the Des Plaines River on the right.

Two Cabbage White Butterflies…

A Monarch Butterfly in the Red Milkweed below.

And a Pearl Crescent Butterfly…

I have been out to the Portage a couple times in the last week and will be back with some of that, but I thought it might be nice to briefly remember what the sunlight looked like in the middle of summer before we finally plunge into some winter weather. Rain may turn to snow with some accumulation tomorrow.

Summer Slowdown at the Portage

Posted on August 22, 2021 by Lisa Rest

I went rather late to the Portage yesterday morning. I chalked it up to being tired after swimming late Friday night and not happy getting up in the dark. I have been to the Portage a few more times that I haven’t written about yet, but I didn’t take too many pictures yesterday so this is about the size of a blog post I can handle at the moment.

Sometime this past week, after picking up my new prescription glasses, it occurred to me that the viewfinder on my camera might be dirty. I have had a snap-on cover over the LCD display since 2013, and I don’t think I ever removed it to clean it! There was dust and dirt and who knows what else, and while it doesn’t exactly cover the viewfinder, it snaps onto it to align with the LCD display. So after ordering another cover in case I messed up trying to remove and clean, I cleaned the cover, the LCD display and the viewfinder, replaced the cover and solved the main reason why I haven’t been able to focus the camera. One of those “Duh, is it plugged in?” moments…

There weren’t many birds to see yesterday, and for the most part those that I did see were very far away. But now that I am able to focus…sometimes it’s easier to see them with the camera than my binoculars. Two distant male American Goldfinches below…

There were several male Baltimore Orioles about but they didn’t sit still for long.

I was surprised to find what looks like a juvenile Blue Grosbeak in my photographs. I was listening to chip notes that sounded very metallic like a cardinal’s but wasn’t exactly sure who I was following with my lens in the photos below, due to the backlighting making it difficult to see. Blue Grosbeaks are not common at the Portage.

Just when I was about to give up on Robins, I did find the flock as I was heading out of the woods. I caught this one on its way to join a few others in the bare tree branches below. And way in the upper left is an Eastern Kingbird which otherwise would never have made it to the list. So it pays sometimes to take pictures of distant backlit birds.

Pretty well-disguised, I had to look at this photograph more than a few times before I could find the bird in it, which appears to be a young Gray Catbird. I heard several along the trail, but did not see the ones I heard.

My best close encounter was this juvenile male House Finch.

I have been looking for these Damselflies on the back trail that leads out to the train tracks and runs parallel to the river. This one was nice enough to stop and pose for me.

More pollinators…

This young-looking House Wren was quite far away…

Even farther away was a flock of birds that, until I could blow them up on my laptop later, I couldn’t identify. They turned out to be Cedar Waxwings.

I have become more interested in the plant life that seems to be forever changing at the Portage as more and more invasive species are removed. Having said that, there’s still a potpourri of natives and non-natives. The distant fruits on the left appear to be Pokeweed. The pink flowers in the upper righthand corner are persicaria longiseta which I have been pulling out of my yard for years, as it is non-native (it seems to have a million common names, among them, Oriental Lady’s Thumb). The white flowers are White Snakeroot which I have also been pulling out of my yard before they ever got to bloom. It’s native but weedy.

We’re in a moderate drought again, with periodic promises of rain that so far have not amounted to much.

One more photo of the Silver Spotted Skipper which, in this cropping, at least, makes me appreciate Giant Ragweed a bit more.

I have seven more days of work. It seems hard to believe.

I didn’t go out this morning because I wanted to be home for the “live” videotaped broadcast of Unity Temple’s last virtual service. My friend Linda Rios and I contributed with our musical offering recorded about a month ago, after several false starts and some procrastination. We played Schubert’s Sonatine in D Major for the Prelude and two other shorter pieces: Hommage a J.S. Bach by Hans Andre-Stamm for the anthem and Wait There by Yiruma for the postlude. We will be going back to live services which to be streamed online, but without the congregation as originally planned. The choir also had its first rehearsal outdoors in another church’s garden, complete with chairs set up, a keyboard for the accompanist, new music to learn and a cicada chorus which never stopped singing. We are going to continue to rehearse in this format until we run out of daylight, I guess. See what happens…

I know I am always making promises but I will be back with more from previous Portage visits – before fall migration clamors for my remaining disk space.

Summer Slough

Posted on August 8, 2021 by Lisa Rest

Even though it’s not a great photograph, I am leading off this post from McGinnis Slough on July 17 with this rather rare sighting of two Trumpeter Swans and their three Cygnets. While one can normally count on seeing the swans, albeit from a great distance way on the other side of the slough, the largest part of the slough has virtually no open water, so the swans moved to the small portion of water that is closer to LaGrange Road. I saw them through the tall grasses and reeds that grow close to the trail. I posted close-ups of the adults in March of 2019 when there was excessive flooding which enticed them to check out what this side of the slough was like. Here’s a link to that post. https://wordpress.com/post/musicbirdblog.com/21280

Below are two photos of what the larger body of water looks like without much water in it. If the swans nested in their traditional location, I wonder how difficult it was to move the kids all the way across this marsh.

I heard more birds than I saw. The Marsh Wrens are always frustrating to me this time of year. I hope to start going back next weekend as fall migration approaches, and maybe I’ll get luckier. In the meantime, below are some more photos of the swan family. They were joined briefly by a Wood Duck.

Butterflies are not in great numbers, and I missed seeing the dragonflies I would expect to see. But it’s always nice to see a beautiful Monarch.

Below you might be able to see the Great Black (Digger) Wasps on the Red Milkweed along with the butterfly.

Northern Crescents seem to be everywhere this summer. They are very tiny but colorful so they stand out.

Here’s a new wildflower discovery for me. It’s called Self-Heal or prunella vulgaris.

A little more water…but no birds in it.

There were a few Great Blue Herons – which I managed to capture off and on.

And it’s bunny rabbit season…

I am trying to stay grounded but it’s hard. I am in limbo, shuffling work, my envisioned future without the stress of it, and the shape-shifting present we all share. Swimming, music and the birds will keep me going. I have had enough of the summer heat and look forward to spending more time outside. Fall migration will begin soon, and with it I will be leading several Saturday bird walks. I dream of visiting more places once with my weekdays are free.

Thanks for stopping by, I treasure your interest and support!

Goose Lake Prairie

Posted on July 30, 2021 by Lisa Rest

I missed my annual visit to this place on the July 4th weekend. Then two Sundays ago, I decided to see what it looked like two weeks later. Weather conditions were favorable and I had no other plans, so it seemed like a good thing to do after I psyched myself up for the nearly hourlong drive. How spoiled I have become zipping over to the Portage in five minutes every weekend.

I don’t know why I have never bothered to look at the signs before but this time I paid more attention to them. The one below, however, is the only one the birds did not decorate. The rest, which explained more about the plants and the history of the place, were too messy to include here.

The parking lot was empty. However I was greeted by a Killdeer. If I remember correctly, there was a Killdeer here last time I visited. I suspect they nest near the Visitor Center. Also below is a recording from the parking lot.

I always count on seeing and hearing Dickcissels here and I was not disappointed. Except there seemed to be fewer individuals to photograph. The one below, perched and singing which is how you normally find them, was still farther away than I would have preferred. The Dickcissel’s song is below the pictures and there is also a Field Sparrow singing in the background.

Field Sparrows are lovely little birds and I was happy to see and hear them.

I got a closer look at this Field Sparrow with a worm.

View of the Visitor Center from the trail

I heard more Common Yellowthroats than I saw, which is typically the case. This one would not turn around and face me.

It took me quite a while to find a Song Sparrow, of all things.

I decided that the prairie plants were as spectacular as the birds and easier to photograph. I was a little disappointed to find the Purple Loosestrife as it is not a native species.

Below, a Monarch Butterfly enjoying a Compass Plant flower.

I couldn’t stop taking pictures of this tiny Northern Crescent butterfly.

On a small piece of remaining boardwalk. I found a Red Admiral trying to blend in with some coyote scat. The other individual was more discretely checking out the gravel trail.

There didn’t seem to be many Indigo Buntings but in general, the birds were busy nesting and not displaying. I did manage to capture this one.

Great Blue Herons flew past, but I missed seeing any up close. There was one barely visible when I reached the Goose Lake, such as it is, but I did not want to disturb it so I reversed course.