Tag Archives: Chipping Sparrow

Before the Deluge

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Portage IMG_4961_1

The picture above was taken on April 14 at the Chicago Portage. There had been some rain, but the deluge was yet to come. The colors were still muted, with hardly any green. After the Portage, I continued on to part of Ottawa Trail Woods for the first time, searching for signs of spring.

Female Ruddy Duck

Female Ruddy Duck

I was a bit surprised to see this lone female Ruddy Duck at the Portage, napping. A little farther down stream were Blue-Winged Teal. Perhaps this couple was looking for a nesting spot.

Blue-Winged Teal

Blue-Winged Teal

The Canada Goose below was sleeping peacefully on her nest, incubating her brood. But I am afraid she has probably been washed out by all the rain that followed.

Canada Goose on nest

Canada Goose on nest

An early female Red-Winged Blackbird was sitting quietly off to the side.

Female Red-Winged Blackbird

Female Red-Winged Blackbird

Ruby-Crowned and Golden-Crowned Kinglets were everywhere. This particular Ruby-Crowned seemed to be having a little trouble controlling his crown in the wind. But in the second photo it really looks like a Crown sitting on top of his head.

Ruby-Crowned Kinglet

Ruby-Crowned Kinglet

RC Kinglet IMG_5262_1

Here’s a Golden-Crowned Kinglet, for comparison.

Golden-Crowned Kinglet

Golden-Crowned Kinglet

The sunshine, which had been in short supply, brought the turtles out of their sleep. This is but a small group: there were at least thirty.

Turtles IMG_5384_1

A freight train crosses the Des Plaines River.

Portage Freight Train over the DesPlaines IMG_5269_1

This Chipping Sparrow disappears right into the tree colors surrounding him.

Chipping Sparrow

Chipping Sparrow

Yellow-Bellied Sapsuckers almost blend into the birch trees.

Yellow-Bellied Sapsucker

Yellow-Bellied Sapsucker

Oh, just one more turtle. I couldn’t resist.

Painted Turtle

Painted Turtle

At the end of the day, the emblematic first warbler of spring, the Yellow-Rumped, still vies for my attention.

Yellow-Rumped Warbler

Yellow-Rumped Warbler

More to come…after the downpours.

 

The Other Half of Last Sunday

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McGinnis Slough

McGinnis Slough

After I visited the Chicago Portage last Sunday, I went to McGinnis Slough, another of my favorite haunts, to see what was up besides the wind.

Although the big draw for McGinnis is the slough, often most species are too far away to photograph over the phragmites. With a scope one could see lots of Ruddy Ducks, Ring-Necked Ducks, Canvasback, Bufflehead and two Trumpeter Swans, to name a few species. But the best picture I could get was of two happy Mallards.

Mallards at McGinnis IMG_4576_1
On land, I did see two Eastern Bluebirds. Here’s one.

Eastern Bluebird

Eastern Bluebird

McGinnis Slough IMG_4602_1
Soon there will be Wood Ducks hanging out in the backwater sections of the slough.

Just like last time I was here, I found one warbler, a Yellow-Rumped, looking a bit spiffier.

Yellow-Rumped Warble

Yellow-Rumped Warbler

And then when I thought I had seen everything, a small flock of Chipping Sparrows appeared, foraging in the grass where a path is cut to walk to the south end of the slough.

Chipping Sparrow

Chipping Sparrow

I got lucky when one Chipping Sparrow flew up into a nearby tree and decided to model all his sides for me. The last photo might make an excellent quiz shot. 🙂

Chipping Sparrow McGinnis IMG_4687_1Chipping Sparrow McGinnis IMG_4688_1Chipping Sparrow McGinnis IMG_4692_1

Sparrow City

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Back at work, my opportunities to see migrants back home have been few so far. I hope to get caught up with some of the birds tomorrow and in the next few weeks. It’s really hard to think about anything else during migration!

White-Throated Sparrow

White-Throated Sparrows are everywhere, and there sometimes seem to be more of them this year. One day I’m sure there were at least 100 in the little area of Grant Park I still frequent. I have photographed so many of them over the years I often disregard them looking for someone different, but I hate to overlook a bird who’s posing. And even if I stop looking at them, they invariably sing their way back into my consciousness.

White-Crowned Sparrow

The White-Crowned Sparrows are next in number. They’re singing quite a bit too.

Chipping Sparrow

There also seems to be a lot of Chipping Sparrows this year. They are a bit smaller than the other sparrows and can disappear into a few tufts of grass, so it was nice to run into this guy who seemed to be as interested in me as I was in him.

Hanging out with some Chipping Sparrows were three Indigo Buntings. Here’s one of them.

Indigo Bunting

Migrants aren’t only in the park. I found a Savannah Sparrow at 155 North Wacker Drive on my way into work this week.

Savannah Sparrow

I’d been looking for a Lincoln’s Sparrow ever since I tried to make a shaded Song Sparrow into one last week, so I was more than happy to photograph this little guy.

Lincoln’s Sparrow

Lincoln’s always seem so good-natured to me. There’s something bouncy and fresh about this bird with his delicate streaking.

Lincoln’s Sparrow

Back out in the grass, someone looked different. He was far away, but I recognized him immediately. A Clay-Colored Sparrow. In breeding plumage, a downright snazzy looking bird. He was the highlight of my sparrow saga.

Clay-Colored Sparrow

Maybe some day I will bond with a Clay-Colored Sparrow the way I did with this White-Throated one.

Southern Illinois paradise

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Sandstone cliff

I have been in the southernmost part of my state the past few days and I may as well have been in another country. I had no Internet access but did not miss it. The pristine habitat of the Shawnee region is so remarkable, it is easy to slip into a sense of timelessness. And there is no limit to the discoveries one can make. Our stay was much too short.

Summer Tanager

Warbling Vireo

There were birds everywhere.

Black and White Warbler

Eastern Phoebe

Great Crested Flycatcher

The most elusive birds periodically became cooperative.

Prothonotary Warbler

This Prothonotary Warbler has staked out his territory in the wonderful Heron Pond portion of the Cache River Basin.

A boardwalk invites us into the thick of it all.

It was hard to leave.

We heard Kentucky Warblers everywhere we went, but did not see one until the morning of our departure.

This Kentucky serenaded us from his digs in Giant City.

Kentucky Warbler

Kentucky Warblers spend a lot of time furtively foraging on the ground which makes them hard to see, but this one was nice enough to fly up and perch just above our heads almost at eye level. What a beautiful bird.

Spring arrivals

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FOY or FOS? I suppose it all depends on the distinction you want to make. FOY is First of Year, FOS is First of Season.

Yesterday in the park there were four new species of birds, first for my season or my year. Sneaking out of the office two afternoons in a row has paid off.

Yellow-Bellied Sapsucker

A Yellow-Bellied Sapsucker. No wait, I saw one a few days ago. Well, this one was new anyway.

Brown Creeper

A Brown Creeper.

Rusty Blackbird

A Rusty Blackbird. I was looking for these guys. There were about six of them yesterday, but today they were gone so I’m glad I got a chance to visit with them. I took so many pictures of this one he finally started singing, to break the monotony of his photo shoot.

Ruby-Crowned Kinglet

A Ruby-Crowned Kinglet. I saw another today who wouldn’t sit still long enough. Sometimes they’re very cooperative. Rarely do I see the Ruby Crown he’s named for.

Field Sparrow

and today, in addition to a better view of a Field Sparrow than that when I saw my first last week,

Chipping Sparrow

there was a beautiful Chipping Sparrow, as an added bonus. This was a FOY.

Red Admiral

The Red Admirals were big on sunshine today.

Song Sparrow

And although Song Sparrows have been around for weeks, you never know when you’re going to find a particularly handsome one.

More to come when I get a little less bogged down at work!