by Sue Leaf | May 3, 2021 | Birds, Environment
Leggy and elegant, the stately Great Blue Heron cuts a striking figure on Minnesota’s bird scene. We often see great blue herons wading in water on the edge of a pond, rapt and motionless, poised, it would seem, for a kill. Or they appear in the sky, necks drawn into...
by Sue Leaf | Mar 3, 2021 | Birds
We had two inches of fresh snow last night and the landscape is wintry as I write this, so it is hard to believe that in just three weeks it is likely we will hear the first Red-winged Blackbirds in local marshes. T.S. Roberts records the earliest arrival in...
by Sue Leaf | Feb 16, 2021 | Birds, Environment
A few years ago, I had the opportunity to view a short movie filmed by the University of Minnesota’s Raptor Center. The film showed a mature Bald Eagle writhing in the throes of a painful death from lead poisoning. Dr. Pat Redig, the director of the Center at the...
by Sue Leaf | Jan 24, 2021 | Birds, Environment
Despite the pandemic, Wild River Audubon’s 45th annual Christmas Bird Count went off without a hitch. On December 19, 2020, 38 participants fanned out in our count circle of fifteen-miles diameter, centered at County Roads 12 and 20, or counted at their backyard...
by Sue Leaf | Jan 24, 2021 | Birds
Hiking along the Temperance River on the North Shore in early November, I was looking for birds. Our list that weekend was miserably low. A yellowish-streaky bird with white wing bars flitted past me and landed in a nearby spruce. At last, I thought. A Goldfinch. But...
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