Backyard wilderness

Birding is usually slow in June, though there were some interesting sightings, so I will start with turtles for something different. On June 3, it was around 70 degrees farenheit and a cool rain was falling by the end of my walk. A regular park walker and good park neighbor said she had just seen snapping turtles mating on the northeast corner of the lake near the park building.

By the time I got to that area, the turtles were resting and enjoying a cigarette. I might be exaggerating about the cigarette, but they were still there, in the water, very close to the shore. They were not wary as usual and I could carefully walk to within two feet of one of them. They were both 30 to 36 inches long. Five days later, just west of the Swingley Memorial Garden, at the top of the slope north of the lake, I saw a large snapping turtle come out from the tall plantings onto the mowed grass. I tried to turn it around and head it back to the lake with encouragement and a couple of sticks. But it would not cooperate, so I left it alone. There was not much else I could do.

I returned at the end of my walk to find, as I expected, the turtle had dug a small depression and was laying eggs and covering them. I don’t know if it was one of the turtles I had seen five days earlier, or how long the eggs take to hatch, another item for me to research, like the several other subjects I am behind on researching.

Another non-bird item: there were several reliable reports of deer in the park on Memorial Day weekend. I did not report them last month because, rightly or wrongly, I was worried about rotten kids or other misguided people bothering them. There have been no reports, to me anyway, of any deer since then. The reports ranged from a buck and a doe, a doe and a fawn, to “a deer.” I guess there could have been a buck, doe and fawn, and all the reports could be accurate. I made various searches specifically for deer, with no luck.

On my latest trip to South Dakota, where I am as I write this, I saw two deer standing in a beautiful green field in western Minnesota that looked like a scene from a tourist brochure. Then I took the tour loop through the Big Stone National Wildlife Refuge, where, in addition to various birds and the resident Bison herd, I saw twin deer fawns, not much larger than the greyhounds that sometimes walk around Powderhorn. The fawns were very cute and curious, like young kittens or puppies. I was going to try to pet one or wrestle it to the ground. They were so close, but not quite close enough for that.

Back to birds: Finally the last usual Heron family visitor returned to the lake. After seeing Great Egrets fly over the park for a couple of months, one finally stopped and spent a week at the lake in mid-June. A Black-crowned Night Heron was at the lake on June 19, and the two birds crossed paths while walking around the shore in opposite directions. Those are my only Heron family reports on land for the month.

Great Blue Herons and Great Egrets continue to fly over the park and yard quite often. My two usual reasons for a lack of bird variety this year (odd weather and the disruption of the lake rehabilitation project) were in fine form once again this June. The lake level was quite high in early June, and four to five feet high after the June 24 storm, which almost completely flooded the island. The island was temporarily made less hospitable by the netting and fencing put around the new plantings done early in June. I don’t know how long the barriers will stay in place.

The Usual Suspects

The Canada Geese and litter of six goslings continue to do well even though I think they let people get too close to them. A flock of forty Canada Geese flew over the lake early in the month and a group of three adult geese spent part of the day on the lake on June 16. The Wood Ducks and Mallards seem to be doing fine. I have given up on trying to figure out how many litters there are, but one Wood Duck litter had 23 ducklings early in the month. Occasionally there are minor disputes when babies try to join the wrong group and occasionally there are babies that are temporarily lost.

The Chipping Sparrows, Kingbirds, Goldfinches, Crows, and Downy and Hairy Woodpeckers are usually somewhere in the park. I did not see a hawk in the park in June but I heard a Peregrine Falcon one day in the neighborhood. The usual baby birds are often in the yard, mostly English Sparrows and Starlings, and some Blue Jays. We had a couple of baby crows for a few days, full-sized, but babies. I thought there was only one and I was trying to tame it (or them). A neighbor was concerned about one that was sitting somewhat motionless, but everything seemed OK. It was just not totally up to speed on flying. I thought the one the neighbor was concerned about had moved and spent hours sitting in my windshield wipers. It finally left, gently crashed into the garage door, unharmed, came through the yard and gently tripped and crashed again going over the picket fence. After all that, I saw that another one was still on the neighbor’s fence a little ways from where it had started the day. The parents were usually keeping an eye on them and were pretty aggressive verbally and physically when they found me getting too close to the babies. I think the young ones now know all the ropes.

I saw my first (and so far only) bat of the year in the front yard on June 14. Nighthawks were heard in the city on the 12th, and I heard some on the 13th. So far I’ve not seen or heard any in the neighborhood.

I’m running out of space and time. Hopefully next month I can finish my stories about the Great River Birding Festival.

Comments and observations are always welcome. Send them to me, in care of the Southside Pride. Thank you.