Wisconsin Statewide Birding Report 7.12.13
Summer birding is at a turning point. This is a great time for backyard bird watching or visiting your favorite local patch as bird song declines and family groups with fledged young become more visible. Forest edges, brushy fields, and emergent wetlands should be excellent this time of year for spotting a wide variety of species. Bird feeders may see a slight increase in activity. Providing water sources for birds is a great idea during these drier, warmer months. Believe it or not southbound ?fall? migration is well underway with sightings of least sandpipers, lesser yellowlegs, ruddy turnstone, black-bellied plover, short-billed dowitcher, and other shorebirds at interior wetlands and along the coastal Great Lakes. These represent the vanguard of adult shorebirds that nested in the arctic tundra of northern Canada and are headed to wintering areas from the Gulf and Atlantic Coasts south to portions of South America. Their offspring will make the trek on their own in August-September. Federally-endangered piping plovers successfully hatched young from five nests on Lake Superior?s Long Island, while Kirtland?s warblers in Adams County suffered a tough breeding season ? most nests were lost to predation and only a handful produced fledged young. Birders seeking unusual gulls continue to find success at Sheboygan?s North Point, where rarities such as laughing, little, and Franklin?s gulls are still being seen. Find out more about summer birding opportunities at dnr.wi.gov/topic/outdoorrecreation/activities/birding.html and help us track bird populations by reporting your observations from field or feeder at ebird.org/wi. - Ryan Brady, Bureau of Wildlife Management research scientist, Ashland
