Hummingblog

Wooded Isle Report, Chicago, IL, USA

I live on the lakefront in Chicago, IL and it offers great birding opportunities year round. Spring and Fall migration are always great, and Winter birding brings us gulls, owls, ducks and winter finches. Spring is well underway now in Chicago with birds such as Eastern Phoebe, Hermit Thrush, Northern Flicker, Brown Creeper, Eastern Meadowlark, Song Sparrow, and Yellow-rumped Warbler already having arrived.

This morning I drove down to the south side of Chicago to my favorite spring-birding location, Wooded Isle. My walk there goes through several different habitat types including open water (Lake Michigan), beachfront (64th St. Beach), grassland (Bobolink Meadow), pond (Lagoons surrounding Wooded Isle), and deciduous forest (Wooded Isle). We don't have many evergreen trees there, but there are a few that do get birds like Pine Warbler, Long-eared Owl, Northern Saw-whet Owl, etc. There is also quite a bit of open parkland with all types of large and small trees throughout that also offer up some goodies.

This morning I started my day looking for the male Harlequin Duck that was seen earlier in the year and then again by my friend Scott yesterday along the rocks on the lakefront. Couldn't relocate the bird, but along the way I walked through the park at the Promontory Point and picked up Savannah Sparrow, 3 Fox Sparrows, Belted Kingfisher, Golden-crowned Kinglet, Field Sparrow, Swamp Sparrow, and Double-crested Cormorant. I soon ran into my friend Paul and we started birding together and were immediately rewarded with a record early arrival of Barn Swallow (Paul has been keeping detailed arrival/departure data for the past 25 odd years) The previous record arrival for Barn Swallow was April 7, 1980 and '81. Throughout the rest of the morning we saw 4 Eastern Meadowlarks, Great Blue Heron, American Pipit, Common Merganser, Bufflehead, Horned Grebe, Yellow-rumped Warbler (over 20 and all but one of them males), Winter Wren (only seen by Paul), Carolina Wren, Ruby-crowned Kinglet, Tree Swallow, and Black-crowned Night Heron.

Arrivals that we are expecting to show up any day include Pectoral Sandpiper, Wilson's Snipe, Louisiana Waterthrush, Blue-gray Gnatcatcher, Merlin, Bonaparte's Gull, Greater Yellowlegs, and Vesper Sparrow.

I'll keep you posted.

Promontory Point

Wooded Isle