The Birders of Woodlawn

Male and Female Red Crossbills (S. Plessner)

Way back in February Greg Links told me that I should check out the birding at Historic Woodlawn Cemetery in Toledo.  When he told me this I was a little skeptical.  After thinking about it for sometime however, it totally made sense.  Cemeteries, especially older ones with mature trees, are excellent spots for birding.  I ended up going to Woodlawn several times.  The place produced a great variety of birds, including my lifer White-winged Crossbill.

Greg also mentioned that there was a group of birders that got together every Friday morning for a couple hours of birding at Woodlawn.  Since then, through various gatherings and events, I have met a couple of the people who attend these walks regularly.

The Birds of Woodlawn group was started by Woodlawn's Assistant Director Patty Toneff.  Patty keeps track of who comes to the walks and forwards the daily list of species to anyone who provides an email.  Currently, over 100 people receive the weekly list.

American White Pelicans (T. Thompson)

The group has birders with decades of experience, but also has a handful of newbies.  Relative beginners like Kendra Mock, Kimberli Allan, Brian and Kelly Navarette, and Julie Heitz may not be as quick to identify every bird, but the history and importance of a place like Woodlawn Cemetery is not lost on them.  Julie loves Woodlawn for the variety of habitat, and loves learning about all the influential Toledoens who have found their final resting place on the historic grounds.  When asked about her rarest bird sighting at Woodlawn, Julie sighted her beginner status and stated, "Everything has been rare for me!"

In addition to Greg Links, the more seasoned birders of the group include Sherry Plessner, Tim Thompson, Tim Drewyor, and Tim Haney.  Sherry serves as a volunteer naturalist for the Toledo Area Metroparks.  She is often one of the main leaders of the group.  The three Tims have been given the designations T1, T2, and T3.  Tim Haney (T1) has the most experience birding Woodlawn.  He worked at the cemetery for over 20 years, compiling a list that now stands at 203 species.  Tim has birded with some legendary nature lovers, including The Dean of Toledo birders, Lou Campbell.  Tim Drewyor (T2) has been birding Woodlawn for about 6 years.  Tim is held in high regard by many of the beginners and is one of the people the group depends on for getting on good birds.  Tim Thompson (T3) has only been birding at Woodlawn since January, but he is an avid and knowledgeable individual.  I have run into Tim at Oak Openings and other spots, and I always find myself smiling when I see him.  I think that's because he's one of those people who is always smiling or laughing about something.  Happiness is infectious!

White-eyed Vireo (J. Heitz)

Among the group, there is a wide range of favorite sightings.  Sherry was thrilled to get her lifer Red Crossbills at Woodlawn.  Several others mentioned greatly enjoying the White-winged Crossbills discussed earlier.  T3 got a kick out of the American White Pelican fly over the group was treated to one fortunate Friday.  The Navarette's were partial to two special sightings of a Blackburnian Warbler and an Eastern Kingbird.  T1 has too many great sightings to mention for this post.  I am considering posting all the information he provided me about his experiences at Woodlawn.  It was a wonderful read.  The one sighting that he mentioned that really made me say "Wow!" was one in which he spotted an American Bittern.  It was  perched atop a shrub, and did not move until he actually was able to touch the bird!

A red resident at Woodlawn (J. Heitz)

I asked the group what makes Woodlawn so special.  Many people mentioned the great variety of trees.  After all, the cemetery boasts over 300 different species of trees.  Others mentioned the architecture or the history.  Reading headstones like that of Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court Morrison Waite, the namesake for Waite High School, makes walking around Woodlawn Cemetery all that more interesting.  The most common answer, however, was the people they have met while birding at Historic Woodlawn Cemetery.  Birders are, by nature, amiable and helpful people.  Those that bird this once rural but now urban cemetery are no different.  The rest of their week may be filled with all of the usual responsibilities of life, but on Fridays from 8:30 to 10:30 they are at Woodlawn, helping each other see some really cool birds.

Thank you to everyone who answered my questions about your experiences at Woodlawn Cemetery.  I know there are more members to the group than those that were talked about in the post.  Hopefully nobody gets upset if they were left out.  If anyone does have a beef, they can take it up with me personally next Friday.  Provided everything works out, I plan on joining the group for some birding next week.  I'm really looking forward to meeting all of you.  Thanks again and happy birding!

Audrey Lee: The Baby Birder

If the birder was napping...does the Whooping Crane count?

So this past week was a whirlwind.  At 4am on Thursday August 1st Elissa started having contractions.  Less than 4 hours later we became parents for the second time.  Her name is Audrey Lee Brywczynski.  When she was born, she was 19 inches long and weighed 6lbs 10ozs.  It's amazing how such a little life can cause so much happiness.

Ruby has been adjusting well to the new addition to our family.  She still hasn't mastered her sister's name, but she is well aware that Audrey is in fact her sister.  Last night we let Ruby "hold" her during our bedtime story.  I know she is only 2 years old and Audrey isn't even 2 weeks old, but she already shows signs of being a very caring big sister.  I am a very proud father.

My wonderful wife was a shining example of someone who knows how to have a baby in record time.  So much so that one of the nurses told me that we were lucky we got to the hospital when we did.  Otherwise, she said, I would have been delivering a baby.  This statement terrified me.  Elissa said she probably would have just done it herself.  I have to believe I would be up to the task, but my wife is pretty self-sufficient sooo....

GB Heron pretending to be a Phalarope

So what have we been doing with our new baby?  Birding of course!  In fact, Audrey's first life bird was a Whooping Crane!  Elissa and I took a drive up to Schoonover WPA to see a beautiful individual who is apparently part of the Wisconsin population.  This guy evidently took a wrong turn somewhere, and I'm happy he did.  Whooping Cranes are an endangered species.  Their population got down to just 15 birds in the 1940's.  According to the Cornell Lab, there are about 600 birds today.  Knowing this information makes this sighting that much more special.

Tomorrow I will be taking part in a shorebird trip put on by Black Swamp Bird Observatory and The Toledo Naturalists Association.  I'm very excited about this trip because, like so many birders, I have trouble with shorebirds.  Having experts like Kenn and Kim Kaufman around really help when trying to ID tough birds.  One thing I've learned as an educator is to never be too proud to ask for help.  I'm sure I will be asking a few questions about this sometimes difficult but always exciting group of birds.  Happy birding y'all!

Whooping Crane hanging out with Sandhill Cranes

Birds in Profile: Black-billed Cuckoo

Black-billed Cuckoo

Some birds really ruffle my feathers.  Starlings will devour my suet before my woodpeckers even have a chance to get some grub.  Cowbirds lay their eggs in other birds' nests, threatening the survival of the host bird's brood.  The birds that really make me crazy, however, are the ones that I can not find.  They really tick me off.

For a while my nemesis bird was the Blue Grosbeak.  Thanks Greg Miller I was able to add that beauty to the Big List.  My current challenge: The Black-billed Cuckoo.

Many of you, mainly my friends who care little about birds, may be thinking, "He's totally making this up.  There aren't any Cuckoo birds in Northwest Ohio."  On the contrary, there are two species of Cuckoo that reside in the area during the summer months.  The more chatty and less elusive Yellow-billed Cuckoo is already on the list.  The Black-billed differs with the Yellow-billed in that it has a black bill (duh!), a red eye ring surrounding a black eye, a smooth monochromatic brown on the back of the head, neck and back, and has noticeably less white on the underside of the tail.  Yellow-billed's have a rufous colored patch on the wings in place of that smooth solid brown.

Cuckoos are a group of birds that are often heard but not seen.  They're very elusive creatures who move methodically from branch to branch.  I often hear Yellow-billed Cuckoos at Oak Openings, but have yet to hear the Black-billed.  Here's a short clip from YouTube that shows a Black-billed Cuckoo half-heartedly calling out.  When they really get going these birds can seem like they don't require oxygen to breath.  They go on and on and on...



When I've done these little bird vignettes in the past I always visit the Cornell Lab's All About Birds page.  It's a great place to get some very useful information about birds.  My favorite thing from this resource is the "Cool Facts" section.  Here they are for the Black-billed Cuckoo:

• Cuckoos eat many spiny caterpillars and the spines stick in the lining of the stomach.  The stomach lining periodically sheds to remove the spines.

• The apparent tendency to call more frequently before rain explains why both Black-billed and Yellow-billed Cuckoos are called "Rain Crows."

• The Black-billed Cuckoo is known occasionally to lay eggs in the nest of other bird species.

• The time from egg laying to young leaving the nest is, at 17 days, among the shortest for any bird.  Despite this speed, most pairs raise only one brood a year.

On that last point, Kenn Kaufman points out in Lives of North American Birds, that Black-billed Cuckoos may lay more eggs in a season depending on the abundance of caterpillars.

Speaking of Kenn Kaufman, I enlisted his expertise for this post.  For you non-birders who don't know Mr. Kaufman, he is an authority on birds in general.  He has been a bird brain for decades.  The Kaufman Field Guides are arguably the most useful quick reference material a birder can have.  He writes in various publications including Birds and Bloom.  He also happens to be married to Kimberly Kaufman, the unbelievably hard working executive director of the Black Swamp Bird Observatory.  Together, the Kaufman's have done wonders for birding in our area and around the world.  And like everyone else I have mentioned throughout the year, they happen to be really nice people.

Since I have been having such a tough time finding a Black-billed Cuckoo, I asked the expert a few key questions.  Is their a particular time of the day (or night) when they are most likely to call?  Do they usually sit at a particular height?  In Northwest Ohio, where are you most likely to see them?

Kenn gave me some great, but slightly depressing news in that it seems very possible that Black-billed Cuckoo might be one bird that might slip by me this year.  He stated that Black-billed Cuckoos are really tough to find in the summer.  Yellow-billed's will continue to call throughout the summer, but Black-billed's seem to quiet down after the spring migration and the early summer period.  He also said that they have a tendency to sit quietly at mid-levels in trees, especially in dense willows near marshes.  Magee Marsh should be a good spot for them, but Mr. Kaufman said that he has never found a single one there in summer.  Based on his response, the Oak Openings area seems to still be my best bet for a Black-billed Cuckoo.  

Kenn said that you really need to have precise locations to find a Black-billed Cuckoo in the summer.  He suggested that I try to catch them as a fall migrant.  There is a three week window in August and September that might afford me the opportunity to get one of these buggers before they fly south for the winter.

I'd like to thank Kenn Kaufman for graciously fielding my questions for this post.  Kenn has a few blogs of his own, and I'd like to highlight one before I go.  This post on his Crane Creek-Magee Birding blog is a very timely article because shorebirding is really going to get hot here in August.  Dad, I know shorebirds aren't your thing.  "They're too hard to identify."  Anything worth while isn't easy pops.  Happy birding everybody!

Information in this post was gleaned from:

Cornell Lab of Ornithology. Black-billed Cuckoo (website). Retrieved from http://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Black-billed_Cuckoo/lifehistory

Kaufman, K. (1996). Lives of North American Birds. New York, NY: Houghton Mifflin Books

Birding is My Escape

A favorite spot at Oak Openings

Since I graduated in 2007, I have applied at every major school district in Northwest Ohio.  I have had countless interviews.  Many times I get called back for second and third interviews.  The result at the end of this process is always the same.  Someone with more experience is chosen.  They wanted a hometown person for the position.  A few times I've found out that a board member's son was hired over me.  Many times a district will post an opening, you'll do all the paperwork for the application, and they will fill the job internally.  When you find out that any of these things happen, you can't help but feel a little depressed, angry, and hopeless.

Birding has become my escape from constantly thinking about my professional failures.  When I'm out looking for and listening to birds, I am able to forget about these frustrations at least for a little bit.

My wife is always positive no matter how low I get.  I feel very fortunate to have someone like her in my life.  Here she is nearly 9 months pregnant and she's the one talking me up.  She's one tough cookie.  Although I am anxious and apprehensive about what life will be like with two crazy kids, I am so happy that I am married to such a special woman.  With her by my side, I know things are going to work out.

Last week I found out that I was passed over for two jobs.  I was so confident about the prospect of getting one of those positions that I even thought about how my Big Year would have to be set aside for a more important purpose.  Bad news: I didn't get either job.  Good news: I get to keep birding.  What can I say?  It makes me happy when I otherwise would feel pretty crappy.

Tomorrow (or today since it is now after midnight), my dad, my aunt and I will be heading out to Ottawa County to see what's flying around.  Stops will probably include Maumee Bay State Park, Camp Perry, Magee, Metzgers, and Pearson Park.  I haven't added a bird since July 11th, so I'm chomping at the bit to get a new one.  We'll see what happens.  Happy birding!

Target Birding with Greg Miller

Greg Miller and yours truly!

I know what you must be thinking.  The answer to your question is yes.  I only go target birding with guys named Greg.

For crazy birders, no introduction is needed for Greg Miller.  For my non-birder friends who may be reading this, Greg Miller is a bit of a birding celebrity.  One year of his life is documented in the book The Big Year.  In 2011, that book was made into a feature film of the same name in which Jack Black plays Brad Harris (the fictional Greg Miller), a computer analyst who decides to make 1998 his Big Year.  The movie is good, but the real story is better.  I highly recommend the read.

Although Greg has received quite a bit of attention due to his amazing story, he is a very grounded individual.  Elissa and I spent about 5 hours birding with Greg Miller, and I was very impressed with how positive a person he was.  Although Greg helped me get Blue Grosbeak and Barn Owl checked off my list, my favorite part of the whole experience was listening to his stories, knowledge, and philosophy.

Elissa and I drove down to Millersburg, Ohio Tuesday night.  We stayed at the Hotel Millersburg.  When we arrived there at 10pm, we found that our key had been left for us in the foyer.  Nobody was at the front desk.  We got up at 5am.  I dropped the key in a drop box on our way out the door.  Nobody was at the front desk.  Great service!

We picked up Greg at his place around 6am.  Less than an hour later, Blue Grosebeak went from target bird to bird #249 on my list.  An hour or so later, Greg took us to a local farm to look for bird #250.  Sitting up inside the top of a grain silo were two adult Barn Owls.  Why I didn't take a picture of these guys I have no idea.  Two Barn Owl butts would have been a funny image to pass along.

Dickcissel

Although we struck out on Kentucky Warbler, Prarie Warbler, and Lousiana Waterthrush, I found the trip down to Amish country well worth it.  I hope we get the opportunity to bird with Greg Miller again.  If you would like a custom birding tour from Greg Miller I encourage you to visit his blog at Greg Miller Birding.

On our way back from Millersburg, Elissa and I stopped at Killdeer Plains Wildlife Area.  We didn't spend a lot time there, and I didn't add any birds there, but Elissa did got her lifer Dickcissel.  I know the last part of that sentence might be difficult for some of my friends to leave alone.  I can't help what people name these silly birds.

In other news, I added Broad-winged Hawk yesterday at Oak Openings.  My goal of 300 species feels very reachable now.  I'm excited to see how many I can get before my trip to Texas at the end of the year.  Now that Blue Grosebeak is out of the way, my new nemesis bird is the Black-billed Cuckoo.  They're pretty sneaky birds so there's a good chance this one might not make the list.  We'll see!  Happy birding everybody!