Hawkfest Delivers

What a wonderful day at Lake Erie Metropark. From the kids’ activities to the professional bird counters there was something for everyone to do. Booths for many birding associations, bird info, seminars, live bird displays and a visit by a pair of bald eagles were some of the happenings.

The bird counters set up by the boat launch area and were busy counting. Over 200,000 birds had been counted in the previous week. Saturday was slow, with the strong breeze out of the south hampering kettling for the raptors. Kettling is a group of raptors soaring in a circle riding the warm air drafts and easing their way south. They don’t get the warm updrafts over water so Lake Erie funnels them to the very location of the Metropark.

I learned birding from my brother Roger, who just recently passed away. After my Dad passed away Rog took me on his family vacations and taught me how to spot birds and what to look for in identifying them. From Colorado to Lower and Upper Michigan I got to see a vast variety of birds. That experience has stayed with me and kept me interested in bird watching. Birding is a great exercise in that it only takes a bird ID book and a pair of binoculars to participate. Once you try it you’ll be hooked.

                            

One of the other things going on during the festival was the banding of raptors. The USFWS had a capture operation set up in the area. With the migration in full swing this is a perfect time for them to do this. A report came in that they had captured and banded a Broad Wing Hawk. Normally they catch smaller raptors like the kestrel so there was much excitement about this. After some info talk the captor was released.

Fly away Rog.

Get Outdoors Downriver

Lake Erie Metropark's Hawkfest

This is must see fall action. The raptors migrate south and Lake Erie funnels them west, right over LEMP. Hopefully the timing is right so many kettles will be seen drifting south on the drafts of warm air, drafts aren't found on the lake as much so the birds stick to the warmer land. All that's needed is a pass to the park, binoculars, food for a picnic and the need for having a fun time.

See hawks in the sky and meet a few at Lake Erie Metropark’s “24th Annual Hawkfest,” a two-day celebration of the annual fall migration of birds of prey - hawks, eagles, falcons and vultures - on Saturday and Sunday, September 21 and 22, from 10 am to 5 pm each day at the Marshlands Museum and Nature Center of Lake Erie Metropark in Brownstown.

Programs include talks on birds of prey, including an osprey update, raptor rehabilitation and the Oak Openings Raptor Project. Members of the Michigan Hawking Club will bring hawks and discuss falconry. Live birds of prey will be brought out during special programs by Joe Rogers on Saturday at 10 am and 3 pm, and the Howell Nature Center on Sunday at 11 am and 3 pm. Also, on Sunday, Reg Pettibone’s Native American Hawk Dancers will perform traditional “eagle dances” at 4 pm. Kids can play educational games and make crafts.

Each September, tens of thousands of broad-winged hawks pass over the park, which is designated as an Important Bird Area and one of the premier hawk watching sites in North America. All together, about 16 or 17 different species of migrating birds of prey fly overhead during the fall migration season. Hawk watchers will be counting migrating raptors, and their spotting scopes can be used to take a peek at birds in the sky. Typically, 200,000 birds of prey migrate over Lake Erie Metropark from September through November on their southward journey.

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The River has a Thousand Eyes

Sounds reminiscent of an old Twilight Zone episode, or a good day fishing in the spring when the walleyes are running. No, this is about the new world we live in. Cameras are every where from elevators to the streets of Missouri. Now an unfortunate rule breaker has been caught right at the head of the Detroit River. Fishing for the favored walleye he caught a trash fish, at least in his mind. The trash fish was a musky, not of legal size, so he made sure it wouldn't survive and then threw it back in.

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Everyone should be alarmed by this video, not in the way as it pertains to Ray Rice but in a way that cheapens our natural resources. Musky fishermen and especially musky clubs on both sides of the border are spitting mad about this. Some musky enthusiasts even have long tanks on their boats that they put caught fish in to recover after a long battle. These tanks are very expensive and almost required when fishing when the water is warm. So you can understand their voracity when someone kills one of their future prizes.

The buzz created by the video finally got to the authorities and he will be dealt with thru the proper channels.

http://blogs.windsorstar.com/news/accused-muskie-hater-apologizes-for-killing-fish-and-heated-confrontation

Get Outdoors Downriver.

Water, Water Everywhere, Nor Any Drop to Drink

Blue green algae toxins have brought back the curse of the ancient Mariner.
Water everywhere but none to drink. The problem has existed for many years but for some reason no has become acute. Over 40 years ago there was a documentary about the Great Lakes and the narrator canoes from Lake Superior to Lake Ontario. As I remember the context of the film, past history of the waterway was compared to current conditions. When the canoeist gets to Lake Erie he dips his paddle into semi-pristine water and lifts it up to drink from the run off. Quite a trick to pull off but when you're thirsty it is refreshing. As the paddle hits the apex of the lift the water turns from 17th century water to the sludge that existed in the 1960's, green and chunky. Along with DDT and mercury problems many considered Lake Erie dead.

 

An effort was started to clean up the Great Lakes and things turned around quickly. However there's always been an algae bloom in Lake Erie and this causes a dead zone that can cause major fish die offs. The lake is shallow in terms of the rest of the Great Lakes and accepts many chemicals from the Detroit River and the Maumee. This feeds the algae and along with the warm temperatures of the shallow water their population takes off.


 







The problem is very complex with contributions coming from fertilizers and the waste of animals, including humans. Nowhere else on the Great Lakes does this problem happen even though almost every lake has the same types and amounts of contributors. Thankfully now the Feds are chipping in. $12 million is set aside to find out where the worst contributor exist. From manure to excrement to farm runoff, how much and where from. Hopefully we'll get some answers that solve this big problem and get the albatross off our necks.