Monday, January 28

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We did an overnight trip with Barb up above the 45 parallel to the Sault Ste. Marie area. Added 12 new species to Michigan list for the year. I’m at 64 species and Lise is at 65.

A couple we could have gotten down here but some were really good birds to get. One was Northern hawk owl. This is a small, quite handsome, occasional winter visitor from parts further north. As posted, the owl was located at Curleze Corner Hair Salon.

Northern hawk owl. One classy looking owl.

One not too classy looking hair salon. I’m guessing the garage doors are so you can get your beehive hairdo out the door. Or a mullet gone bad. Maybe they do oil changes while your hair is drying.

Walk-ins welcome, but anyone walking there has a fair piece to walk.

In the same area we had not one, but two, snowy owls. Again, occasional winter visitors from up north. Last year there was a major irruption and they were appearing fairly far south. Not so much this year. They are really striking birds, especially when you see them fly against a dark cloudy background.  

Another classy owl. They can turn their head almost 180 degrees around. They have feathers on their feet to stay warm

Another lifer for both Lise and me was sharp-tailed grouse. We searched for them in the same area last year with no luck. I think our search engines weren’t tuned quite right. We needed to be looking for blobs up in the trees, not birds on the ground. Once we figured it out we found about seven of them. Plump little birds, just hanging out in the trees.

We also got a ruffed grouse, one of my nemesis birds last year. Getting one this early in the year is a good sign. This one was up in a tree eating catkins. I’ve never seen a grouse up in a tree. Usually they’re well camouflaged on the ground, exploding out right in front of you when you almost step on them, causing a minor heart attack.

Ruffed grouse eating catkins.

Other new ones for the Michigan list include pileated woodpecker, common raven, Northern shrike, rough-legged hawk, glaucous gull, hooded merganser, hoary redpoll, and pine grosbeak. This was only the second time I’ve seen pine grosbeaks and these cooperated for pictures.  

Rough-legged hawk. Biggish lens handheld so not too great a picture.

Northern shrike. Small bird, a bit far away, so another so-so picture.

Cooperative pine grosbeaks.

We did miss a couple we expected to get like evening grosbeaks, white-winged and red crossbills, pine siskins, and the nemesis gray jay. We tried really hard for a gray jay. Barb even tried the old “rattle a chip bag to bring them in trick” and it didn’t work. Second time they have shut us down. We even used Lay’s potato chips and they didn’t respond. So we ended up eating the potato chips. While we were rattling chip bags for gray jays Lise took pictures of an incredibly rare snow snake.

Barb with the chip bag and no gray jays. Yes, it was cold.

Lise’s snow snake.

We got to see some weirdness while up there. We went to the Dafter dump looking for gulls. I got the bright idea to walk around the dump on some snow covered railroad tracks for a better view. Bad idea. We got around the dump but the view wasn’t good and the air was worse. There was a vent pipe with so much methane gas coming out of it the air was distorted. The smell was bad enough to gag a maggot. I’m thinking it will be pretty interesting if one of the truck drivers flicks his Bic to light up a butt.

Methane vent. Breath deep, the gathering gloom…….

Then we found a half a trailer home. I’m guessing everything was literally split in half after the divorce. This thing reminded me of the football player Hacksaw Reynolds. In the late 60s his college team lost a big game. He was so mad he sawed a car in half with a hacksaw.

“For the divorce settlement we split everything down the middle, fair and square.”

We finished up Saturday evening with dinner at Antlers. Still a lot of dead things hanging on the wall. They have even branched out to tropical fish. I can’t believe that Antlers doesn’t make it onto chowhound.com.

The usual dead things on the wall.

The tropical fish selection.

All-in-all a good trip. Fun with friends, new species for the year, a couple lifers, and some serious weirdness. The only down side was the drive home. Making a winter trip in Michigan is always a gamble. The weather is about as stable as the Greek economy. We had to do about four hours in a nasty winter storm but we got back safe and sound. All is well.