This was a rare summer because June had nearly expired before we made the trek up north to visit family.  With a prolonged school year, Bible school, and swimming lessons, a trip to God’s country was tough to pull off until just recently.  Besides family and amazing scenery, northern Minnesota is also attractive to us because it is full of incredible birds in the summertime.  Many birds that people only see during migration are summer residents in the north woods.  There were a couple migrants that we missed out on this spring that we were hoping to get while in the northland – the Blue-headed Vireo and the Black-throated Green Warbler.  Ever since Evan and I took a birding walk at Bear Head Lake State Park last year, the Black-throated Green Warbler has been one that we have wanted to find.  Its cool appearance and elusiveness made it all the more attractive.  Any bird that requires four words for its name is a good bird.

While our two target birds could probably be found in our parents’ back yards, there was another target bird that popped up on our radar early this summer along the North Shore of Lake Superior.  We learned that the beautiful Black-throated Blue Warbler can be found consistently at Oberg Mountain near Tofte. My wife and I have always loved going to the North Shore, so we decided to start our Up North trip by camping at Temperance River State Park which is just a few miles away from Oberg Mountain.

I was excited to be back birding in the woods, hunting for warblers. That’s how this hobby began for me a little over a year ago.  When we pulled into Temperance River State Park and got out of the car to register at the office, the woods were alive with all kinds of terrific bird songs that we don’t hear at our home.  After all, 16 species of warblers nest here, whereas we have just a couple species back home.  While I was anxious to start checking out everything with feathers, we had camp to set up.   I did manage to get out a little before dark to preview what might be in store for us the next day.  Right away I came across an American Redstart singing away.  This was a a treat to see one sitting still.  During migration we saw lots, but they were constantly moving.

Then in the distance I heard the Black-throated Green Warbler sing just one time!  I knew the song well because we’d been studying it.  Birding by ear is about the only way to find a specific bird this time of year.  Its song is a buzzy “zoo-zee-zoo-zoo-ZEE!” It was here!  Now we just had to wait until morning to look for it.

I was up the next morning before everyone else, so I walked around the campground just to see if I could find this warbler.  Within a minute of starting my walk, I heard “zoo-zee-zoo-zoo-ZEE!” This persistent singer made him easy to track down.  It was right behind the park office.  After a year of waiting, I finally laid eyes on this great-looking bird.

Because this bird was singing on territory I knew it would be easy to bring Evan back later to find it.  So after letting him sleep in, I brought him out to see this life bird and get some more photos.

Our trip had barely started and one of the three major targets was done! It turns out that this bird was easier to get than I thought.  There were several different ones throughout the campground.  In fact, we had one at each of the two campsites we occupied in addition to the one at the park office.  Its song was so common and so frequent that even Marin could be heard saying, “Zoo-zee-zoo-zoo-Zee!” One time I asked her if she knew what bird made that sound.  She said she didn’t know, so I told her.  I asked her if she could then repeat it right away.  She responded with, “A Black-throated…ummm….aa…bird!” Close enough, Marin.

The birding was great at Temperance River State Park.  We picked up another life bird, the Veery, a couple campsites away from us.  On one outing out of the park we got our Merlin lifer.  We also saw four species of woodpeckers and had Ruby-crowned Kinglets buzz through our campsite.  And we were constantly serenaded by the beautiful “Oh-sweet-kimberly-kimberly-kimberly” song of the White-throated Sparrow – a song that always transports us back home.  While many Minnesotans may not know that song or the bird that sings it, everybody in the state can appreciate this next bird and hear its voice.

Our Up North trip was off to a great start.  We enjoyed the temps (high of 61° and low of 38°!) as we could hang out in jeans and sweatshirts, and the sights of this state park were simply incredible.  If you are driving up Hwy. 61, you need to pull over at the wayside parking lot and take a short hike to check out the Temperance River gorge.  The power of this river and the rugged geological features are awesome.And then there’s Lake Superior…

Read Day 1 of Blue Mounds State Park – The Search for a Blue Grosbeak by clicking this link.

Friday night I debated setting an alarm to make sure we got out early before the rain came.  I don’t know if I was optimistic I’d wake up early on my own or if I was just lazy, but I didn’t set it. The next morning I woke up to a sickening sound – pitter patter pitter patter.  I cursed myself for sleeping in and missing our window.  It turns out I did wake up early after all; the rain decided to come ahead of schedule.  Darn it. Now what?

Eventually we were all awake trying to make sense of the day ahead.  Normal tasks, like going to the restroom or cooking food, were now very difficult since they required going out into the wetness and returning with water and debris.  While Melissa and I tried to keep the camper somewhat clean and livable, the kids entertained themselves by wrestling each other on their bed.  Time and cramped space got the best of us, though. It didn’t take long for the whining and fits to start.  The kids even joined in.  Finally I took the kids for a birding drive around the park which would end with a stop at the park’s interpretive center.  My purposes were twofold: 1) The kids needed something to do.  2) The park ranger told us the previous evening that someone had found three pairs of Blue Grosbeaks last week right by the interpretive center at the start of the Bur Oak Trail.  It was worth a shot.

It was a good soaking rain.  There was no let-up at all.  The bird activity was extremely minimal.  We didn’t even come close to seeing the numbers or variety we saw on our quick outing the previous evening.  I did manage to get a picture of a very wet, angry-looking Bobolink.  I wouldn’t want to be a bird on this day either.

We eventually wound up at the interpretive center which is over two miles from the campground and park office. It is located at the southern edge of the park along a rocky bluff.  This center is built right into the hillside and used to be someone’s house in the 1960s.

It was really cool inside.  Most impressive was the rock cliff that made up the center’s back wall.  It contained a fireplace with a roaring fire which felt so good on this day, and the bathrooms each had about a 15-foot rock cliff that made up one wall.  Besides the architecture, there was a full-size mounted bison that the kids loved. Additionally there were animal pelts on display, including a huge bison hide.  The bird taxidermy on display taunted us, especially since one was a life bird that was a secondary target for this trip – the Dickcissel, which is the small bird with the yellow chest and black bib on the left.

The kids looked through magnifying glasses at pinned butterflies, snake skins, and animal skulls while I chatted with the attendant about Blue Grosbeaks.  She explained they were literally seen from the paved path you see in the picture of the interpretive center shown above.  We saw no sign of them on our walk from the parking lot.  Not a flutter, not a noise.

On our way out we again carefully looked around this path for our target bird. No luck. We headed back to the camper for more wrestling and restlessness.  Once again the confines of the camper got to us.  We were all going crazy and getting crabby with each other. It was time for another trip.  This time Melissa came with us to see this amazing interpretive center for herself.  As we pulled into the parking lot and looked at the 100 yard walk to the center, the rain intensified.  Instead of ducking and running to the center, we kept driving and decided to take a quick trip into Luverne which was only a couple miles away to look for ponchos.  We weren’t going to let some rain determine how this trip was going to go.

Although we found a Shopko in Luverne, they did not have adequate nor enough ponchos for our family.  Shoot, Sioux Falls wasn’t more than a half hour away.  It’s a big city, so there had to be Wal-Marts and Targets everywhere.  Before we knew it, we were headed west. We’d be back to the park within an hour.  Or so we thought.  We didn’t recall how spread-out Sioux Falls was, nor did we know that a discount store would be so hard to find in this town.  After much searching we finally found a Target. Unfortunately nearly all of South Dakota’s population lives in this town, and they were all out and about buying all the ponchos.  We couldn’t find one.  Our search eventually landed us at a Wal-Mart.  Same story, except Marin got one.  I should say Melissa bought one for Marin while I weathered a different storm in the car – Marin was throwing a mega fit as she refused to go to the bathroom.

After battling horrendous traffic, stores crawling with people, and Marin’s temper-tantrums, we finally found a Scheel’s. If these people didn’t have rain gear, no one did. And if they didn’t, we were so on edge that we might have mugged some SoDak for his poncho. Thankfully it didn’t come to that.  Scheel’s had what we needed.

I couldn’t get out of Sioux Falls fast enough.  South Dakota wasn’t supposed to be people crazy like this.  Our trip wasn’t supposed to involve retail stores – at all.  On top of it all, the hope of finding our Blue Grosbeak was dwindling faster than a campfire in this never-ending rain. Four hours after our decision to head to SD, we were back at the camper.  Evan’s awareness of geography is growing, so at least he got a new state out of this snafu.

With new gear donned, the kids and I poked around the Interpretive Center one more time to find our bird.  Despite the poncho, Marin quickly grew unhappy, so we headed back to the camper after just a couple minutes.  The kids played, wrestled, and watched movies to entertain themselves. Every so often we’d go on a birding drive around the park.  We were desperate.  One of these drives was just Evan and me.  He’d been asking to go to the park store for some time.  At the store we picked up two small stuffed Bison and a Blue Mounds patch for Evan’s back-pack.  The Blue Grosbeak keychains and mugs taunted us.  While there, the ranger said the rain was supposed to subside by noon tomorrow. A glimmer of hope.

On this last drive of the day, I noticed something yellow in a bush through the fat drops of water on my driver-side window.  It couldn’t be a bird as it was absolutely motionless. It must be part of the bush.  I rolled down my window and pulled up the binoculars.  I couldn’t believe it.  I was not looking at a plant, but rather the bright yellow chest and black bib of the Dickcissel! This was an exciting life bird that made this ugly day a little brighter. I only got one bad photo of his bad side before this guy flew deep into the bush to try to keep dry.  This bird was a secondary target for us at this park.  We knew we could get the Dickcissel in our area, so it wasn’t as urgent.  Nevertheless, it was fun to check this one off.

The relief in mood was only temporary.  The forecast was for solid rain all night and all day tomorrow (the ranger was wrong about it ending at noon).  It’s one thing to not find our target bird, but it’s entirely different to not even be able to adequately search for it.  Besides that, this park was gorgeous, and everything in it was screaming to be explored and photographed if only the weather would cooperate.

As I laid in bed that night listening to the incessant pitter-patter, I tried to scheme up a way I could bring Melissa back home on Sunday so she could work on Monday while the kids and I returned for another night or two of camping and exploring.  It was craziness, I know.  But the sunny and beautiful forecast for every day in the coming week and those darn key chains were teasing me.  It was the only hope I had as I drifted off to sleep even as the condensation from a buttoned-up camper now literally created rain inside and splattered my face.

Read Day 3, Last Day, of Blue Mounds State Park – The Search for a Blue Grosbeak by clicking this link.

After a long winter and a cold spring, we had been itching to get out camping.  With a prolonged school year from snow days and with other planned family events, June was filling up fast.  We decided we had to get out this past weekend or it would be July before we were pulling our pop-up down the road. Our first destination of the summer was Blue Mounds State Park located in the very southwestern county of Minnesota only about a fifteen minute drive from both South Dakota and Iowa.  Blue Mounds is a very unique park.  This huge mounded prairie whose elevation is much higher than the surrounding landscape is dotted with rocky outcroppings, prickly-pear cacti, and the resident bison herd.  This large mound ends abruptly on one side with a narrow oak woods and a sheer rocky cliff.  It is hard to believe that this is still Minnesota.

While we eager to enjoy the unique beauty of this place, we were headed there for a very specific reason: the Blue Grosbeak. This bird isn’t just another plain bird to add to the life list – with its deep blue plumage and rusty wing patch, it is a beautiful bird, a prize to be found.  The Blue Grosbeak is mostly a southern bird, but it is a rare regular resident to Blue Mounds State Park.  While the bird has shown up in other Minnesota counties, Blue Mounds is the most reliable place to find one.  Minnesota birders know this and travel there for that one reason.  This fact is an advertised highlight of the park.  It is so much so that the park’s gift shop has key chains, magnets, and mugs adorned with the Blue Grosbeak’s image.

The forecast for Saturday and Sunday was bleak – a good chance of rain both days. But, there was always a chance that forecast would be wrong or that there would be a break in the rain to get out and do some birding.  Friday was a beautiful sunny day, but we couldn’t hit the road until late in the afternoon because Melissa and Evan had their last day of school to finish.  Besides that, my vehicle was getting detailed that day and wouldn’t be done until 4:00 – there was a lot of dirt and grime to clean up after a winter and spring of bombing down gravel roads searching for birds.

By 4:30 or so, we were finally on the road.  I was anxious to get there before dark to get some birding in because I knew the next day or two could be bad.

While en route, Evan was busy checking out birds on the National Audubon Society bird app on his iPod.  I had him play the Blue Grosbeak’s song about a dozen times so we’d be familiar with it.  I’m learning that birding by ear is critical to finding target birds when all the trees are leafed out.  This is tough for me as I’ve discovered I’m not an auditory learner. Evan is much better at it than me. A lot of the birds songs blur together for me, especially when Evan played the songs of several different species we needed.  Hopefully, though, this repeat play of the Blue Grosbeak’s song would help it stick in our minds in case we heard it.

It was a fairly long trip to that corner of the state.  We finally made it into the park by around 7:30.  Then we had to get the camper popped up and set up camp.  By the time that was done we only had about a half hour of daylight to find some birds.  There would be no hiking tonight; we’d have to settle for driving the park’s only short road.  It didn’t take long to realize that this park was a great destination for birds and birders.  We had a beautiful male Orchard Oriole fly across the road and into the shrubs off to the side. Then I heard a familiar bird sound that belonged to a bird Evan needed for his life list – the buzz of the Common Nighthawk.  They were everywhere.

We drove by one of the lakes on the park and found Cedar Waxwings, Eastern Kingbirds, Baltimore Orioles, and an unidentified Cuckoo.  We need both the Black-billed Cuckoo and Yellow-billed Cuckoo for our life lists, but we weren’t able to determine which this one was.

We stopped by the swimming beach to throw rocks and look for birds.  This has been a common pairing of activities this spring/summer.  There was a small flock of fast moving birds skimming back-and-forth over the water’s surface.  It was the Black Tern, a life bird for both of us.  Excuse the photo – it was near dark, and these birds were cruising!

Two life birds for Evan was nothing to sneeze at, but neither was our primary target.
We were pinning our hopes on getting out early the next morning to hunt for the Blue Grosbeak since the rain wasn’t supposed to start until 9:00 or so.  In the meantime, though, we enjoyed a nice campfire on a gorgeous night.

Read Day 2 of Blue Mounds State Park – The Search for a Blue Grosbeak by clicking this link.

Read Day 3, Last Day, of Blue Mounds State Park – The Search for a Blue Grosbeak by clicking this link.