Kirtland's Warbler
Near Grayling, MI
June 2004

In mid-June, we went to Grayling to find a Kirtland's Warbler. The US Fish and Wildlife runs daily trips from the Holiday Inn in Grayling. They start by showing you an educational piece on the Kirtland's project. Then they take you out into the field. The service is free.
As soon as we stepped from our car in the young jack pine area, the naturalist pointed in a direction and said, "That's him." Sure enough, we heard the sound that we had been listening to on our tapes. It wasn't long before we saw one. We saw a total of 8 different Kirtland's Warblers. The highlight was when Deena saw a female carrying nesting material--likely for a second brood.
The naturalist was pretty excited about that! He was also excited about the number of Kirtland's that we saw. Had we seen four more, he said that would have been one percent of all the Kirtland's in the world!
He then took us to the cage were they trapped Brown-headed Cowbirds. The Cowbirds lay their eggs in the nests of the Warbler, to the demise of the Warblers.
When we got to the cage, there were only dead Cowbirds to be seen and a very active Sharp-shinned Hawk.
The Sharpy had done the work of the naturalist.
The naturalist caught the Hawk in a net and showed us its feather structure, up close and personal. He then released the Hawk.
While in the area, we visited the Nature Center at Hartwick Pines State Park and had wonderful views of Evening Grosbeaks at the Center's feeders.