February 21 at 1:00 p.m. to Muskegon County Listers:
"Hello all. I was driving to the channel and saw a gray bird fly in and land on the fence next to the Windward Pointe sign on Lakeshore Drive: Northern Mockingbird! The bird is foraging on the ground and hopping back onto the fence. Good luck!" - Bailey Mitchell
February 18 at 12:20 p.m. to Muskegon County Listers:
I am sitting in my car at the trail head of Black Creek Trail, one of the North Hoffmaster State Park hiking trails and just north of the campground, and there is a Gray Catbird eating oriental bittersweet! Some of you may recall there was one on Black Lake Road for several weeks last winter.February 9 Email:
Here are a few pictures from the last week around the Muskegon Wastewater and some Trumpeter Swans from the Muskegon River near Croton.
February 7 to Muskegon County Listers:
Golden Eagle continuing at Wastewater on Monday afternoon. Flying over cells, flushing everything in sight. Perched in stand of trees north of main road. Same general area as reported by Kevin Wistrom in late January. Thanks to Bailey Mitchell and Kevin for posting pictures to eBird in the last few weeks.
- Karl Sineath
- Charlie DeWitt
There was some open water on the north side of channel with good number of Redheads, Mallards, Common Goldeneyes and Scaup, mostly Greater. I did see two Canvasbacks and four Gadwall.
Then I went to the Grand Haven north pier and counted 7 Great Black-backed gulls. From there I went to the south side and checked the berry trees by the Snug Harbor restaurant. I counted 20 American Robins and 60 to 70 Cedar Waxwings.
Beth Miller sends these photos of a Northern Pintail and Greater White-fronted Goose today in a flooded rapid filtration cell at the Wastewater just west of Ditch B right next to the main road:
Dec. 28 Email:
Following up on Steve Minard’s message of 15 December (below), Adam Byrne and I stopped off in Ravenna this afternoon and found the Eurasian Collared-Doves that Steve had seen on the 15th. Like Steve, we found them perched on a telephone pole in front of Ravenna Feed and Grain.
Today there were six doves, not five. Of those six, five were “pure” Eurasian Collared-Doves, with blackish primaries, dark gray under tail-coverts, and the correct pattern on the undersurface of the outermost tail feather (black on the outer web projecting farther toward the feather-tip than the black on the inner web). The sixth also had blackish primaries and dark gray under tail-coverts, but it had only one tail feather, so we couldn’t tell if it had the correct tail pattern or not.
- Phil Chu
Dec. 27 Email from Beth Miller:
Bailey Mitchell found a Varied Thrush this afternoon at Lost Lake trail! Go to the 4th plastic bridge. GPS Coordinates: 43.25024° N, 86.33443° W.
Dec. 28 Email from Mike Boston:
Varied Thrush seen this morning at 11:00 a.m. in the same general area but a little further along the trail, a few yards south of the Barred Owl sign.
Charlie DeWitt
Phil Willemstein photographed this Snowy Owl yesterday on a pole south of White Road in Egelston Township.
The flock of White-winged Crossbills reported Saturday morning on our Muskegon Christmas Bird Count along the northeast shore of Lost Lake (north of Snug Harbor at Muskegon State Park) were reported by Beth Miller again this morning at the same location.
To Muskegon County Bird Listers Dec. 15:
Five Eurasian Collared-Doves were atop a pole in Ravenna in front of Ravenna Feed and Grain. This is also by the Musketawa Trail near Crockery Creek. They look to be good Eurasian Collared Doves with dark upper undertail.
Also seen on the Wastewater CBC today were Greater White-Fronted Goose, a Snow Goose and a Northern Shrike from the Musketawa Trail west of Swanson. Hundreds of Canadas there too. Another shrike on the fence of the Ravenna Sewage Ponds and just north of there, three peacocks on a roof.
