October Field Trip Report

    Six people found 27 bird species at Black Lake Park on October 11, 2025 (Migratory Bird Day). 

    This cool sunny Saturday morning began with a Cooper’s Hawk flying over us in the parking lot before 8:00 and perching near our cars for a minute.  

    Soon afterward we began a slow walk around the south loop trails.  Robins were everywhere.  White-throated Sparrows and flickers were also abundant.  Other species included Pied-billed Grebe, Eastern Phoebe, Winter Wren, Cedar Waxwing, Purple Finch, White-crowned Sparrow, Eastern Towhee and Yellow-rumped Warbler.

    The trip ended at 10:45.

October Events

Monthly Field Trip

Black Lake Park

NOTICE NEW DATE:  October 11, 2025

    Normally our field trips are held on the third Saturday of the month.  But October 11, 2025, is World Migratory Bird Day, so we're moving our event up one week to be in the field on the same day as birdwatchers around the world.

    Meet at 8:00 Saturday morning, October 11, 2025, in the parking lot of Black Lake Park (Wood Road about half a mile south of Pontaluna Road).  We will walk the trails of the park looking for whatever local or migratory birds we can find.

    This trip will end before noon.  We hope to see you there.

October 21 Program

Loutit Library, Grand Haven

Social Time:  6:00-6:15 p.m.  Program:  6:15-8:00 p.m.

Identiflight: Protecting Endangered Raptors

Throughout the World

Caleb Putnam

    Caleb Putnam will present his exciting work with Identiflight, the world's top AI camera system protecting birds at windfarms worldwide.  Caleb will also speak of his work at Real Birds, especially about backyard habiscaping and bird water features.

    Caleb Putnam is a professional ornithologist and owner of Real Birds LLC.  A lifelong birder, Caleb has exceptional enthusiasm and passion for birds and birding.  He has served on the Michigan Bird Records Committee and is a statewide expositor of eBird as well as a local eBird reviewer for an 11-county area in west lower Michigan.  

    Caleb spent twelve years working for the National Audubon Society as the Important Bird Areas Program Coordinator and two years with Audubon Great Lakes and the Michigan Department of Natural Resources as the Michigan Birds Program Coordinator.  He also has spent many years in environmental consulting, especially focusing on wind power and green energy development.

September 20 Field Trip Report

     Five of us birded the south end of Hoffmaster State Park for a couple hours Saturday morning.  There were a few flurries of activity at a sassafras tree beside the picnic pavilion parking lot.  Swainson’s thrushes and several warbler species (including black-and-white, magnolia, and chestnut-sided) flitted around in its branches.

    All told we found 19 bird species including four woodpeckers (flicker, downy, hairy and red-bellied), both nuthatches, and a rose-breasted grosbeak before calling it a day.

September Field Trip and Meeting

 September 20 Field Trip

Meet at 8:00 a.m. in the south parking lot (by the picnic pavilion) of Hoffmaster State Park for our monthly Saturday morning field trip.  We will look for fall birds at various places around the park, exact locations to be determined that morning.  This trip will end around noon.  Hope to see you there!

September 23 Meeting and Program

All members of the Muskegon County Nature Club are invited to the first meeting of the 2025-2026 season.  Meet at 5:30 p.m. at the Loutit Library in Grand Haven.  The meeting will end before the 6:00-6:30 social time before Curtis Dykstra's Birding Slovakia and Central Europe program

August Field Trip

Seven people birded the Muskegon County Resource Recovery Center properties on Saturday morning, August 16.  They found 41 bird species (including a Common Raven by the entrance), Wood Duck, Blue-winged Teal, Northern Shoveler, Ruddy Duck, Sandhill Crane, Spotted Sandpiper, both yellowlegs, Pectoral and Least Sandpipers, American Kestrel, Bald Eagle, Horned Lark, Bank-, Tree-, and Barn Swallows, Cedar Waxwing and Bobolink.

(We’re lucky we did not try to have the George Wickstrom Trail dedication this morning as originally scheduled.  Although most of the MCRRC properties were acccessible, the headquarters and trail-head locations were barricaded.)

Black Lake Park Field Trip

On Saturday, the 19th, eight people enjoyed seeing a couple dozen species of birds at Black Lake Park.  One highlight was seeing an adult Common Raven and hearing two juvenile ravens near it.

June 21 Field Trip

Five people walked around the Muskegon Lake Nature Preserve for 1-2 hours this warm and VERY windy morning.  Amazingly we found 25 bird species, none remarkable.  We also met a snapping turtle out on the boardwalk!

Big Day Produces 116 Species

Considering the cold, windy conditions on Saturday, May 17, and an abbreviated day (we quit early), our total of 116 Muskegon County bird species was very respectable.  At least ten people participated from 5:00 a.m. until 7:00 p.m. from Lane’s Landing to State Game Area Headquarters to the Wastewater to Hoffmaster to Black Lake Park.

Notable species included Trumpeter Swan, Blue-winged and Green-winged Teal, Black-billed and Yellow-billed Cuckoo, nighthawk, whip-poor-will, hummingbird, American and Least Bittern, Yellow-throated Vireo, Northern Rough-winged Swallow, Veery, Cedar Waxwing, Orchard Oriole, Northern Waterthrush, Blue-winged, Black-and-White, Prothonotary, Magnolia, Blackburnian, Black-throated Blue and Chestnut-sided Warbler, and Scarlet Tanager.

We dipped on both nuthatches.  Go figure!

May Events

 

Thursday Evening, May 15, 2025

 Potluck Picnic Meeting & Bird Walk

    Our last meeting of the 2024-2025 season as usual will be combined with a potluck picnic at the Snug Harbor pavilion at Muskegon State Park.  Arrive by 6:00 p.m. with a dish-to-pass and whatever beverages, plasticware, napkins, etc. you will be using.  (The club will not be providing water, etc.)

    After the meal we'll hold a brief meeting which will include election of officers for the 2025-2026 season.  Then for those who want to stick around until dusk, we'll take a bird walk around the area.

Saturday, May 17, 2025

Big Day Count

(Bring a lawn chair for lunch.)

This is our annual all-day find-as-many-bird-species-in-the-county-as-we-can field trip.  A few die-hards will spend the entire day together, but most will join and leave the group as they wish.  Here is a list of where we'll be and approximately when:

Before 5:00 a.m.:  Meet Beth Miller and others at the outer gate of Lane's Landing.  This is the driveway off Maple Island Road about a mile north of the Wastewater (Muskegon County Resource Recovery Center) entrance at the bottom of the hill where Mosquito Creek goes under Maple Island Road.  Be careful here as traffic on Maple Island Road can be fast.

5:00 - 5:30 driving the mile to the inner Lane's Landing gate with a couple of stops along the way to listen for night birds.

5:30 until dawn, in the parking lot by the inner gate.

First half of the morning walking the trail up through the Lane's Landing Marsh and the "Prothonotary Woods" to the Muskegon River and back.

Second half of the morning on the Michigan Depatment of Natural Resources property (entrance about 1.3 mile north up Maple Island Road from Lane's Landing, 7600 Messinger Road) walking from the headquarters buildings along the Maple River west to the "Snipe Field" and back.

Lunch (brown bag) near the field office headquarters building.  The porch there no longer exists, so having a lawn or camp chair will be handy, but is not necessary.

First half of the afternoon on the Wastewater (MCRRC) properties, mostly by car.  A walkie-talkie tuned to Channel 11, subchannel 0 can be helpful, but is not necessary.

Second half of the afternoon, wherever we drive to find bird species not yet found.

Early evening supper at the McDonald's restaurant in North Muskegon north of the Veterans Memorial Causeway, followed by a walk around the Muskegon Lake Nature Preserve.

A brief evening walk near the wesr end of the Snug Harbor parking lot at Muskegon State Park.

Finally, still at Muskegon State Park, a drive to the north side of the Muskegon Channel in hopes of adding a Lake Michigan species or two and likely finding some Purple Martins at the channel.

We hope you can join our group for some or all of this day!

April 19 Field Trip Report

Nine people met at the Muskegon Lake Nature Preserve on a cold cloudy morning for this month’s field trip.  By the end of the trip before noon, skies were sunnier and temperatures were warmer.

We counted 46 species on a slow walk around the property.  Notable were Wood Duck, Blue-winged and Green-winged Teal, Northern Shoveler, Gadwall, Hooded and Red-breasted Merganser, Sandhill Crane, Greater Yellowlegs, Pied-billed Grebe, Great Egret (6!), Bald Eagle, Belted Kingfisher, Northern Flicker (at least 6), Eastern Phoebe, Tree and Barn Swallows, Ruby-crowned Kinglet, Brown Creeper, Brown Thrasher, White-throated, Song and Swamp Sparrow, and Eastern Towhee.