Three January 2023 Events

On Tuesday Evening, January 17, Lucas Timmer will present his program about Habitat Restoration in Ottawa County.  

Lucas is a resident of Holland with his wife Molly and his daughter Florence. Birds have always been an interest to him (Adelie penguins are his favorite animal) but birding as a hobby did not take root until he found time for it during the spring of 2020 during the pandemic. 

As a now avid birder, Lucas has been enjoying using his skillset as a civil engineer who works with local governments to promote local habitat preservation to these same communities as the head of OIAS Habitat Preservation Committee promoting critical habitat for our avian friends. In this presentation, Lucas will discuss some of the work that OIAS is doing currently with habitat preservation in the community and future opportunities for proposing habitat preservation in our area. 

The location for this and the remainder of our season's programs will be the Covenant Life Church, 101 Columbus Ave., in Grand Haven.  Social time: 6:00-6:30 p.m.  Program: 6:30-8:00 p.m.

Please park on Columbus Street or in the parking lot in front of the piano factory condos on Harbor Drive so we reserve the small parking lot next to the church for church programs that take place the same night.  We appreciate GHCLC hosting our programs!

On Saturday morning, January 21, our monthly field trip will be around the many square miles at the Muskegon Resource Recovery Center (formerly the Muskegon County Wastewater Management System).  We will begin just inside the Maple Island Road entrance at 8:00 a.m.  From there we will caravan in our cars around the fields, lagoons and woodlots of that property stepping out often to look for birds.  A spotting scope and a walkie-talkie tuned to Channel 11, Subchannel 0, for car-to-car communication can be helpful, but neither is necessary.  This trip will end around noon.  The public is welcome.

Our January meeting will be Thursday, January 26, at 10:30 a.m. in the Norton Shores branch library on Seminole Road.  We will discuss ideas of what to do with the money bequeathed to our club by the late George Wickstrom.

Two Christmas Bird Counts

This years' City of Muskegon Christmas Bird Count (CBC) will be held on Saturday, December 17, 2022.

As in the past, three groups will begin at 8:00 a.m., count birds at various locations that morning, and meet for lunch at the Cherokee restaurant (1971 W. Sherman Blvd.) from roughly 12:00-1:30 p.m.  

Anyone wishing to participate may do so.  Just join one of the groups mentioned below.  Contact Ric Pedler for more information.  Be sure to dress for the weather.    

Bonnie Kot will lead the south group which meets in the old Denny's restaurant parking at the southeast corner of Seaway Drive and Green Street (east of Mona Lake Park).  The group will drive to various locations to walk and count birds for awhile.  

Ken Sherburn will lead the north group.  That count won't include as much walking as in previous years, but will still include walking the Snug Harbor and Muskegon Channel areas of Muskegon State Park and the Muskegon Lake Nature Preserve.

Although the central group will be censusing several areas within the city of Muskegon, it will not always be participating as one group and will not be starting at one location that morning.  So if you want to participate, please meet at 8:00 with either the south or the north group.

    

After the all-group lunch at the Cherokee, some people may continue to count birds, but most will call it a day.

The Muskegon Wastewater CBC will be on Wednesday, Dec. 14, 2022 (not the 21st as first posted).  For your area of coverage within the 15-mile-diameter-circle, meet leader Brian Johnson in the headquarters parking lot of the Muskegon Resource Recovery Center (formerly Muskegon County Wastewater Management System), 698 N. Maple Island Road, between 8:00 and 8:15 a.m. on the 14th.

This count is done almost entirely by car.  Participants may meet for lunch around noon at Granny's Griddle Restaurant (northeast corner of Apple Ave. and Wolf Lake Road), but check with Brian that morning to be sure.

November 12 Field Trip Report

Our monthly field trip probably began a bit late this morning.  Prior to our starting time of 9:00, one of our early arrivers had already recorded several bird species.  On the other hand, one said that she wouldn't have participated if the trip had begun any earlier.  You can't win for losing!

photo by Carol Cooper

For about three hours, seven of us recorded 30 species around the Snug Harbor area and on a walk out to Lost Lake.  Notable were 16 Tundra Swan, Hooded Merganser, Pied-billed Grebe, Bald Eagle, a docile Red-shouldered Hawk that sat for the better part of a half hour along the northwest shore of the harbor, Belted Kingfisher, Downy, Hairy, Re-bellied and Pileated Woodpeckers, Winter Wren, many Eastern Bluebirds, a few American Robins, Evening Grosbeak (flying over Lost Lake), Purple Finch, and American Tree and Song Sparrows.

We also witnessed our first snowfall of the season!

November Events

November 15 Hawaiian Birds Program

Lonny Garris is an avid birder and an Owashtanang Islands Audubon Society board member.  He traveled to Maui, Hawaii, in September of 2020 to celebrate his wife's birthday and bird as much as she would let him. 

Join Lonny Tuesday evening November 15 as he talks about his experience traveling to Hawaii during the pandemic while sharing his birding experiences in the paradise of Hawaii.  

Covenant Life Church, 101 Columbus St., Grand Haven

Social Time: 6:00-6:30 p.m.  Program 6:30-8:00 p.m.

October 18 Wren Program Report

At Covenant Life Church in Grand Haven this evening Dale Kennedy and Doug White presented a program perfect for the audience from the Grand Haven and Muskegon Audubon clubs.  Using images and audio from ever-changing technologies, they explained the various behaviors and vocalizations of male and female house wrens on the many territories at Albion College’s Whitehouse Nature Center.  Afterward they answered questions from the audience.

October 8 Field Trip Report

Seven of us birded areas around Muskegon Lake on Saturday, October 8, hoping to see migrating raptors and blue jays.  The harsh winds prevented us from traveling out the Pere Marquette pier very far so we headed for the channel. 

Photo by Charlie DeWitt

While it was less windy, it was not very birdy at the channel.  We checked out Muskegon lake near Harbor Towne, Cottage Grove launch ramp, and finally Grand Trunk launch ramp and ended the October Big Day with 25 species, including Blue-winged Teals and an American Pipit at the pier, a Common Raven at the channel, a Great Egret at the Cottage Grove launch, and an Orange-crowned Warbler at the Grand Trunk launch ramp.  We hope you can join us on November 12 when we explore Muskegon State park’s Snug Harbor.

September 10 Field Trip Report

Eight people participated in Saturday morning's field trip.

We found 18 bird species at the north pier at Grand Haven including a Semipalmated Plover with an injured left foot, a Ruddy Turnstone, Sanderlings, Bonaparte's Gulls, Bald Eagles, Caspian Terns and Forster's Terns.

At Ottawa Sands County Park we encountered 39 species including Ruby-throated Hummingbirds, Green Herons, a Northern Harrier, several woodpeckers (Red-headed, Red-bellied, Pileated, Downy, Northern Flicker), Eastern Wood-Pewee, Swainson's Thrushes, Rose-breasted Grosbeaks, several warblers (American Redstart, Magnolia, Blackburnian, Blackpoll and Bay-breasted) and a Merlin chasing a Mourning Dove.

Our 2022-2023 Season

        We're back!  This year's schedule reflects the difficulties that many Audubon chapters are experiencing just staying alive these days.  Fortunately the Muskegon County Nature Club (MCNC) is back for another season, thanks in no small part to the efforts of our new president, Beth Miller.

    MCNC and the Owashtanong Islands Audubon Society (Grand Haven's chapter) will combine their resources for programs this season.  Instead of scheduling fourteen (7 per club per season) for our gradually-dwindling audiences, we've combined resources and scheduled a total of seven.  Until further notice, programs will be presented at the Covenant Life Church, 101 Columbus Ave. in Grand Haven.  See the sidebar.

Our first MCNC meeting of this new season will be at 6:30 p.m. on Thursday evening, September 15, at the Roosevelt Park Community Building as in the past.  One item of business will be to determine dates, times and locations of future meetings.  We'll also catch up on what we've all been doing since last season.  There will be light refreshments for this social time.  We hope to see you there.

The MCNC will continue to conduct monthly field trips, the Christmas Bird Counts, the Big Day Count, and our annual Potluck Picnic meeting in May.  See the sidebar. 

August 20 Field Trip Report

Ten of us began Saturday morning's field trip to the Muskegon County Resource Recovery Center and were joined along our way by four others.  Thanks to the birding skills of Chip Francke, we found an excellent number of shorebird species: Semipalmated Plover; Killdeer; Stilt, Least, White-rumped, Baird's, Pectoral Semipalmated and Spotted Sandpipers; Red-necked Phalarope (15 in the northeast corner of the West Lagoon) and Lesser Yellowlegs.

Among the 47 other identifiable species were Blue-winged Teal, Ruby-throated Hummingbird, Sandhill Crane, Bonaparte's Gull, Green Heron, Bald Eagle, Osprey, Northern Harrier, American Kestrel, Merlin, Horned Lark, Tree, Cliff and Barn Swallows, Cedar Waxwing and Eastern Meadowlark.

A trip highlight was the Merlin seen first eating small prey on the wall of the aeration lagoons and later zipping over a rapid filtration cell scaring all the birds and tail-chasing some shorebirds.

Thankfully, very little of the predicted rain materialized.  All photos by Glen and Beth Miller.

Lesser Yellowlegs were seen at various locations.

Tree Swallows, Red-necked Phalaropes, Bonaparte's Gulls and Mallards.

Stilt Sandpiper

August 20 MCRRC Field Trip

You're invited to meet with those of us breakfasting at the McDonald's restaurant at Apple Ave. & US-31 before the field trip.  We will leave the restaurant at 8:00.

The trip itself will begin around 8:15 a.m. just inside the Maple Island Road entrance to the Muskegon County Resource Recovery Center (formerly the Wastewater).  We will bird the entrance area until 8:30 before heading to the headquarters, the dikes, and the fields of this 16-square-mile property.  

We will drive to various areas and then get out to bird.  Besides your binoculars, a spotting scope and a walkie-talkie tuned to Channel 11, Subchannel 0 will be useful, but neither is necessary.

We hope to find many migrating shorebirds and yet-to-migrate breeding grassland and woodland birds this Saturday morning.  The trip will end around noon.  The public is welcome.