Victor Bakhtin landscape painting–almost as good as being there.

Outside the Whooping Crane exhibit here at ICF there is a beautiful landscape mural painted by Victor Bakhtin, the same artist who painted the Platte River mural inside our visitor’s center.

The landscape is located just south of Baraboo, Wisconsin, not too far from the International Crane Foundation.  Victor Bakhtin painted it in 1994, but when does it take place? Here are some clues.

This looks like a tree full of Passenger Pigeons, but my boss says there are also Mourning Doves in there. Here is a website with ID information: http://www.si.edu/encyclopedia_si/nmnh/passpig.htm Anyone care to comment?

This looks like a tree full of Passenger Pigeons, but my boss says there are also Mourning Doves in there. Here is a website with ID information: http://www.si.edu/encyclopedia_si/nmnh/passpig.htm Anyone care to comment?

According to the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources, the last two bison east of the Mississippi River were shot in 1832. This scene probably took place at least a century before then. At that time herds of bison roamed the great prairies surrounding Baraboo, and Passenger Pigeons were so plentiful that they could blacken the sky for hours as they migrated in search of acorn masts. Today’s bison herds are a mere shadow of their former greatness, and the Passenger Pigeon is a ghost. As it approached extinction, a few brave conservationists began to call for measures of protection, or for at least some limit to Passenger Pigeon hunting. Their pleas would go unanswered.

In 1857, the Ohio legislature infamously stated: “The Passenger Pigeon needs no protection. Wonderfully prolific, having the vast forests of the North as its breeding grounds, traveling hundreds of miles in search of food, it is here today and elsewhere tomorrow, and no ordinary destruction can lessen them, or be missed from the myriads that are yearly produced.”

By 1900 the last wild Passenger Pigeon in North America was shot by a farm boy in Ohio. In 1914 the last Passenger Pigeon died in the Cincinnati Zoo. She was named Martha, after Martha Washington.

I like to use this mural while giving my talks to discuss the idea of extinction. It shows what our landscape used to look like, and foreshadows the fate of many species on the brink of extinction. The mural is filled with other species that have tenuous futures. At ICF we strive to conserve land and resources not only for cranes, but for other species that share their landscapes. And for us, because a world without biodiversity wouldn’t be worth living in.

Here are some more hidden gems from the mural. Don’t worry, there are still more for you to discover on your own.

Counting Cranes and Booming Cocks

This weekend was very birdful. I think I’m too exhausted to go into great detail, so I’ll try to let the pictures speak for themselves.

Saturday morning I surveyed cranes at Mirror Lake State Park for the Annual Midwest Crane Count. It was my second time at Mirror Lake, and I liked it so much that I went back for a third time today. I was lucky enough to steal my survey area from someone who had other commitments, but she claimed that her crane count survey area was the best in Sauk County, maybe the best in the state of Wisconsin. I believe her. It was gorgeous.

I forgot to set the focus to "automatic", but here is a blurry shot of Mirror Lake just fter dawn.

My last crane on the count, a female Sandhill Crane sitting on a nest at Mirror Lake.

Crane Count was incredible. Not only did I see 17 Sandhill Cranes, I also saw many other bird species, a muskrat, and a beautiful sunrise. I also helped contribute to citizen science. Crane Count data is continuously being compiled to add to our knowledge of crane populationt trends, which determines conservation efforts for North American cranes. This morning I found a second nesting Sandhill Crane at Mirror Lake. What a cool place.

Last night my friend Michelle and I headed to Hartman Creek State Park to camp before seeing the Greater Prairie Chickens leking near Stevens Point, Wisconsin. We had almost the entired campground to ourselves and picked a nice site overlooking a small lake. Before an amazing dinner of instant rice and Indian food, we took a slow walk around the lake. A solitary Canada Goose stood as still as a Ninja on a shoreline log, while ten or so Woodducks made passes through the lake and surrounding pine forest. A Rusty Blackbird male whistled and garbled near our campsite as we ended our short hike. After many s’mores (way too many) a Sora called once from the shoreline. My first of the year.

Four short hours of sleep and we started breaking down camp at 2:30 in the morning. We got to the meet up site near Plover, Wisconsin at 4:30, and set off to start viewing at 5:15. It was worth the earlystart.

Greate Prairie Chicken (Tympanuchus cupido) cocks on the booming grounds

Michelle, my co-counter, and two Greater Prairie Chicken blinds next to each other.

In all we saw 15 Greater Prairie Chickens, consisting of 12 booming cocks (yes they are really called that) and 3 hens. The cocks were trying their hardest, leaping into the air, shaking and shimmying around the leking ground, lifting up their “rabbit ear” feathers, and of course, booming. The booming calls were constant for the two hours we were in the blind. Priaire chickens cocks boom by inflating their balloon-like orange air sacs and using them to resonate a low, haunting call The cocks also fought incesisently with each other, cackling and complaining and clawing instead of concentrating on the real prize, the hens. Michelle was lucky enough to witness one copulation, and she even got it on video! I can’t wait to see that. We filled out a survey form for our blind, which is another contribution to citizen science. Call me a nerd, but I love conducting bird surveys.

To say I had fun this weekend would be a huge understatement. It was phenomenal.

Wetland Birding in Lake County, Illinois

On April 10th I met Joel Greenberg at Wadsworth Wetlands for some morning birding. He had a survey to fill out, while I just had time to burn and the itch to see some first-of-the-year birds. Mission: accomplished for both of us.

The early morning air sung as waterfowl whistled through the marsh. Blue-winged Teals were out in fair numbers, with the occasional scattered Green-winged Teal. I love the bright, crisp colors of male waterfowl, and their desperate attempts to round-up less than enthusiastic females. The plants were feeling the drive to reproduce as well. Some spring flowers, namely Blood Root, were blooming, and many plants were starting to show green. Everything right now is twitterpated, and I myself fall in love with the scene around me every spring.

Joel demonstrating the incredible construction tactics employed by beavers

After the bird survey at Wadsworth we decided to hit up some more Lake County birding spots. A trip to a tucked away subdivision yielded my first Rusty Blackbird in the lower 48. Its call conjured up memories of nest searching in Alaska, when I was employed as a Rusty Blackbird field technician in Yukon Flats. It’s funny how a two note call and an electronic garble can open up a flood of memories. It was a happy moment. And I was glad to see at least one Rusty Blackbird on the migration route–it gave me faith that some of them can indeed find stopover sites in Illinois.

Joel pointed out a Beaver lodge that had overflowed onto the walking path. He showed me, through some tugging and pushing, that beavers build their dams by interweaving sticks and branches and packing in mud, making them very difficult to pull apart. Clever little engineers, aren’t they?

Just before we headed back to the car, I snapped a blurry picture of Painted Turtles basking on a log. There were piles of them, like mishappen flap jacks, strewn about the wetland.

Painted Turtles (Chrysemys picta) basking

The last birding spot was Lake Michigan, where I encountered a FOY Common Loon. It displayed beautiful breeding plumage, but only gave us furtive glances. We stood for a while, hunting it down in a bay area while it spent most of its time hunting underwater. Once Joel and I both got good looks, we decided to call it a day.

As usual, a lot of birding only makes me feel like birding a lot more. Fortunately this works out. In a few days I will be conducting a Crane Count in Sauk County, Wisconsin. Following that experience I will be visiting a Greater Prairie Chicken leking site in Stevens Point, Wisconsin. I can’t wait.

April 7th, 2010: Prairie Dropseed

2 days post burn at the International Crane Foundation

I took the above picture 2 days after a 30 acre prescribed burn at the International Crane Foundation.

12 days post burn at the International Crane Foundation

The second picture is one I took today. Less than two weeks post burn and the blackened earth is sprouting green. I was chatting with Shannon, one of the other naturalists here at ICF, and we thought that a lot of the green seen in the above picture may be invasive, cool-season grasses. But the photo posted below is definitely an image of a native prairie plant.

Spring sprouts of Prairie Dropseed

Peeking out from a blackened exterior, signs of spring (even on a dreary day like today). Prairie Dropseed (Sporobalus heterolepis) grows in clumps. One of the ecologists here calls it “Cousin It” grass, because it looks like an Adam’s Family character has been buried in the prairie soil, with just its head sticking out. The recent burn should trigger flowering in this year’s Prairie Dropseed plants, which are apparently very fragrant when in bloom. I’m excited!

I was lucky enough to experience ICF’s “burn school”, a two day course taught by our staff ecologists on the ecology and logistics of using prescribed fire as a restoration tool. Looks like the burn on ICF’s property is already working its magic on the landscape.