Hannah and I love to follow the posts on Michigan Bird Watching on FB. There are so many wonderful things about Michigan including protection of "wild" areas throughout the state. I mean, we have an ENTIRE peninsula that is pure wilderness, eh? ;-). Because of all these wild areas, there is a lot of wildlife, including birds. (I know I've said this before, but besides crows and starlings and the occasional blue jay, I never heard another bird in PA, including on walks in the woods. Thanks so much, farming chemicals.). When we came to Michigan, we set up a feeder in the backyard next to Glo's window, and it didn't take more than a day to have flocks of goldfinches covering it. And we can't forget the AMAZING Baltimore Orioles that commandeered our hummingbird feeder last spring.
Well, on the FB page, people from all over Michigan post photos and videos of various bird sightings. There are a lot of professional photographers who are obviously trying to sell their photos, but there are others like me who are just happy to post a photo of a bird they've never seen before. The simplest people post pictures from Kensington Metropark near Brighton.
I don't know exactly what a "metropark" is, but we have a lot of them in Michigan. They feel like State parks but maybe they're privately owned, or owned by the county or city? I don't know. (As an aside, Michigan only has one national park, Isle Royale, an island off the northernmost point of the UP, but has many state and metro parks. I wonder if the state is trying to keep control of the areas instead of turning them over to the national park system which is a stroke of genius, considering what's happening to the national monuments under our current administration. But I digress....). There are several metro parks within 20 minutes of the greater Ann Arbor area, and one of them is up by Brighton. It's called Kensington Metropark. Not a week goes by that someone doesn't post a photo of a wild bird coming up to eat seed or peanuts out of a person's hand. A lot of people post slow-mo videos of the birds even.
Hannah and I love to talk about the different posts we see, so I decided on this trip home for her, we would drive up to Kensington and see if we could attract any of those birds. We didn't know what to expect, but we went armed with a bag of seed and a canister of unsalted peanuts. Supposedly, the smaller birds like the seed, and the bigger birds (jays and woodpeckers) like the peanuts.
What a surprise when we drove up to see a line of cars at the gate--no sneaking into the park this time! I bought an annual pass because, if nothing else, we always have to buy a day pass for the Turkey Trot. Hannah then pulled up the website to see what suggestions people have had. On a recent post, she read that we should park next to the nature center, go down the boardwalk, and stand there. "Not more than 200 feet of walking" it said. Great!
Well when we did that, there were so many people that we just kept walking. We probably walked another 1/4 of a mile and stopped. I didn't have much hope because quite honestly, I didn't hear any birds. We walked into the woods, and Mark found an old piece of farm equipment where he sat down. It didn't take more than a minute or two and he had birds coming to him like Cinderella. We all filled our hands as well, and it was like taking candy from a baby....or like another cinematic moment.
I have no idea how long we were there, feeding the birds. The chickadees were fearless and the first to come. Here are just a few of the pictures I got of the chickadees.
The titmice were right behind them. Titmice are some of the most beautiful songbirds in my book, so seeing one up close was pretty amazing.
And then the nuthatches. We aren't huge fans of nuthatches and woodpeckers, seeing as John fought the war of 2018 with one of them and the wood siding on our house, but I'm happy to report that they are very loud and I can now recognize their call. I couldn't get one to land on my hand for an up close shot, but they sure did love Hannah.
And the best moment? A couple of downy woodpeckers came straight to our hands.
We also had a very reluctant (or as Mark said, "sassy") blue jay who wouldn't come down and take anything from our hands but just sat directly above us, or one time, swooped down at Mark's hand.
And the red-headed woodpeckers (the BIG boys) flew all around us, even dropping down to the ground to pick up the seed and peanuts we had dropped, but they wouldn't come to us either.
We also caught very close sight of two red-tailed hawks which we would normally love to see, but songbirds don't really like to stick around when the hawks are in the area.
I sure am glad we got the annual pass, because I have no doubt we will be back.
Well, on the FB page, people from all over Michigan post photos and videos of various bird sightings. There are a lot of professional photographers who are obviously trying to sell their photos, but there are others like me who are just happy to post a photo of a bird they've never seen before. The simplest people post pictures from Kensington Metropark near Brighton.
I don't know exactly what a "metropark" is, but we have a lot of them in Michigan. They feel like State parks but maybe they're privately owned, or owned by the county or city? I don't know. (As an aside, Michigan only has one national park, Isle Royale, an island off the northernmost point of the UP, but has many state and metro parks. I wonder if the state is trying to keep control of the areas instead of turning them over to the national park system which is a stroke of genius, considering what's happening to the national monuments under our current administration. But I digress....). There are several metro parks within 20 minutes of the greater Ann Arbor area, and one of them is up by Brighton. It's called Kensington Metropark. Not a week goes by that someone doesn't post a photo of a wild bird coming up to eat seed or peanuts out of a person's hand. A lot of people post slow-mo videos of the birds even.
Hannah and I love to talk about the different posts we see, so I decided on this trip home for her, we would drive up to Kensington and see if we could attract any of those birds. We didn't know what to expect, but we went armed with a bag of seed and a canister of unsalted peanuts. Supposedly, the smaller birds like the seed, and the bigger birds (jays and woodpeckers) like the peanuts.
What a surprise when we drove up to see a line of cars at the gate--no sneaking into the park this time! I bought an annual pass because, if nothing else, we always have to buy a day pass for the Turkey Trot. Hannah then pulled up the website to see what suggestions people have had. On a recent post, she read that we should park next to the nature center, go down the boardwalk, and stand there. "Not more than 200 feet of walking" it said. Great!
Well when we did that, there were so many people that we just kept walking. We probably walked another 1/4 of a mile and stopped. I didn't have much hope because quite honestly, I didn't hear any birds. We walked into the woods, and Mark found an old piece of farm equipment where he sat down. It didn't take more than a minute or two and he had birds coming to him like Cinderella. We all filled our hands as well, and it was like taking candy from a baby....or like another cinematic moment.
I have no idea how long we were there, feeding the birds. The chickadees were fearless and the first to come. Here are just a few of the pictures I got of the chickadees.
The titmice were right behind them. Titmice are some of the most beautiful songbirds in my book, so seeing one up close was pretty amazing.
And then the nuthatches. We aren't huge fans of nuthatches and woodpeckers, seeing as John fought the war of 2018 with one of them and the wood siding on our house, but I'm happy to report that they are very loud and I can now recognize their call. I couldn't get one to land on my hand for an up close shot, but they sure did love Hannah.
And the best moment? A couple of downy woodpeckers came straight to our hands.
We also had a very reluctant (or as Mark said, "sassy") blue jay who wouldn't come down and take anything from our hands but just sat directly above us, or one time, swooped down at Mark's hand.
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| Mark has a nuthatch in his hand, but see the blue jay above him?? |
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| I can't even believe I got the shot of him getting his courage on....but bailing at the last minute. |
We also caught very close sight of two red-tailed hawks which we would normally love to see, but songbirds don't really like to stick around when the hawks are in the area.
I sure am glad we got the annual pass, because I have no doubt we will be back.
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