Tag Archives: MN North: Amity

Hooting up a Storm, During a Storm!

Year 9
So last night what do you do during a BIG snowstorm? If you are my local male Great Horned Owl, you hoot your love to your sweetheart. If you are me, you head out hiking during the storm and find said owl … in the dark silhouetted against the sky … and watch / listen to the singing. The owl would move its entire body with each hoot. It had to hard to hoot into the wind. I have edited out some of the silence. The photograph is of the actual unique individual owl which is hooting, just during the day and not in the middle of a snowstorm, but the hooting is from last night.
(audio link for email subscribers)

If anyone would like a free PDF download of my children’s book, which documents the owlets raised my this owl and its mate (factually correct), browse to Hoot’s page.

Boreal Bird?

Year 9

Here is a bird I never would have considered a Boreal bird … the Red-Bellied Woodpecker. I photographed it in my yard yesterday morning, and although it is in an aspen, my neighborhood is dominated by white pine trees. It stays the winter, along with a pair of Northern Cardinals … another bird which never used to live up north. While hiking in the Lester / Amity woods, I often see the Red-Bellied foraging on both pines and cedar trees. It has obviously adapted to the pine forest.

Photographed during a snow squall … another major winter storm starts late tonight!

Red-Bellied Woodpecker (male … a female would have a gap at the top of its head in the red coloring)

Enjoying the snow (video link for email subscribers)

Emerald Ash Borer Larva

Year 9
Two afternoons ago I was actually on my way to fill the French River Lutheran public bird feeders, and I came across this pair of Pileated Woodpeckers. The ash tree is quite obviously dead, and I assume the woodpeckers were eating Emerald Ash Borer Beetle Larva. It is rather obvious this tree has been a favorite of theirs for some time … all the flaked off bark.
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There had been some hope the Emerald Ash Borer would not get well established in northern Minnesota given our extremely cold winter temperatures, but this ash tree is within 100 yards of Lake Superior.  Thus the temperature never gets quite as cold right next to the lake. Head 3 miles inland from Lake Superior and the temperature can drop 10 to 15 degrees (or be that much warmer in the summer).
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See in you can find the second Pileated Woodpecker in the third photo. It’s present!

And the birds at work (video link for email subscribers)