American Robins Nesting in St. Louis Area

American Robins (Turdus migratorius) are of course one of the most familiar birds in North America, although I don't see them all that often where I live in the Central Valley, with the exception of my MJC Mini-wilderness where more than a thousand wintered last year.  On my recent trip to the St. Louis area they turned up just about everywhere, and were the most visible bird I saw during my visit.

Two of them were nesting, one outside our hotel, and the other just outside the foyer where the wedding was taking place. If the bird was panicked about the dozens of people milling just below, it gave no sign.

A couple of posts are coming in quick order, as I am "clearing the decks" for my overseas journey to the Hawaiian Islands. There may be many birds to see, but probably little time to post!

Bald Eagles Nesting Near St. Louis

If you've been following my last few posts, you'll know that I was in St. Louis over the weekend for a wedding. Being not one of the bridal party, instead being just an uncle, I didn't have to get caught up in the maelstrom of wedding planning. The groom's father didn't have a lot to do on Saturday, so he took me kayaking on an 80-acre lake on the outskirts of St. Louis. One of the attractions, besides being my first kayaking "adventure", was a Bald Eagle nest along the shoreline.

I'm amazed, of course, that my camera didn't end up on the bottom of the lake, and we were able to float close enough for some good shots of the Bald Eagle family. Both parents were in attendance, along with one chick, which appeared to be getting reasonably close to being a fledgling.

Bald Eagles (Haliaeetus leucocephalus) got treated rather shabbily for being our national bird. They were shot and poisoned almost to extinction in the lower 48 states, and the widespread use of DDT made things worse. They have recovered nicely, and are reclaiming much of their lost range. It was nice to see a thriving family in the Midwestern U.S.

Great Horned Owls at Merced National Wildlife Refuge (and the 100th blogpost!)

Why do owls seem to scowl so much? In this instance, the reason is clear. Despite being on the road and in our car, the owl was not all that happy that we seemed to see her sitting in her nest. We were at the Merced National Wildlife Refuge providing a bon voyage for the geese that were still there, but of course we were looking for birds of any kind. As we drove through the barren trees of the eastern margin of the auto tour, we could see some large knots, but one of them resolved into a pile of sticks.

Sticks with eyes...

The Great Horned Owl (Bubo virginianus) has proven to be a dependable sight at the Merced National Wildlife Refuge, as we saw them the last time we visited a month ago. But I've never seen one in a nest before. They tend to take over the nests of other birds and modify them to their own needs. It helps that they lay eggs weeks or months ahead of many other birds.

I guess the trees are leafing out soon, so we might not get the chance to see the nestliings on our next trip, but you can be sure we'll looking.

This has been the 100th blog of Geotripper's California Birds, a purely amateur birding site that I've been doing simply for fun. Part of the purpose is educational, of course, but mostly it's for the fun of getting exercise and exploring some of the corners of our valley that I did not know existed. I've posted photos of 80 different species of birds so far, and since beginning the blog in the middle of September of last year, I've had 8,600 page views. The most viewed posts were the Yellow-rumped Warblers in my back yard (323 views), the Anna's Hummingbird that Mrs. Geotripper photographed in our front yard (192 views), and the Killdeer I photographed at the Merced National Wildlife Refuge (155 views). I don't know why the warblers were the most popular, but I suspect it had to do with the name itself (but maybe someone learned something anyway). I have plenty of pictures in the archives and have no plans to stop our weekend excursions, so I may keep at this for awhile. I'm getting better at bird identification, but as always I appreciate any corrections and comments you have. But more than anything else I want to thank the small cadre of friends who read regularly!