Our top story this morning is the exciting return of the wood ducks to the pond in Estabrook Park. There were three drakes and two hens in all.

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The lighting was a little tricky this morning, but the drakes were looking resplendent nevertheless.

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In other news, the Canada goose situation continues to be an evolving story. When I first arrived at the pond this morning, there were nine (9!) of them on the water, and I don’t believe I’ve ever seen so many. Our heroes, who’ve been there since March 6, and who I hear have nested there for years, were having a heck of a time keeping all the interlopers at bay, despite a lot of honking and other heroic efforts.

I left them to sort it out amongst themselves while I went to check out the river, and when I returned, they had managed to get the crowd down to just six. One couple was on the western lawn, one couple was on the back (NNE) side of the island, and our heroes where back in their spot on the southern tip of the island. That’s still 200% more geese than the status quo last spring, but they seemed to have agreed to a truce for the moment, and everyone was peaceably going about their business.

Meanwhile, Mrs. Gadwall was also on the pond with several mallards, and one lone goldeneye hen was still on the river with a slew of mallards and geese. I didn’t see the buffleheads today.

The one other exciting spot, which I was not able to document, sadly, was the merlin quickly gliding over the wildflower meadow at tree-top level. Happily, a fellow amateur naturalist, Jim Kogutkiewicz, spotted it just yesterday a bit south along the river and posted a stunning picture on instagram, which I hope you check out. We of course don’t know if all these merlins are one-and-the-same bird, or even the one we saw in Estabrook back in January, but how many could there be, this far out of their range, right?

Finally, color continues to pop out of the ground, and for these, I’m going to go with alpine squill (Scilla bifolia), as opposed the the siberian squill we saw just yesterday, and whose blossoms face downward.

Well, by “eagle” I mean the female Canada goose on the pond in Estabrook, and by “landed” I mean assumed her throne, and by “her throne” I mean her nest on the island in the pond.

Finally, and not a moment too soon! There were 3 other pairs of geese on the pond this morning. Here’s the male warding off the boldest of them. Their conflicts over territory include many pauses for grooming, it seems.

Here’s a more heated moment.

Here’s one of those other couples discussion their next move.

Meanwhile, the mallards try to stay out of the way.

Until, that is, Mrs. Gadwall blithely glides past, but she quickly dissuaded them of having any interest in her.

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After all that excitement, I headed down to the river, but I don’t have much to report other than that the buffleheads are still there. I wonder if they’re going to stick around. It’s a long way to their breading grounds in northwest Canada, but they have been spotted in northeast Minnesota from time to time. Maybe these two aim to expand that in Wisconsin. They wouldn’t be the first visitors who found Wisconsin had just what they were looking for, right?

Since the pond had so much going on, I swung by one more time on may way home, and as I sat on the bench for a moment, several critters stopped by to say hi.

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Finally, there’s a new splash of color in the park, emerging from low on the side of the bluff, and it appears to be a Siberian squill (Scilla sibirica).

It was a delightful morning in the park, and there was surprisingly little going on. Not many visitors and no new critters.

The two pair of geese, a pair of mallards, and Mrs. Gadwall were all on the pond.

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The river is full of geese and mallards and one last goldeneye hen.

The red-bellied woodpeckers are still calling to each other like crazy along the river, and this female was willing to pose for a picture.

Finally, as I was heading home I accidentally startled Blondie and Dagwood, whom we haven’t seen in a few days, and they took off down river. I called after them that the lighting was no good that way, but they just kept going anyway. They don’t care about the lighting it seems.

Lastly, I found another park beer, but it was pretty old, and I’m guessing it’s past its prime.

I couldn’t find the wood ducks again this morning, neither on the river nor on the pond, and was making my way home empty-handed, when I stopped to check on the Cooper’s hawk nest I spotted under construction yesterday. Is I searched the treetops for it or the hawk itself, a bird watcher came by whom I see every now and then in the park or on the Oak Leaf Trail.

I said “hi Charles” and proceeded to tell him about what I was looking for, and he glanced up and said right away “well, there’s the hawk, right there.” Ha! It was in the tree right in front of me, and it turns out to be a red-tailed hawk, maybe even the same one as yesterday, but how had I not seen it?

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Anyway, it became annoyed that now even I could see it, so it took off, and I lost it in the trees. Not Charles, though. He quickly pointed out a little dark spot against the sky in a tree easily 150 yards away where it had perched. Uncanny.

So when I got home I googled “charles shorewood birds” and discovered that Charles is not just some shmuck like me walking though the park with a pair of binoculars. He’s Charles Hagner, “State Director of Bird City Wisconsin”, “former Editor-in-Chief of BirdWatching magazine”, and author of “American Birding Association Field Guide to Birds of Wisconsin“!

Holy Moly! No wonder he was able to spot a hawk in the tree right in front of us. Anyway, he seems like a super nice guy and never let on that he was a big-shot.

Okay, back to work. On the pond this morning, I did see the two pair of geese, about 3 mallard drakes and at least one hen, and our surprise visitor, Mrs. Gadwall, who seems to be in no rush to move on to her nesting grounds upstate.

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Finally, the other fun find of this morning was a mobile phone, and not a cheap one either, by the looks of it. It was lying face down on the mud along the river about a foot from the water.

I had gone out again once it had warmed up, since my first trip this morning was such a bust, but I didn’t see much new, and spent some time picking up litter left on the mudflats by the recent high water. As I was walking home, I reached for my phone, but it wasn’t in my pocket. I immediately panicked, of course, and hustled back down the the mud flats only to search in vain.

So I headed home in hopes that I had simply forgotten to put it in my pocket when I headed out, which I have done before, but that was sadly not the case this time. Happily, however, google has a nifty tool that let me lock it up tight, showed me that it was indeed down by the river, and even make it ring, all from the comfort of the laptop on my dining room table. I got Anne to wait at home and press the button to start the ringing in 10 minutes so that I had enough time to hurry back over there.

I arrived back by the river a little early and as I wandered around retracing my steps from earlier and wondering where would be the best place to stand to hear it ring, I finally spotted it. Apparently, as I had bent over to fetch some water bottles out of the river, it had slipped out of my unzipped jacket pocket, and I never noticed it!

PHEW!

Okay, one last dash of color from another maple tree this morning.

They’re back …. the wood ducks that is. I spotted my first pair on the river this morning just off the south shore of the northern island basking in the morning sun. Some of you long-time readers may recall that my very first post from the park was to announce that I had spotted wood ducks on the pond, back on March 26, 2020. Seems like a hundred years ago, eh?

Besides all the geese and mallards, I was surprised to see that the wood ducks were also accompanied by our old pals, the buffleheads, now that all the goldeneyes and mergansers seem to have moved on to colder waters up north.

Meanwhile, on the pond, a few mallards come and go, it appears that the second pair of geese is there to stay, the fifth wheel is gone, but the gadwall hen is still sticking around. Perhaps if the two pair of geese can keep the island between them, everyone will be happy. There’s no sign of nesting yet.

Lastly, as I reluctantly walked home, I noticed a large bird, looking like a raptor, towing a stick as it swooped up into a tree. Sure enough, once I got my binoculars out, it appears that a Cooper’s hawk is building a nest high up in an oak tree overlooking the bluff. It took off after a bit, and as I continued to look, I thought it came back to perch even closer. I soon realized that it was a completely different bird, a red tailed hawk, this time, if I had to guess. What are the odds of see that again, right?

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Anyway, I did my best to memorize where to look for the Cooper’s hawk nest, so I can check in on that and keep you posted.

The greening of Estabrook continues, perhaps slowed by the grey skies but undaunted.

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The geese at the pond have picked up a fifth wheel whom nobody seems to like.

There were three mallard drakes and one hen, and she rebuffed advances more than once.

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And the solo gadwall hen is still there doing her thing, mostly feeding and doing her best to blend into the background.

Not much to report from the river. I spotted one male common mergansers, one male goldeneye and a few females amongst all the mallards and geese. That is all.

I didn’t get to the park until this afternoon and it was quiet, super quiet. The wind was calm, the sky was dark grey, hardly anyone was around, and many of the critters were taking a nap, like these two mallards beside the pond.

We’ve seen them there before, and I wonder how long they’ll keep it up as visitor traffic increases with nicer weather.

Not everyone was napping, though. There was a second swan couple on the pond, which I was very surprised to see, and even after a skirmish, neither pair seemed willing to budge. I can’t wait to see how this turns out.

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Our gadwall hen was also still there, and she even seems to be getting more comfortable. Here she is showing off her white speculum feathers.

The situation was similar on the river. There are a lot of Canada geese jockeying for prime nesting sites and a bunch of mallards feeding along the shore. I didn’t see our new yellow mallard hen again today, and there were no mergansers, goldeneyes, or scaups, but I was pleasantly surprised to see the bufflehead couple again.

We’re in their winter range, so one of these days I expect they’ll just be gone without so much as a goodbye.

The wind was brisk out of the ESE this morning, so right off of Lake Michigan, and it felt like it. The cold snap was not slowing down this maple tree, however.

The 5 recent regulars were on the pond, the goose couple, the mallard couple, and the solo gadwall hen, but there was nobody new, so I let them be and headed over to the river, which is starting to recede a little bit, and so is not quite as brown and furious as it was last week.

Most of the ducks we’ve been seeing there in recent weeks appear to have moved on, and those left are mostly Canada geese and mallards now. I did spot a few outliers, and got all excited, but it turns out they are just a quartet of goldeneye hens and one greater scaup hen. None were diving, so that threw me off.

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The one newcomer I did spot is this fascinating yellow mallard hen. I have a hope that she is the yellow mallard duckling we saw last summer all grown up now. Wouldn’t that be fun.

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She was sticking pretty close to a mallard drake, so despite her colloration, I presume she identifies as mallard.

First things first, I gotta apologize for misidentifying yesterdays newcomer to the pond.

After I gave it what I thought was my best shot and pressed the “publish” button, the decision still gnawed at me, and I dug even deeper, which led me to a nice page published by “The Wildlife Trusts” on “How to Identify Dabbling Ducks“. That’s where I found a match for the missing detail of “the small white speculum on the wing”, which makes her a female gadwall (Mareca strepera), not a female American black duck, which I now read has a purple speculum. Live and learn, we hope, right?

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Anyway, she’s just got just a little further north to go along the lake shore to the eastern Wisconsin patch of her breeding grounds.

While I was trying so hard to get a better picture of our elusive little guest, the Canada geese came over, perhaps to see if I had anything to eat.

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I read that we should not feed the waterfowl because it is bad for them, but I see signs from time-to-time of folks who just can help themselves, and I think the geese have been conditioned to expect a treat when someone approaches the shore with a bag in their hand.

There was nothing new on the river that I could see. I spotted the grebe again, but my picture was even worse than last time, so I’ll spare you.

On my way back up the bluff, I spotted our deer quartet, whom we haven’t seen in weeks, in the very spot where I first stumbled upon park deer almost a year ago. They were pretty deep in the brush, so I only have presentable images of one of them, who clearly found me so threatening, that she had to lie down.

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She was able to continuing chewing, thankfully.

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The fun continues on this fine spring day in Estabrook with new birds on the pond, new birds in the river, and new flowers up out of the ground.

First, the new bird on the pond looks like a female mallard or a female American black duck. You may recall we saw a male on the river back in January. Well, this morning there was duck who looked like a female mallard, but she was much shyer, and I had a heck of a time getting a decent picture of her even on our little pond.

Based on her un-mallard-like behavior, her dark brown body, and her olive bill, I thought she’s a female American black duck. Upon further digging, however, I now believe the better match, especially for “the small white speculum on the wing“, is the gadwall (Mareca strepera). Here’s a shot of our mallard couple from this morning for comparison.

Meanwhile, the geese are doing just fine, but no nesting yet.

And the herring gulls are back for more fish, which is good because there are a lot of them, and they won’t last long in this weather.

Down on the river, between the two islands, the exciting new arrivals are some greater scaup, which you may recall we first saw down by Discovery World back just over a week ago. I’m glad to see that some got a chance to sample the waters in our little park before the continue north to Nunavut, Canada.

I spotted our redheads also on the river yesterday afternoon foraging off the mudflats.

Lastly, on the river in the warm sun yesterday afternoon, these large fish, 18-24 inches long, almost seemed to be sunning themselves in the shallow water over the rocks where fishermen usually stand just below the falls.

Finally, here’s another batch of flowers, crocuses, already in bloom along the Oak Leaf Trail.