Illinois State Beach

I went up to Illinois State Beach this past weekend to go birdwatching (by myself). It was interesting. It was similar to the Dunes up in Northwest Indiana in terms of terrain (obviously, since it was on the lake). In case you haven't noticed, I'm essentially using my blog as my birding journal, because then I can post pictures to it and typing is faster than writing. So the thing about going on your own is that every single rustle in the bushes scares the bejeesus out of you. I kept expecting some exotic animal to come out of the bushes and chase me. I'm pretty certain most of the sounds were chipmunks, but I only realized that after I got used to it. So the birdwatching started out pretty slowly. Aside from the migrating birds that I saw on the Lake, I didn't see an actual bird for like 30 minutes. It was very frustrating. But when I finally did, this little guy came and visited me for quite some time. I thought with all the notes I took on him and the amount of time that he spent with me that he'd be really easy to identify. Turns out that he was a flycatcher in which there are 5 distinct species that all look incredibly similar. I've narrowed it down to a Willow Flycatcher or an Alder Flycatcher, two species that can only be told apart by their song, and my little guy wouldn't sing. I'm going to call it an Alder because my research shows that they've been known to nest in that particular park. Although the following pictures seem different, it's probably just different lighting. The first is an Alder and the second is a Willow. The one I saw had the cute gray crown (which all the bird books call brown, but frankly, I don't see it) like the second picture. But this first guy just might not have his up.

So after him, I didn't see anything (except a brown bird that I couldn't identify) for a while. Then I found a trail that didn't look terribly well-used and eventually I came to a clearing that had a whole bunch of birds. I came upon a bench and was rather frustrated by the lack of birds so I sat down and heard, very softly some pecking which I knew was a woodpecker. So I looked around and found him. And he flew away. So I followed him. He was a Downy Woodpecker. The Downy and Hairy Woodpeckers are nearly identical except for 2 things. The Hairy is about 3 inches larger than the Downy and his beak is significantly larger. As I was studying him, I did focus on his beak because I was looking at the hair around the base and therefore I'm able to identify him as a Downy because his beak was small, not large. The one on the right is a Hairy Woodpecker, and the left is a Downy Woodpecker.

Black-Capped Chickadees so far have been around at the same time as the Woodpeckers. They must like the same habitat.

Then this guy caught my eye. He's a white-breasted Nuthatch. They kind of creep along the branches with their belly to the branch, just like in the picture. He was really easy to identify because of the unique way that his head is marked. I actually drew it in my notebook while I was watching him, and it looks just like that in the pictures. You can't really see it all that well in this picture.




Then I saw a pair of Eastern Bluebirds flying around. It was cute because it was a male and a female and they stuck together the whole time. I didn't have any trouble identifying them, although in the shade, he looked a shade darker of blue - not that bright.




I'm not sure if I saw this guy or not. It's a brown-headed cowbird. I thought that they were relatively large, but I saw a bird from the back that had a navy blue body with a brown head. It could've been a trick of the light, I suppose. But I never saw the face of that bird before he flew away.



There were tons of Goldfinches flying around, as always.

Then I saw a finch-like bird with a red stripe on his crown that I must have made up in my head because I can't find it anywhere. I saw him clear as day and wrote a description down, but maybe I was seeing things, because I can't find anything like it.

It was also during this time that I scared a stag out of the bushes. Scared me half to death. All I saw was him bounding away. His antlers were so freaking cool! I could see the fuzz on them, I was so close. I also had a chipmunk nearly run across my feet at one point. So after my tour of the woods I went to the beach. I've never tried to identify gulls before, so this was new. At the very end of the day I saw 2 Killdeer playing. They're pretty easy to identify because when they fly, you see a white stripe on the wing, plus their markings are unique.

So I kept watching gulls flying along the shoreline, South to North, and I saw white ones and brown ones. Much to my surprise, there are NO brown gulls in the bird books. Turns out that Juvenile Gulls are gray and brown and those are probably what I was seeing. I saw some Herring Gulls (much larger with the really big yellow beak) and Ring-Billed Gulls (smaller with the beak with black on it). You can't really see the size difference in the pictures, but Herring Gulls are probably 1.5x the size of Ring-Billed Gulls.

Ring-Billed Gull:

Juvenile Ring-Billed Gull in flight

Juvenile Herring Gull in flight

Herring Gull

I also saw Double-Crested Cormorants flying over. I would've never known they were cormorants in migration unless I had seen them at Eagle Creek and Starved Rock in their neat wing-drying position and seen them fly before. When they're migrating/flying they look kind of duck-like, black, and you can see their big 'ol yellow beak out in front.

And I finally was able to identify a Barn Swallow. I've seen Swallows before, and all the books said they would be really easy to identify because of their coloring - blue and orange. But I couldn't see the coloring before (which makes me think, now that I've seen them, that those weren't Barn Swallows). There were 2 of them and they were flying all around me and they were absolutely gorgeous! The blue and peach-color of their belly are just beautiful. And it's fun to watch them fly.

So that's all, unless I somehow identify my mysterious finch.