A long time coming

I found a lifer today after four years of scanning snow covered fields and following leads from eBird reports. I was getting desperate enough to place a personal ad in the paper, ”Avid birder seeking winter roadside dweller with a penchant for flying miles away at the slightest sound”. Instead, I mustered up the courage to reach out to a local birder who I had only met twice and she was nice enough to point me in the right direction this week. The push was on because the snow will be melting soon which makes it even more impossible to find a (drumroll please) - a LAPLAND LONGSPUR.

On Wednesday, I went to my usual spots to see Horned larks who are known to have a few Lapland longspurs along as company as they forage for food on snow covered farm fields. It was a cold day with high temps in the single degrees Fahrenheit as indicated by this fluffed out Horned lark.

I traveled many more miles crawling along country roads trying to find a Lapland longspur amongst the larks. It was not to be.

That evening was when I decided to email a fellow birder who lives in my area and does a fair amount of country road drives in the winter months in search of winter birds in southern Wisconsin. She was more than happy to lead me in the right direction. The next day, I made my way to the new spot that was near a large farm that she had described. Only instead of birds by the silage pile, it was farm equipment moving bales around. I pulled along the side of the road about 20 feet further and saw a bird on a post in the distance. Suddenly, it flew down and grabbed a tiny mammal. As I suspected, it was an American kestrel. It was a nice consolation prize to see this bird in action because as it turns out I was 0 for 2 on the Longspur at this point and plenty discouraged. When I got home I was thrilled to find that one of my photos showed tufts of fur flying to the left of the kestrel after his successful hunt.

Can you see the tiny tufts of fur to the left of the bird?

I went back to my original spot the next day since my birding informant had indeed seen a Longspur that morning at my usual spot. I got there and could even see a set of tire tracks along the side of the road that could have been hers. I parked and rolled down my window hearing the delicate, musical song of the Horned larks as they scattered about the field looking for food to forage. After a while of waiting without hearing the clicking flight song when the Longspurs take flight, I decided that today was not going to be my day to find a one and headed home.

Which brings us to today, when I decided to go back to the farm in hopes that there wouldn’t be equipment moving about to scare away the birds. I got there and rolled down the car window and nothing, just the wind. I searched for motion in the distance and saw none. I headed back the way I came and came across a flock of 40 Horned larks. I pulled over the road and patiently waited as they got closer to my car and my camera lens. Sure enough, there was a male Lapland longspur molting into breeding plumage amongst the larks!

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Thanks for reading my first Substack! I enjoyed sharing my birding experience with you this week. This is much more enjoyable for me than condensing my thoughts into short blurbs on other social media apps.