What? A bird typically found in the Rocky Mountains is here in southeast Michigan?
Wait a minute. You’re talking about a Mountain Bluebird, here in December?
Word spread quickly throughout the birding community in southeast Michigan about the unusual sighting.
Heck, word spread on birding lists throughout the Great Lakes that a Mountain Bluebird was enjoying the dried grapes on the shoreline of Lake St. Clair.
What would a Mountain Bluebird be doing in Michigan, hundreds of miles northeast of its typical winter location?
The bird didn’t seem to be in a hurry to move on.
Birders had reported sightings of the Mountain Bluebird in the same location for almost three weeks before we decided to head out to find it.
When we arrived on a gray cloudy, windy day at the point on Lake St. Clair, it didn’t seem to be a great day for birding.
The winds were strong off the lake, ice was breaking up on the shoreline, and rain was expected by mid-day.
All we saw initially were about a dozen Canvasbacks out on the water as we carefully hiked the icy, mud-frozen trails.
But when we moved to the north shore of the point, we met up with other birders, also looking for the Mountain Bluebird.
Have you seen it yet? everyone asked each other.
Not yet, but we know it loves the wild grapes and stays in the underbrush much of the time.
And then someone noticed movement above us.
There it is!
About 25 feet up in a tree, where it sat for a while, before descending down to land on a plant about 30 feet from us.
The bluebird seemed unconcerned with the half-dozen people quickly taking photos of it.
As you can see, I managed to get better shots of the backside of the bird than the front.
Then the rains came and we scurried back to our vehicles.
Still, a great day! The Mountain Bluebird was a life bird for me. Wonderful way to end birding in 2016!
Nice photos! Did anyone come up with an explanation of his location so far from normal?
What kind of camera/lens do you use for birding?
Hey, Paul!
No one seems to know how the bird found its way to Michigan. Every so often Michigan gets an unusual, unexpected bird during migration. He was spotted in early December, but it seems the duck hunting this weekend has scared him off. No one saw him yesterday (I went out for a second time, but he was nowhere about the area.) I have a Canon Rebel T6i with a Canon telephoto 75-250mm lens. I’ve been looking for a new lens for birding, but the one I’m interested in is very expensive. Do you photograph birds?
I tried a couple of times but don’t have the lens or the steady hand to get the photos I wanted. The best lens I have right now is an 80-200 2.8, which was fair but hard to get close enough to get the good detail. I rented an 18-300 3.5-5.6 for a trip to the Everglades and it was fair, but definitely noisy.
I’d like to have a good 400 to use, but I definitely don’t do enough shooting any more to make it worth it.
Oooh, have a link to share of your Everglades photos? I’d love to see them, Paul. I’d love a 400, it’s still on my mind. Trying to balance the cost with the frustration of not getting the shot I want.
Well, they aren’t very good, but – https://oylercreative.com/oyler-photography/everglades-photos/