My Big Year

                                                                           Rowan Stamm

                On June 7th 2012 I decided to do a big day (try and get as many species of birds as possible in one day) and from there it turned into an big week a big summer and finally a big year. (A Midwest big year I do not have the resources for a North American big year.)

Indigo bunting at my aunt and uncles pool

                Obviously I started with the common birds in my back yard, robin, common grackle, brown headed cowbird. But I also got some less common birds the first day, like black billed cuckoo, rose breasted grosbeak, and bobwhite quail. That day we had friends from Portland, Oregon. My friend Dawn and I trekked through the woods around my house came back all scratched up and with a new bird a bobwhite quail. (Dawn is a non birder but she was a big help.)

(The birds listed are not in the order they were seen they are listed by family.)

Bird 1: black bellied whistling duck seen at shoveler 's sink.

Black bellied whistling duck normally live in Texas but was seen near Madison WI.

Bird 2: canada goose  seen at a pond near a kwik trip.

Bird 3: trumpeter swan seen on the Radisson flowage.






                 The first trip I took was just driving around in the country by cornfields looking for sparrows.
I saw horned larks, bobolinks a kingfisher and a kestrel.

Bird 4: wood duck seen on the radisson flowage

Bird 5: mallard seen at a kwik trip.

Bird 6: blue winged teal seen at an industrial pond in Middleton Wi

                  The next trip I took was to Brooklyn wildlife area looking for indigo buntings I got the bunting and a hooded warbler.The same day I went out to my aunt and uncles swimming pool and was sitting onthe rear bumper of my van calling indigo buntings in to watch when all of a sudden a bunting fly's in and lands on my foot and stayed there for 30 seconds the played in the gravel in front of me.