There are a few times a year that a birder looks forward to. They usually have to do with birding trips and migration and when you are able to combine the two, it makes for a good time.

Whitefish Point in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan just north of Paradise, MI, is well known as the place where the Great Lakes Shipwreck Museum is located. It is also where the tanker the Edmund Fitzgerald (made famous with the Gordon Lightfoot song of the same name) sank not far from this point. Tourists can visit the popular museums for both the lighthouse and the Edmund Fitzgerald.

What isn’t well known though, is that it is a great waterfowl migration location due to the distance of just 17 miles of Lake Superior between the point and Canada. This is also a great migration stop for exhausted songbirds after a tough windblown journey across the lake.

During the migration months in spring and fall there is a dedicated person with their binoculars and spotting scope, 8 hours a day 7 days a week, counting everything that comes through their lenses. During these times there a quite a few dedicated birders who help as much as possible and while we enjoy seeing the birds come through, we also enjoy being able to help. Whether it’s a few hours during the week or a full weekend, every bit of help is appreciated from the counter. Of course there are times while looking through our scopes where, while one person can’t figure the tiny specs in the distance out, another will. Many times the birds are so far our you actually hear: “I think it’s a duck…but it could be a loon…uuhg!” “What do you think?”

This is also a time for those of us who like to bolster our yearly birding totals to check off a few of the specialty birds known to frequent that particular part of the state of Michigan.

Surf, Black, and White-Winged scoters, Spruce Grouse, Common Redpols, and Red and White-Winged Crossbills are among those hoped for. We were able to cross off all but one, though. We went to where the Red Crossbill is expectedly seen or heard, and to our dismay, there had been a bit of logging in that spot, so the habitat wasn’t as plentiful as we had hoped for.

While the birding was a little slow in numbers, we were able to check off all but the Red Crossbills. That made it for a successful trip to the wilderness of the Upper Peninsula of Michigan.

I’m still trying to ID that duck, though…or is it a loon….Grebe maybe?…uuhg…