December 2025

Nov 30 – Took a walk at Gt Sp this afternoon.  Lots and lots of buffleheads, goldeneyes, mallards and Canada geese on the water upstream from the hatchery.  Also saw a fairly tame juvenile shrike up fairly close but did not have a camera along, unfortunately / Saw what I think was a female long-tailed duck pretty much all by itself diving repeatedly in some of the open water down by the dam.  Did not have a spotting scope so could not confirm but would like to know if anyone else has seen one there recently. – Steve

Nov 30 – I had heard, somewhere, that collared doves can’t tolerate cold temperatures. We had at least a minus 15 last night. This morning I saw a dead dove in the road and kicked it off to the side and saw another. I started counting at that point and found 15 in a 1/4 mile section of road (lined with spruce trees). They were untouched, like they literally froze and fell out of the trees. A few had moved a couple feet before expiring.  – Beth H

Nov 29 – A flock of 200-300 snow geese just flew over the north side of town.  This weather should bring a few ‘winterhawks’ with it too…..   We had 50-100 finches mobbing the feeder yesterday but not this morning. – Steve L.

Nov 28 – The snow has made it much easier to spot new birds, we have a Junco this morning. – Richard M.

Nov 26 – WRS West: Airport Bench – The first 15 minutes of driving were a little treacherous.  Knowing the forecast was warmer and some sun we kept going expecting the trace of snow pack to melt shortly – it did.  Thanks to Steve for some skilled driving.  Velda and Bev did a great job spotting once again.  Interesting sights – mini-goats wandering around Sun River.  We had several isolated Snow Geese.  A group of 3 in a field made us wonder if they were ill.  When we returned past that same spot 30 minutes later – 7 (SEVEN) Golden Eagles and a big smear of white feathers on the ground.  7 eagles can make short work of a Snow Goose.  One young Bald Eagle – had the “osprey” look – a 2 year old.  The day started out cloudy, ended mostly sunny with temperatures between 35 and 40 degrees.  The wind was nice – SW 5-15 mph all morning. – Beth H.
Trip report: https://ebird.org/tripreport/436115

Nov 25 – WRS South: Cascade – Ulm– What a nice bunch of birds today.  It was interesting that there were only adult bald eagles.  The Prairie Falcon was so hard to see – its back was to us, it blended right in with the top of the power pole – looking like an insulator.  It took off and flew around a bit before landing on another pole.  It was like a lesson identifying a bird by its flight pattern.  It was wonderful to stop and watch a Northern Shrike as it evaded photo capture by flying constantly away from us as we crept down the road.  The biggest surprise was a field full of Sandhill Cranes slowly walking in a southerly direction.  85 cranes!  Once again – thanks to Steve for driving and the spotting of Renee and Richard. – Beth H.
Trip report: https://ebird.org/tripreport/435878

Nov 24 – I’ve doing some last minute gardening and I heard some old familiar bird songs so I went inside and grabbed my phone and turned on Merlin and in seconds Merlin confirmed my suspicion, Redpolls and Goldfinches. I just got finished reading that there will likely be an eruption of finches and indeed it has started. It only took seconds for Merlin to confirm. Probably a good year for Nyjer. – Richard M.

Nov 18 – Spent a couple hours looking for the badger Steve photographed without any luck | sunlight was reflecting on the water; couldn’t ID the ducks that were way out there |  did see coots; some Canada geese | and hundreds and hundreds and likely thousands of swans and cygnets | some solo, some in pairs, some family groups with cygnets, and hundreds on the edges of the water opposite the road | just before sunset more swans arrived in flight followed by more and more – Bev A

Nov 15 – This route has more uncultivated agricultural ground than the 2 routes already completed this month.  Fewer fences and open space for the wind to run free – and it did.  The wind was a pretty steady 20 mph plus to gusts reaching 40 for sure.  Still, we had 11 individual raptors (5 golden eagles was thrilling, several showed off their golden head and nape).  Several ravens performed some strong maneuvers in the wind, their efforts imitated soaring raptor movements.  Sometimes we will find fields full of Canada Geese, but not today.  There were 2 battling headwinds near a reservoir.  It was a little surprising that we saw zero Bald Eagles.  Perhaps on a later survey.  Thanks to Velda for driving and spotters Richard and Bev. – Beth H
Trip report: https://ebird.org/tripreport/432630

Nov 15 – On the raptor tour around the Highwood Mountains – 90 miles and no “pit stops” anywhere. 5 Golden Eagles – some quite distant – others flashed their golden head feathers. – Beth Hill

Nov 12 – Just had a flock of Cedar Waxwings come get a drink from the birdbath, they have been hanging around for at least a couple of weeks feeding on Crabapple and possibly Juniper in the neighbors trees. -Richard M

Nov 8 – Not bad for an early November survey. Not too many birds (numbers). In addition to those listed we had a pair of Bald Eagles soaring over the Manchester Rd area that were observed. One pair was seen on a nest, later we observed a soaring eagle – since it was no more than 2 miles away and we watched it take off and head in the general direction of where we saw the soaring eagle. There was a good chance it was the same bird even though this area can be rich with eagles in January. One unknown buteo was seen on the first stretch of survey, on the return trip of the same stretch of road we had positive ID on a very dark Red-tail Hawk (saw a rusty tail) and a positive on a Rough-legged Hawk (and an American Kestrel) – the unknown buteo was deleted as it was most likely one of the two we saw later in the morning.
A nice sunny day, temperatures ranged from 30-49 degrees with no noticeable wind (SW 5-10 mph). It was fun with Nora driving (thanks!) and Ava and April as back seat spotters (thanks!) – Beth Hill
Trip report:  https://ebird.org/tripreport/430647

Nov 5 – Bev A and Richard M joined me as spotters today for our first winter raptor survey (WRS).  We did the ‘dreaded’ Vaughn-Fairfield route.  It was far from dull.  Although we had only 13 individuals we had 7 species.  3 rough-legged hawks, 2 American kestrels, 2 northern harriers (both males!), 1 adult bald eagle, 1 gorgeous golden eagle, 2 sharp-shinned hawks (!) and 1 great horned owl.  2 of the sharpies were chasing each other around. / Only one other time have we had 7 species (19 individuals).  Quite a few times we had more individuals, but bald eagles accounted for the higher numbers.  And those were 2 years ago, last year the area was almost a desert. / The route was 86 miles and took us 5 hr and 45 minutes to complete.  Trip report link below. Great spotting! – Beth H
Trip report: https://ebird.org/tripreport/429832

Nov 3 – on my way home from the gym about a half hour ago, I spotted a northern harrier atop a utility pole on 33rd Ave S by Highland Cemetery – Bev A

Nov 1 – Was driving through the park about 10:30 and was lucky to find the White-winged Scoters fishing close to the shore. One caught a crayfish, which put up a good fight, but lost. – Jan Wilson

Nov 1 – we must have just missed each other Jan. I took an early drive out on the frontage road past Ulm but hit such dense fog I couldn’t see anything  | went towards the buffalo jump and saw three big coyotes off in the distance  / then along the river near Black Eagle Island and Giant Springs  / came home to find this large raptor in one of our trees – Bev A

Nov 1 – Yesterday I watched one come up with a crayfish and swallowed it – I was surprised the gull that was following did not attempt to grab it. – Beth H

Nov 1. – Oh what a great pic!  Right time, right place…. that is always a great feeling. Photo made me check my bird books/apps as there is no ‘white’ showing on this apparent white-winged scoter.  Lo and behold, there is not a lot of difference between juvenile and female surf scoters and white-wings.  And the Sibley book shows adult female white-wing with no white showing on wing.  Jeez…. reminds me of orange-crowned warblers whose ‘orange crown’ is RARELY seen in the field, according to the Sibley book.  Ugh…. as if bird ID was not already hard enough…..I can’t imagine swallowing those prickly (and bitey…) crawdads whole. | Beth and I were talking about all the birds that eat crawdads down there,,,, gulls by the hundreds all summer then ducks (including even mallards) by the hundreds all fall and winter.  That river/reservoir bottom must be crawling with crawdads…. Steve Leathe