Photo: Peter Lewis

From the Grand Marais Audubon Christmas Bird Count Organization - December 18, 2022


We had an good day of birding for the Grand Marais Christmas Bird Count on Saturday, December 17, and the temperatures were mostly near freezing and not too much wind, so it made for a comfortable count.  We had generally low numbers for all species due to the snowstorms knocking birds out of the area last week.  Looking at the results, we all did ok considering the previous week conditions.

So we did count our circle area of birds and have an reasonable list compared to previous years. Thanks to ALL who birded Saturday and checked out our area.

We had 32 species on the count day, and 0 additional species so far on the count week.

We've had over 1400 individual birds, which is a low amount.

Circle area is a 7.5 mile radius circle from a point 3 miles south of the middle of Devil Track Lake.  The count circle covers Hwy 61 to Lindskog Rd and north, some of Cty Rd 60, Gunflint Trail to the
landfill road, Pine Mountain Rd to the backside of Elbow Lake, Devil Track Rd to Bally Creek Rd, Ball Club Rd to The Grade, Pike Lake Rd, and Hwy 61 west to Cascade Lodge, and all of the lakeshore between Lindskog Rd and Cascade Lodge.

We're still missing some species that we typically expect to see, so if you've seen any on this list below or others between 12:01 am Wednesday, Dec 14 and 11:59pm Tuesday, Dec 20, we can still count it for the count week species list.  If you saw any of these on count day, Saturday, we can
promote them to the count day results. Email your findings to: [email protected]

Barred Owl (any owls)
Black-backed Woodpecker
Black-Billed Magpie
Cedar Waxwing
Brown Creeper
Mergansers
Northern Flicker
Red-Necked Grebe
Red-Tailed Hawk (any raptors)
Sharp-Shinned Hawk
Any sparrows
Blackbirds
Common Redpolls
European Starling!
Juncos
Larks
Snow Bunting
ETC!


Here are the current results in order of abundance from Saturday and count
weekers:

Black-capped Chickadee
Bohemian Waxwing
Herring Gull
Evening Grosbeak
Common Raven
Downy Woodpecker
American Crow
Pine Grosbeak
Red-breasted Nuthatch
Blue Jay
White-winged Crossbill
House Sparrow
Rock Pigeon
Pine Siskin
American Goldfinch
Common Goldeneye
Hairy Woodpecker
Long-tailed Duck
Mallard
Pileated Woodpecker
Red Crossbill
Bald Eagle
Bufflehead
American Tree Sparrow
Northern Shrike
White-breasted Nuthatch
American Robin
Red-Bellied Woodpecker
Ruffed Grouse
Northern Cardinal
Gray Jay
Brown Thrasher