Animal Person

APRIL 5, 2009

On Friday, April 3rd, Montana Governor Brain Schweitzer returned House Bill 418 to the legislature with suggestions for amendments. Tell the governor's office that (live) horses are a symbol of the American West and Montana should not want to be known as the horse slaughter capitol of the country. PLEASE TAKE ACTION.

Horse Slaughter 100

Horse Slaughter Montana Horses Slaughter 100

10,000 Birds

APRIL 20, 2012

One of the admirable things about Montana is how it contains prime examples of not one, but two iconic North American landscapes. But eastern Montana contains the equally though differently stunning high plains, a world unto itself with very different wildlife meeting very different challenges.

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Ferrets Wildlife Montana Prairie Dogs 241

10,000 Birds

JUNE 20, 2014

The species that calls western Montana home is the black cottonwood, while plains and narrowleaf cottonwood call the rest of the state home. Each of the seeds that blows by me, in short, has not much more of a chance than an actual snowflake. Humans have not helped.

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Montana Cattle Deer Shelters 223

10,000 Birds

JULY 4, 2014

Moving to Montana was not even exotic – it was a non-possibility. I didn’t go to grad school or move to Montana until my 30s, and I didn’t see the Bullock’s Oriole until I had been in Montana almost four years. It was not mine, and I couldn’t miss what I had never had.

Baltimore 231

Baltimore California Condor Montana Cleveland 231

Critter News

MAY 3, 2009

Montana has passed a law making it difficult to challenge the building of a horse slaughtering facility in that state. The last such facility in the US closed in 2007. This bill specifically makes for groups that might oppose it to use the court system to do so. From the bill, which you can read here : Section 2.

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Montana Horses Horse Slaughter Slaughter 100

10,000 Birds

JULY 25, 2014

The state of Montana is very firm on the subject of spotted knapweed, and the closely related diffuse knapweed and Russian knapweed. Spotted knapweed arrived in Montana in the 1920s, most likely in a batch of alfalfa seed or perhaps on the creep down from western Canada, where it may have come ashore in the ballast of ships.

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Montana Goats Sheep Species 187

10,000 Birds

JULY 22, 2016

New York has wonderful birds. I love New York’s birds with a passion, from the parti-colored pigeons to the spring warbler fiesta to Jamaica Bay’s herons and ibises (but not the sandpipers. Never the sandpipers.).

Montana 100

Montana Bald Eagle New York Jamaica 100

10,000 Birds

MAY 24, 2013

When you move on to Montana, you discover that there are worse things that one species of tiny screaming mammal tricking you each year as you try to cope with an influx of songbirds and a winterized memory bank that contains only Black-capped Chickadees and Dark-eyed Juncos (and only about half their calls at that.) You sigh and move on.

Chipmunks 240

Chipmunks Squirrels Rodents Montana 240

10,000 Birds

SEPTEMBER 20, 2013

I also ran into a local birder who was unimpressed when I gushed about how much I was enjoying my morning — until I explained that I was from Montana. Well, I am sort of am from Montana now, I guess. My last species in the park was Wood Duck , which we have in Montana too but which is always fun to see.

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Montana New York City New York Nashville 219

10,000 Birds

MARCH 1, 2013

Besides the owls themselves, I promised them the best pie in Montana, which is to be found in the Ronan Cafe. None of these people were birdwatchers, as such, before coming to Montana, although one of the poets was outdoorsy in a hiking and skiing way. If you are ever in Ronan, Montana, try the pie. And the pie.

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Bald Eagle Montana Owls Mississippi 190

10,000 Birds

JULY 12, 2013

As I’ve noted before, floating is not ideal for birding, but sometimes it’s all you’ve got and if so, it’s time to learn to appreciate the Spotted Sandpiper — along with the Bald Eagle , the Common Merganser , and other commonplace water birds of Montana.

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Bald Eagle Montana Eagles Birds 207

10,000 Birds

AUGUST 16, 2013

Of last round’s candidates, the Gallinaceous Bird TBD is now out, as I’ve since seen both Greater Sage and Ruffed Grouse , stolid Montana natives of good repute. And the Golden-winged Warbler still presents logistical difficulties.

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Montana Blackbirds Birds Eagles 199

10,000 Birds

OCTOBER 28, 2011

The University of Montana Symphonic Wind Ensemble, to be precise. October 13 found me doing something very unusual, even for me: learning about birds while watching an orchestra. At a concert called “Winged Messengers”, which included a piece called “Chickadee Symphony” by Craig Naylor.

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Montana Owls Science Research 253

10,000 Birds

JUNE 6, 2014

Birds Montana names Ospreys web cams' Fortunately, I can now put my irrational fears aside, because one of my favorite sets of names won. Introducing this year’s Dunrovin osprey chicks – Lunar, Sol, and Shadow, named for the eclipse that took place the night the first egg was laid.

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Montana Eggs Birds 203

10,000 Birds

AUGUST 12, 2011

The Sage Grouse is getting a boost in Alberta with the work of The Sage Grouse Recovery Group , which is seeking to augment the dwindling population in Alberta with birds from Montana.

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Montana Groups Birds 165

10,000 Birds

JUNE 7, 2013

Since I moved to Montana I’ve been updating it sporadically at best, and over the past year or so, not at all. Perhaps, too, it doesn’t hurt that the number of lists from Montana is large enough to create meaningful pictures in the data, but small enough that I feel like I’m really contributing in some way.

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Montana 2007 Game Birds 224

10,000 Birds

MARCH 7, 2014

This is my first season with the ranch, and I’m very excited to being putting some of my theories about nest cams into practice. We’ll see how it goes.

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Montana Horses Eggs Morals 248

10,000 Birds

AUGUST 22, 2014

But the turkey vultures would certainly leave the places we saw them – Montana, North Dakota, Illinois and Indiana, Pennsylvania and Ohio and eventually New York – and head south. The only bird we saw in every state was the Turkey Vulture. No vast kettles, yet, only ones and twos.

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North Dakota Turkey Pennsylvania New York 212

10,000 Birds

MARCH 30, 2012

That was not to be, alas, but we did manage a grand slam of Montana nuthatch species ( White-breasted, Red-breasted, and Pygmy ) with their usual attendants the Black-Capped Chickadees , and we spotted another merganser species ( Common Merganser ) winging rapidly upriver. At last we plunged into the woods, hoping for Great Horned Owls.

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Wildlife Montana Bald Eagle Geese 224

10,000 Birds

NOVEMBER 2, 2012

With all my traipsing about this year I’ve actually been shamefully lax on birding Montana. Montana offers little in the way of flamingos, generally speaking. No Snow Geese or swans yet, and no Sandhill Cranes , but it did renew my taste for some of the simpler, homier pleasures of birding.

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Bald Eagle Montana Italy Owls 162

Critter News

FEBRUARY 25, 2009

Great, just after we managed to get rid of the last one "It doesn't mean you have to do it.

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Horse Slaughter Horses Legislature Montana 100

10,000 Birds

OCTOBER 5, 2012

I just chalked this up to my friends being weird, until I took the Master Naturalist Class at the Montana Natural History this fall. Way, way back, during our inuagural game of Gone Birding , my friend Molly developed a theory of birds. There were, in her book, three kinds: Owls, Pigeons, and Ducks. water birds (ducks!)

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Montana Bald Eagle Owls Ducks 203

10,000 Birds

OCTOBER 12, 2021

There is also a research institute dedicated to wilderness: the Aldo Leopold Wilderness Research Institute is an interagency facility located at the University of Montana. For example, hunting is not permitted in most NPS wilderness areas, but it is often allowed in wilderness areas managed by the other agencies.

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Puerto Rico Alaska Protection Montana 298

10,000 Birds

AUGUST 16, 2011

Female White-browed Shortwing ( Brachypteryx montana ) at nest with two nestlings. Practically the entire time we were on these trails (both days) we were surrounded by male and female shortwings frantically searching for food for their nestlings.

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Thailand Montana Birds Africa 245

10,000 Birds

JULY 26, 2013

The swallows here in Montana have an admirable ability to assort themselves into nesting niches. Bank Swallows live in our many sandy banks. Tree Swallows live in trees — and nest boxes. I have seen Cliff Swallows on cliffs, but even more than that, they enjoy bridges.

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Montana Woodpeckers Eggs Raised 199

10,000 Birds

MARCH 2, 2012

I haven’t lived in Montana long enough to feel jaded about Bohemian Waxwings, so I concentrated on them at first. A good thing about those berries, too, since the ground was still covered by not only a layer of fresh snow but also, in many spots, the crusty ice of previous freezes and thaws. Definitely not spring.

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Downers Montana Fish Wildlife 225

10,000 Birds

OCTOBER 25, 2013

It’s not that they’re not around — I’ve seen them at the National Bison Range, to name but one definitively Montana location — but they’re not AROUND, like they always used to be back on the Olde Homestead. I miss Eastern Kingbirds. Instead we have other flycatchers, and I am not a fan of other flycatchers.

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Montana 2009 Eagles Birds 234

10,000 Birds

MARCH 21, 2014

And yet, perhaps ironically, the biggest sign of spring in a Montana March is when the skies fill with white. As ponds thaw open reports are coming in of Barrow’s Goldeneye, Pied-billed Grebe, Cinnamon and Green-winged Teal, Gadwall and Wigeons and Shovelers.

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Geese Montana Breeding Pelicans 237

10,000 Birds

DECEMBER 14, 2021

The Collective added six new states in the past three years, but none have eclipsed the century mark: Wisconsin ( 74 ), Utah (55), Hawaii (38), Oklahoma (18), Rhode Island (9), and Connecticut (5).

West Virginia 263

West Virginia United States Puerto Rico Minnesota 263

10,000 Birds

APRIL 13, 2012

Last week was spring break at the University of Montana, and so, for me, a chance for a brief flying visit back east. Yesterday, there were none. Today, Tree Swallows are here, flashing light and dark above the river. Now, let’s back up. Though spring migration is only just starting to ramp up there, of course I had to visit the Ramble.

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Chicago Litter Louisiana Montana 235

10,000 Birds

FEBRUARY 28, 2014

Ferruginous Hawks breed in the grasslands of eastern Montana, but they are rare in the mountains and in winter, so this bird was certainly a surprise. It sat serenely while we scrambled to set up scopes and get our looks, and only took off as we did so ourselves.

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Bald Eagle Falcons Geese Montana 232

10,000 Birds

APRIL 11, 2014

East of the iconic Glacier National Park and south of the Montana Hi-Line memorialized in the work of James Welch, the area around Freezeout put me much in mind of the Charles M. But when the Snow Geese have moved on Freezeout WMA is still a complex of wetlands, never without birds.

Geese 231

Geese Montana Ducks Falcons 231

10,000 Birds

NOVEMBER 18, 2015

The landscape known as the Crown of the Continent extends from northern Idaho and Wyoming through Montana to the Canadian border, linking the Greater Yellowstone and Salmon-Selway ecosystems and including Grand Teton, Yellowstone and Glacier National Parks.

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Legislation Montana Wyoming Idaho 210

10,000 Birds

JULY 1, 2011

Moreover, at the time I had no inkling that I’d be moving to Montana in two and a half years – in fact, it would be nearly a year before I decided to go to grad school and entertained the notion of leaving New York at all. In Central Park , to be exact. It was exciting — to a degree.

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New York Montana Breeding Fish 217

10,000 Birds

MAY 19, 2015

If you’ve ever wanted to understand why warning calls by one bird species seem to spread rapidly, like an avian version of the Wave , to birds of other species, Professor Erick Greene from the University of Montana is your man.

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Montana New York Times Science New York 154

10,000 Birds

JANUARY 17, 2012

A good number of times – looking at a White-browed Shortwing ( Brachypteryx montana ) or the like – it struck me just how incredibly sharp the image was. I was expecting them to be better than the current EL32s (which I use a lot), but what I did not expect was just how much better they are.

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Austria Thailand Montana Protection 234

10,000 Birds

JANUARY 24, 2014

Though hardly common, Great Gray sightings are a yearly occurrence in Western Montana, and it is one of the twelve species of owl known to breed in the state. As a result, its territory in the Rocky Mountains extends far south of the bulk of its range.

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Owls Minnesota Montana 2014 255