An evening grosbeak is shown. (Scot Stewart photo)

“I cannot endure to waste anything so precious as autumnal sunshine by staying in the house” — Nathaniel Hawthorne

There seems nothing so precious as a day with sunshine in the Upper Peninsula in November. It seems weeks sometimes between glimpsing appearances, quite frequently it seems right near sunset, when it is only the briefest of showings. There seems no better time to be out than those moments, catching an unmasked breath of crisp, fresh air, and escaping, if only for a moment or two, from the days where the art of making sense of things is just that.

Nature does seem to be doing her best to make sense of the days, handing out her seasonal display of the very best of mammals, birds, dried leaves, wet bark lichens, late mushrooms and long, delicately made ice crystals etching the surface of lazy backwaters and small puddles.

On the Dead River last Saturday, in the wide waters above the Lakeshore Boulevard bridge, a trio of lively river otters was seen foraging in the shallows for crayfish and small fish like minnows and sculpin.

They spend more than 30 minutes actively diving, then torpedoing straight up out of the water showing off entire heads and necks as they often came up gnashing and chewing, all incisors gleaming in the afternoon sun.

They seemed to hit a great spot for food, then suddenly dove and swam off without being seen again.

All the while bufflehead, common goldeneyes and a few mallards paddled about in the calm waters tending to their own foraging seemingly without regard to the raucous family.

The Dead River also had a great flyover of a short-eared owl just two days before, probably migrating south from Canada. These owls are rare in the northern U.P., preferring wide-open fields for hunting late in the day or early mornings, often cruising low over the ground in search of rodents.

At Whitefish Point in Chippewa County, the fall waterbird count came to an end on Nov. 15 with no snowy owls seen there during the last week.

A couple had been seen early in the count, but no had shown up lately. Nearby states of Wisconsin and Minnesota have also seen few signs of these owls either this fall so far.

Landowners with crab apple trees in many parts of the U.P. are enjoying a variety of birds feeding on the fruit. A few great flocks of pine grosbeaks have planted themselves daily in the same tree clusters.

There has been a healthy wave of them across the U.P. 162 were counted this fall at Whitefish Point and with most of the area’s mountain ash crop already eaten in September and October by starlings, catbirds, robins and other thrushes, the crab apples are the main fruit available to the grosbeaks.

They will eat boxelder and ash seeds and will resort to sunflower seeds on occasion too.

The pine grosbeaks have been joined by a few robins in Marquette. Three appeared in several different crab apple trees in south Marquette this past week, and European starlings have joined them too. Throughout the winter house finches occasionally can be found in crab apple trees as well. It is always worth it to check the individuals in a flock feeding in a fruit tree as other species may also feed with the grosbeaks and robins. Besides the starlings, small groups of bohemian waxwings continue with the feeding birds, with two being seen this past week in south Marquette and occasionally a Townsend’s solitaire has shown up in locations in the U.P. and in Wisconsin too.

The solitaires are medium sized relatives of robins usually found in the west, with a range that normally extends to the eastern foothills of the Rockies.

They are winter wanders though, and do make it to some points of the Midwest most winters. One was seen at Peninsula Point in Delta County on Nov. 13.

Another unusual bird has also made some appearances across the U.P. this fall, a red phalarope. A smallish relative of the sandpipers, the spend summers on Arctic ponds in Alaska and the far north of Canada. They winter on the southern parts of both coasts and the Gulf and usually migrate south along the coast making sightings in the Midwest rare. They are interesting birds to watch. Frequently when they feed in shallow water, they spin in circles, creating small whirlpools beneath them pulling small invertebrates up from the bottom allowing the phalaropes to pluck them from the water.

Like most shorebirds, their fall plumage is much drabber than their breeding plumage. Three were seen at White Point this fall and on last week near Silver City in Ontonagon County November 13.

Around the area though, there are plenty of winter finch flocks dipping in and out of trees and feeders. Evening grosbeaks and common redpolls have replaced early rushes of pine siskins.

A few small groups of crossbills, both red and white-winged are still crisscrossing the area too.

Flock size and length of stay will determine how long birds feeding on natural foods like birch catkins seeds and conifer seeds stay. Usually as those foods play out, winter finches leave.

Evening grosbeaks will stick around feeding stations where plentiful amounts of sunflower seeds are available and some birders, especially those in western Marquette County have hosted flocks from 80-300 for most of a winter.

Enjoy this great birding season!

EDITOR’S NOTE: Scot Stewart is a teacher at Bothwell Middle School in Marquette and a freelance photographer.