Migration time is chasin' time

Well, we've finally reached that happy time of year when the phone can ring and instead of being the boss seeing if you "want" to come in to work an extra shift, or being informed of the latest family time with the in-laws ;-), it can be news of a bird worth chasing. I had considered biking to Tiscornia this morning but was just too tired to go and see what might be there on Lake Michigan, BUT, when Andre called about midday saying he'd found a moorhen a block away from his house, (in essentially the same location as he'd found my county-lifer bittern last year) suddenly my legs felt much more willing. Moorhen is probably slightly less than annual in Berrien county and this one was just over 10 miles from home so I felt like I HAD to go. The route was just about straight south and with a nice north wind I made it in less than an hour. It didn't take long to scan the lake and spot the bird foraging with a coot on the first pass. The ride home was into a decent head wind and took me close to an hour and a half though I did stop for a few blackbird flocks to try to pull out a rusty.

Another sign that spring is finally here were butterflies yesterday, a morning cloak as well as several Eastern Commas, such as the one below (in the in-laws' defense, this was in their backyard).