[Mnbird] woodcock?! This late?! But I believe so. Northern Anoka County, Oak Grove

[Kyle TePoel]

Pamela,

I heard woodcock-like "peent"-ing a couple days ago in the Sax-Zim Bog that
stopped me in my tracks, as I don't believe I've ever had one in November
either. I didn't report it anywhere for the thought that it surely must
have been something else, some sort of insect (even though they are pretty
much absent by now). But after reading your email, I checked ebird and a
very small percentage--but some nonetheless--of Minnesota checklists in
early November (.1%) have reported Woodcock, according to their "frequency"
bar chart.  See here:

https://ebird.org/species/amewoo/US-MN

So you might not be crazy (and I might not be either...always debatable)!

Kyle Te Poel
Stillwater Township, MN

On Fri, Nov 8, 2019 at 1:41 PM Pamela Freeman via Mnbird <
mnbird at lists.mnbird.net> wrote:

> Last weekend I was traipsing and moseying in the woods and thickets around
> my yard, it is really bigger than a typical yard, but, it isn't really big
> enough to be called 'land' either, at least the parts of it that are
> accessible when water is not stiff, that is to say, when it is liquid and
> you would need to wade, swim, or slog in mud.
> In any case, I was perusing the areas, on the lookout for buckthorn, which
> is easy to spot this time of year, everything else (native) having shed its
> leaves.
> I was in an area that is more thicket than woods, and adjoins a thin band
> of wet or moist thicket that adjoins a wet meadow and large marsh and ponds
> and creek when something EXPLODED in front of me.
> I had just enough time to note the shape and general coloring of the body,
> and a rather long beak.
> It had to be a woodcock or snipe, and given where it was, and what I did
> get a look at, I am fairly certain it was a wood cock.
> But, this time of year?
> It was NOT a pheasant, though we certainly run across those, but no long
> tail, wrong shape and size, and, that beak. It was very obvious and it was
> long.. Slender and long.
> It's takeoff was noisy, not just the dead leaves and stuff that it
> displaced as it exploded upward and forward, but also the sound of its
> wings.
>
> I have not seen one here before, well, I have not seen one before, outside
> of a book or a specimen in a museum or nature lab.
> So, I was thrilled, but also skeptical, because of the late date.
> Still. It was very much identifiable, or so it really did seem to me.
> I paged through my Sibley, my Audubon, Peterson's. Nothing else looks even
> vaguely like it.
> I went to AllAboutBirds online.
> Same.
>
> Otherwise, I am seeing the usual late fall suspects these days, a turkey
> now and then, or a few, which I still find exciting because it wasn't so
> very long ago that one didn't see them wild here.
> Pheasants, of course, I live near open fields and farm fields and
> undeveloped land.
> Lots of nuthatches, chickadees, juncos by the dozen, a handful of bluejays
> who always sound like more than they are, crows, dulled goldfinches,
> occasionally a hawk, at night, we sometimes still hear owls calling, a few
> cardinals to provide a cheer of color if not their cheer call.
>
> Pamela
> Oak Grove
> Northern Anoka County
>
>
>
>
>
> - Pamela
> Never give up on a dream just because of the length of time it will take
> to accomplish it. The time will pass anyway. - Unknown
>
> “There are some who can live without wild things and some who cannot.”
> ― Aldo Leopold
> I am one who cannot.
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