What drifts by on Lake Michigan

     My husband and I have now lived on a bluff overlooking Lake Michigan north of Milwaukee for 19 years. I never tire of the view of this lake. One of the most exciting things to view from our large east facing windows is the weather. The oft remarked cliche: If you don't like the weather, wait 5 minutes" is certainly personified by what I see as I look out over the Lake.

     Given my longtime interest in birdwatching, it is not surprising that I am constantly on the alert for birds flying along the Lake front, or resting on the lake. Of course, given that our bluff is about 100 feet high, and about 2 acres long, any birds on the surface of the lake are necessarily quite distant. However, if I see something unusual, I will do my best to get a photo. The following series of photos was taken in about 2010. For some reason in May of that year, a small family group of tundra (whistling) swans decided to come to rest just off of the point of land that our lot makes into Lake Michigan. They spent half a day just resting and floating and in general gathering energy to continue their migration north, I assume. I called everyone that I could think of and invited them over to take a look through my spotting scope. Here are a couple photos that I obtained during that time. There is a photo of the bluff as well. This was when I was still trying to slow the erosion on the bluff. I had thrown a whole package of vetch seed over the bluff and this plant had seeded quite well. There are still some patches of these plants notable on the bluff. This seed was used a lot on roadways but it was found that such a monoculture was hard on wild life and also the plant became invasive and difficult to eradicate. It has invaded natural areas from roadsides where it was planted to control erosion. I didn't know this at the time that I threw the seed over the bluff, but even so our bluff was so defoliated at that time I was excepting of any plant growth at all. Other plants have now replaced some of this crown vetch.

Tundra swan family resting for 1/2 day on Lake Michigan.

The purple flowering vine in lower right side of photo is the invasive non Native vetch, called crown vetch

         This year, a large number of white pelicans have been seen at various locations along the Lake Michigan coast, in quite large numbers. I am always amazed at my ability to look up and see something unusual out over the lake. I happened to be weeding my flower beds in June, when I looked up and saw this group of large birds flying north and then they turned and flew back south toward Fox Point, north of Milwaukee. I later had postings on friend's facebook about seeing these birds at various points and parks along the southern Wisconsin Lake Michigan shore. They are magnificent birds especially in a large group like this.

About 500 white pelicans in Manitowoc, WI harbor on June 17, 2017.

Photo by P. T. Wallen, published in Herald Times Reporter of Manitowoc.

     As the years have passed, wild turkeys have become more and more common in many urban areas. The Milwaukee area and our backyard are no exceptions. Here are seen a group of hens grazing their way across our backyard. Sometimes I have noticed that they have a hard time learning from one another how to get over these fences. These birds in these photos seem to have figured it out pretty readily, but I have seen a single left behind hen run up and down along this fence for a couple hours rather than fly over it. I don't know if this is just laziness and difficulty thinking about flying over or if it is ignorance. I guess I have never thought of turkeys as extremely bright birds.
     However, I may be wrong. I have done some research on wild turkeys in Wisconsin. By the 1970s due to hunting, these birds were almost absent from Wisconsin. However, they were re introduced in various natural areas in the central part of the state accomplished with a trade of Missouri turkeys for Wisconsin ruffed grouse. At this date, turkeys are prominent in all 72 Wisconsin counties including urban and suburban Milwaukee County. Apparently our bird feeders, and overgrazing by deer have provided food and the forest edge habitat that the turkeys like. They may be more adaptive than we have ever thought. They have even been seen on the Federal Plaza in downtown Milwaukee. The absence of predators such as coyote where humans are very populous also helps them succeed very well.

     Living here on Lake Michigan, we have been fortunate to have a pair of bald eagles as close neighbors for about 8 years. Now I am told that their nest tree has collapsed but I still occasionally see them on the bluff so they are still nesting in the area. In the photos below, we have one of that year's youngsters sitting on our neighbor's chimney.

You can see that this is an immature bald eagle because of the lack of a white head, and the amount of white on its body.

One Baltimore oriole among many; this one waiting its turn for the jelly feeder.

White crowned sparrows and goldfinches at the feeders and oranges for the orioles in May.

My water feature in the late fall: this year's bluebird family bathing in the water and on top of the icy coating.

In this series of photos, a Cooper's hawk has grabbed a songbird and is cleaning the carcass before taking it back to its youngsters in the nest.

A spotted towhee, on the ground. This bird's famous call: "Drink your tee!"

      A certain times each year, we see huge numbers of dragonflies going up and down along Lake Michigan. They seem to be particularly attracted to Lake Michigan, though they are seen in few numbers inland. They are feeding on flying insects and my theory is that since there is no vegetation on the Lake and therefore less insects, these "hawks" of the insect world congregate at Lake Michigan's edge. This particular species is quite large and beautiful and goes by a common name of the green pond hawk.

Monarchs have become somewhat more rare due to habitat loss; here is one on my Echinacea.

     Of course, no natural history section about Lake Michigan would be complete without the white tailed deer, an animal that is at once lovable (Ah, Bambi.) and also in my mind as a flower gardener, a huge species of "rat", that is prolific and destructive. But what human can look at the bottom two photos and not have a warm hear?

     Milwaukee is lucky to have the Denis Sullivan Great Lake Schooner, a partial copy and hand built in Milwaukee by over a thousand volunteers, and over a million volunteer hours, conceived and designed in 1991 and completed in 2000. Above the water, this Denis Sullivan looks very much like the cargo lake schooner that plied Lake Michigan waters in the 1800s. It has 3 masts, ten sails: 3 main sails, 3 raffees, 3 jibs and a flying jib.  Below water this ship varies from the lake schooner for safety purposes in that it has a much deeper weighted keel allowing 6 foot 4 inches of head room below decks. This type of ship was once commonly used to ply the waters of the Great Lakes. As far as we know this is the only modern lake schooner in use in the world.  The Dennis Sullivan spends summers in Milwaukee, offering day sails, and tours, and participating in various Tall Ships events in port cities up and down Lake Michigan. In winter, it usually sails up the St. Lawrence River and out to sea to winter in either Florida, or the Caribbean, returning every summer to its birth at Discovery World Museum in downtown Milwaukee.

     Beginning on August 13, 2012, Chicago hosted a Navy Week of celebration at Navy Pier commemorating the bicentennial of the War of 1812. Many activities centered on this well known landmark in downtown Chicago. Two US Navy ships, a US Coast Guard ship, as well as two Canadian Navy ships participated in this celebratory week at various times. The Canadian Navy ships were the HMCS Moncton 708 and its sister ship HMCS Summerside 711. These two Canadian ships are in the Kinston class of coastal defense vessels. Built n 1998, the Moncton is a minesweeper type vessel but also has participated in world wide Canadian deployment, several times to the Arctic in Operation Nanook, to participate in naval exercise off Denmark and Norway, to West Africa also to participate with naval exercises with the Liberian Navy, and various other missions around the Canadian eastern coast. The Moncton is 181 feet long, 37 feet wide, and draws 11 feet. I am telling you about this ship, because I looked out at our little segment of the lake one morning and there was this grey large ship anchored off our point. With the binoculars I was able to see the Canadian Maple Leaf flag, and I could see its classification number MM708. This allowed me to identify it. The ship was anchored there for most of the day. At times some seamen were working over the side of the ship on its aft, I thought, perhaps painting. This was in 2012 and I am sure the ship had come from its deployment to Chicago. By evening the ship was gone.

     Of course, any gathering of what is viewed on lake Michigan has to include sunrises, sunsets, the moon rise, clouds and storms.