Munuscong Bay State Wildlife Management Area

This area, just south of the Soo, has a reputation among birders of having a reliable population of LeConte's Sparrows. This tiny sparrow is very secretive, uncommon, and highly sought after by listers and photographers. I arrived early Friday afternoon and checked into the State Forest Campground on the Munuscong River. What a difference between last night at Central Lake and here. For exactly the same price I have no showers, no flush toilets, no electricity, no quaint village nearby, and some of the more open lots did not have the grass mowed. On the other hand, however, it had beautiful natural sites, some of the wooded ones backing up onto the river. After selecting a site on the river, I checked out the boat ramp. There were apparently three fishermen trying their luck, judging from the trailers in the parking lot. The river looked high and very muddy.

My biggest surprise was a posting at the launch.

For a minute I thought I was back in Salineno, Texas watching illegals wade across the RioGrande to a waiting pickup truck. I wondered how misinformed these aliens were if they really wanted to be smuggled into Michigan. Did somebody tell them there were great paying jobs at GM and Chrysler? Did terrorists find Michigan to be a target rich environment? With these thoughts in mind I headed to some grasslands where the illusive LeConte's Sparrow waited. I met two bird photographers along the way that I had met previously at Crane Creek, Ohio. They left a little early to catch the Stanley Cup finals.

One strategy when photographing LeConte's is to find their singing perches in the evening and then set up for them before sunrise the next morning, since they often use the same singing perches. This works if you find them in the evening. Common wisdom is that they pop up out of the grass to sing around sunset. I waited, and waited, and waited some more. The sun set. I scanned the fields with binoculars. I listened for their odd song with the windows open while mosquitos poured into the truck. Occassionally I tuned into the RedWings game but unfortunately both the RedWings and I bombed. I drove back to camp, had a cuban libre nightcap, and went to sleep not bothered in the least by aliens slipping silently through my campsite.

The next morning I returned to the same fields before sunrise and did find several LeConte's. I stalked them hoping that after they dove into the grass they might pop up again if I waited quietly. They did not want to follow that script and all I managed was a few distant shots but nothing that would stop my delete button. On the way out I found several Yellow Warblers, a common species, and a poor substitute for LeConte's, but I have always loved these small, energetic, yellow dynamos. I remember in elementary school seeing a picture of a yellow warbler nest with four different levels in it. Each time a cowbird laid an egg in it's nest it would cover both it's own eggs and the intruder's with another layer and start over again.