On Saturday, June 3, at 6:00 AM, 16 people met at Long Lake Recreation Area for the WSO’s Kettle Moraine State Forest – Northern Unit field trip. This is a new meeting location for this trip. Mid-week I had to change the meeting location of this trip because on Wednesday before our trip while listening to WPR I discovered there was a huge event planned at Mauthe Lake, one of our principal sites to visit. The event called the Mammoth March included over 1500 hikers and their supporters. Mauthe Lake was not going to be a good place for us to go. So I made to change to start at Long Lake primarily to stay away from the crowds but also because a had found a Brewster’s Warbler (Blue-winged/Golden-winged hybrid) a week earlier and it was still in the area during the next week.
The weather was great, with clear skies, very little wind, and temps in the mid-60s. Our route for the day included; Long Lake Recreation Area, Jersey Flats Prairie Restoration Area, New Prospect Horse Riders Camp, Haushalter Lane, Forest Lake Public Access, Dundee, and Spruce Lake Bog.
At Long Lake Recreation Area we added 
37 species including Alder and Great Crested Flycatchers, Brown Thrasher, Wood Thrush, Cedar Waxwing, Field Sparrow, Baltimore Oriole, 5 species of warblers (plus the hybrid Brewster’s Warbler), Scarlet Tanager, and Rose-breasted Grosbeak.
Our next stop was Jersey Flats Prairie Restoration Area, on CTH SS just west of New Prospect. While getting out of our cars we could hear a Clay-colored Sparrow’s buzzy song very close as well as singing Field Sparrows. An Eastern Bluebird was on the power line along the road but then flew down and was feeding in the grass next to us only 20 feet away. Its blue in the sunlight was beautiful. This is one of the best locations with easy access to see Henslow’s Sparrows that I know of in southeastern Wisconsin. So it wasn’t long before we could hear at least three birds at fairly close range. We strolled along the grassy trail a short distance where we got great scope views of this small, flat-headed sparrow. Also, we soon found a Grasshopper Sparrow is the same area. Again, everyone had good scope views. We also added a Red-tailed Hawk, a Northern Harrier, and our only Purple Martin of the day. We only had 16 species here but they were good ones.
We made a quick stop at the entrance to the New Prospect Horse Riders Camp where we added Northern Flicker, Eastern Wood-Pewee, Yellow-throated Vireo, and a singing Mourning Warbler. We only got limited looks at the Mourning Warbler but fortunately, we would get better looks later. Mournings are fairly widespread in the forest but getting good looks often takes patience and persistence. We had 25 species here.
Haushalter Lane is often our most productive site on this trip and it didn’t disappoint. We had 56 species along this productive road. All of these are summer residents Notables include; Barred Owl, Hairy and Pileated Woodpeckers, Acadian, Least, and Alder Flycatchers, Tufted Titmouse, Ovenbird, Northern Waterthrush, Nashville Warbler, Mourning Warbler (great looks this time), Common Yellowthroat, Hooded Warbler, American Redstart, Blackburnian Warbler (uncommon to rare summer visitor), Yellow Warbler, Chestnut-sided Warbler, Pine Warbler, and Black-throated Green Warbler. That’s 13 species of warblers and we missed the Black-and-White Warbler that was there the day before. Other misses included both Broad-winged & Red-shouldered Hawks I had the day before, Eastern Phoebe, Blue-gray Gnatcatcher, and Swamp Sparrow.
Our next stop was at the Forest Lake Public Assess along CTH GGG. Cerulean Warbler, a Wisconsin threatened species, has without a doubt declined here in the KMSF. It has been especially difficult to find this year but I did find a couple of singing males at this location. Plus, Joe Phipps also saw a female at this location a few days prior. That’s a good sign that they may nest in the forest again this year. As we were pulling up to the public access I could hear one of the males high in the trees. Soon after we parked a second bird sang from down the road not too far away. We all had great looks and discovered there could be a third bird. This third bird, which I had the day before, was not singing the classic “ziray-ziray-ziray-ziray-zreeeee” song. In the classic song, the first 3-4 notes are consistent, like if you were running up a set of steps but for this bird, it sounded like it was “galloping” up the steps. I don’t know if it was just a variation of one of the other two birds we had or a different bird altogether. We also had our only Warbling Vireo of the day from this site. We had 6 species here.
Dundee Sportsman Club was our next stop. The gate to the Sportsman Club was locked but we could see the Osprey platform from the upper parking area. There has been a pair of Ospreys coming to nest at this location for the past 25+ years and this year was no different. Everyone had scope views of the pair at the nest and possibly one of their chicks. We also pick up our only House Finch and House Sparrows here. We had 11 species at this site. The Three Sweets Bakery is across the road so we took advantage of their restrooms and a few of us their sweet treats. FYI, their cinnamon rolls are awesome!
Our final stop of the day was at Spruce Lake Bog SNA. Here the flora is often the attraction. With temperatures in the upper 80s, the bird life here was less active. We only had 5 species here including our only Great Egret of the day, a Veery, American Crow, Red-winged Blackbird, and Common Yellowthroat. But it was the bog plants that were in bloom that had us looking down. Plants like Pink Lady Slippers (moccasin flower), Pitcher Plant, Royal Fern, the floating sedge mat, three-leaved gold-thread, American Starflower, Partridgeberry, Common Winterberry, Leather-leaf, Bog-rosemary, Poison sumac, the Yellow blue-bead lily to name a few.
Our trip concluded here at Spruce Lake Bog at about 11:30 AM. We had a wonderful group (as always) where we were able to see or hear 73 species for the morning. Here is the link to our entire day’s eBird Trip Report.
Thanks to all that attended. We had a fantastic group and it was a pleasure spending a morning with you all.
Jeff Baughman
