Can You Hear Me Now

Some sweet day
I’ll make her mine, pretty flamingo
Then every guy will envy me
‘Cause paradise is where I’ll be

Mark Barkan

Linda and I recently watched the 2011 movie The Big Year. Despite the star power of Steve Martin, Jack Black, and Owen Wilson, it was a box office flop. It cost around $41 million to make and its worldwide earnings were only $4.7 million. Some reviewers called it plodding and unfunny.

The story is pretty simple. Stu Preissler (Steve Martin), Brad Harris (Jack Black), and Kenny Bostick (Owen Wilson) decide to achieve a Big Year. A Big Year is when a birder sets out to identify as many birds as possible within a single year and a single geographic area. While Stu and Brad are doing their Big Year for the love of birding, Kenny is obsessively competitive and is willing to sacrifice anything to win — including his marriage.

Perhaps I am a bit plodding and unfunny, too, because I loved the film. The friendship between Stu and Brad felt honest and warm. I could identify with their missteps and vulnerability. I have also known people like Kenny and witnessed how their single minded focus can wreak havoc on personal relationships. Sadly, I have been guilty of that.

Most of all, I fell in love with their quest. I found the idea of traveling around the country looking for birds to be very appealing. While I never considered myself a birder, over the years my appreciation for birds has grown and after watching the movie I thought to myself, “why not?”

Am I prepared to dedicate an entire year traveling around the United States searching for birds? No, but I am more than happy to pay attention to those I come upon in my daily life and keep track of them. A few birding day trips outside of Saint Paul is also not out of the question.

That would be me
the long legged shorebird
running between the stability of sand
and the turmoil of churned water

One toe here
one toe there
hopping from firm to uncertain
liquid to fixed

Caught in the maelstrom of reckless confusion

My Big Year

Unlike the rules of an official Big Year, I don’t count a bird if I only hear it. Thanks to the Merlin Bird App, I use sound to help identify a bird, but I need to see it before it ends up on my list.

Hearing a bird can be both rewarding and downright frustrating. Merlin recently helped me identify the yellow warbler I spotted in a tree, but up at our lake cabin it is forever hearing great crested flycatchers that never want to show themselves. I can’t begin to tell you how many trees I’ve scanned and still come up empty.

Fun fact. Linda and I bought our first house in the middle 1980s. Across the alley was an older woman who went by the name Grandma Lou. Grandma Lou told us that when she dies she is going to come back as a cardinal. I am sure that I scoffed at the idea at the time, but many years later when Linda’s father died, a bright red male cardinal immediately moved into our yard. To this day he remains a comfort and reminder of Frank’s continued presence in our lives.

Without any further delay, here is my 2025 list.

• Killdeer
• Dark-Eyed Junko
• Ring-Necked Pheasant
• Common Starling
• Snow Goose
• Northern Mockingbird
• Sandhill Crane
• Spotted Sandpiper
• Lesser Yellowlegs
• White-Throated Sparrow
• Red-Eyed Vireo
• Hermit Thrush
• Cedar Waxwing
• Common Merganser
• Tennessee Warbler
• Chestnut-Sided Warbler
• Great Egret
• Ruby-Throated Hummingbird
• Chimney Swift
• Brown Thrasher
• Eastern Bluebird
• Hairy Woodpecker
• Ring-Billed Gull
• Double-Crested Cormorant
• Mourning Dove
• Cliff Swallow
• Yellow-Headed Blackbird
• Marsh Wren
• Swamp Sparrow
• Common Yellowthroat
• Bobolink
• Blue-Winged Teal
• Rock Pigeon
• Ospray
• Common Tern
• Song Sparrow
• Downy Woodpecker
• House Wren
• Bald Eagle
• Gray Catbird
• Purple Martin
• House Finch
• Broad-Winged Hawk
• Wilson’s Snipe
• Eastern Phoebe
• American Redstart
• Great Blue Heron
• Indigo Bunting
• Chirping Sparrow
• Pileated Woodpecker
• Common Loon
• Little Green Heron
• American Coot
• Lesser Scaup
• Mallard
• Northern Cardinal
• Belted Kingfisher
• American Crow
• Eastern Wild Turkey
• American Robin
• Common Raven
• Sharp-Tailed Grouse
• American Goldfinch
• Red-Tailed Hawk
• Black-Capped Chickadee
• Trumpeter Swan
• Bufflehead
• Turkey Vulture
• Common Grackle
• Red-Wing Blackbird
• American White Pelican
• Blue Jay
• Brewer’s Blackbird
• Barn Swallow
• Wood Duck
• Canada Goose
• Red-Breasted Merganser
• Herring Gull
• Red-Bellied Woodpecker
• House Sparrow
• Northern Flicker
• Yellow Warbler
• Baltimore Oriole
• White-Breasted Nuthatch

I intend for this blog article to be a living document so if my quest interests you, keep checking back for additional sighting. I have only made a tiny dent in the 446 species of birds known to spend time in Minnesota.

Note: I will be adding to the list, but I don’t plan on changing the text of this article. For example, one day I will spot a great crested flycatcher, but I will not change the part about Merlin hearing them and me not seeing them.

Bird On!

There are still quite a few birds that I am certain I will see this year, but have yet to sight. There are also a few stretch birds that I know live in Minnesota, but aren’t that easy to see (at least for me). I am talking about the red-eyed vireo (another one of those Merlin-can-hear-but-I-cannot-see birds) and the sandhill crane. I am also hoping for a great horned owl, but in my 40-plus years living in Minnesota I have yet to spot a single one in the wild. I did, however, see a snowy owl about 20 years ago and that was an incredible treat. They rarely venture this far south.

I have no idea where this will take me. My goal is to keep it fun and avoid becoming overly obsessed. Believe me, that is a definite possibility. For now, it’s exciting to be learning new things and find more ways to get out of the house and into nature.

Thank you for reading. Bird on!

To the fathers and the mothers
with our daily setbacks and struggles
to the children well fed or the painfully hungry
to the rich and the poor and burdens that each must bear
to the gay and the straight
the complacent and the restless
to those blessed with surety
and those that forever question

To us
the birds of many feathers
flocked together as one