Sunday's walk was fun. It was sunny, cool and windy, very comfortable. 17 participants, led by Jeff Koziol, Bluebird trail coordinator, were able to see a bluebird nest and eggs, a tree swallow nest with eggs and a house wren nest. We were able to let everyone identify flying bluebirds and tree swallows. Chuck Henderson gave us all a real treat by finding a yellow billed Cuckoo (sound only) and to observe a perching kingbird. There was a good discussion about problems with cavity nesting birds and loss of habitat, problems of a cold spring and loss of insects. Everyone learned about the problems of house sparrows and competition for nesting sites. We were able to observe the ideal bluebird habitat, the shortgrass prairie around house 5. This is the first year that boxes haven't been occupied by house sparrows!

​
Seth McGee, Biocore lab manager and Purple Martin (PUMA) House monitor, gave a well organized talk about purple martins. We all learned something new. Seth also talked about the Biocore Prairie. It was wonderful; he talked about the importance of fire to maintain the prairie and the ongoing study at the Biocore Prairie dividing  the prairie into sections and selectively burning some sections with an unburned control section. Jeff was able to show people his plant I.D. app and how much it adds to a walk. If you are out on a hike or bird walk, why not check all the plants?
​Seth added this information: PUMAs line their nests with green leaves shortly before the egg laying begins. "The gathering of green leaves is still somewhat of a mystery.  BirdsOfTheWorld says that at least seven hypotheses have been offered to explain it and there seems to be few controlled studies investigating the role of green leaves.  I'm going with "decorating the nursery. 😉"
Richard Ness, PUMA monitor, the next day added photos of Purple Martins gathering leaves from the nearby fruit trees for lining their nests, as a well a Cooper's Hawk standing guard nearby and keeping away unwanted sparrows. Report by Jeff Koziol and Seth Mcgee. Photos by Chuck Henrikson, Signe Holtz, Seth Mcgee and Paul Noeldner. ​

The spring wildflower planting was done at fire circle #3, next to the small beach at the Narrows on Picnic Point. Hundreds of forbs, sedges, grasses and shrubs were all planted to help stem the erosion and beautify the heavily used area. The Preserve student seasonal staff will do follow-up watering and monitoring of the plantings. Participants were Ann Burgess, Biz Nitschke, Doris Dubielzig, Roma Lenehan, Glenda Denniston, Kathi Dwelle, Rick and Nancy Lindroth, Kelly Kearns. Bryn Scriver was the Lakeshore Preserve Volunteer Coordinator.
​Plant List:

Wow!  Thirty-five people arrived for a spring birding tour that began at 7:30am in a chilly mist overlooking the Class of 1918 Marsh. Roma Lenehan, a founder of the Friends and author of the Preserve’s breeding bird survey and Becky Abel, Madison Audubon’s Director of Philanthropy, led the three-hour tour that observed birds in the Class of 1918 Marsh, in University Bay from the Picnic Point trail, in the Marsh on the leeward side of the Point, in deciduous and pine woods, in the former orchard, and on Biocore Prairie.

And the birds cooperated.  Becky Abel explained to the group the importance of stopover sites, like the Preserve, for migratory birds.  On their journey north, birds stop to rest and refuel at three kinds of sites. Typically small, “fire escape” stopover sites, with limited resources, are infrequently used but vital in emergency situations. “Full-service hotel” stopover sites, like the Chequamegon-Nicolet National Forest in northern Wisconsin, provide abundant food, water and shelter for migrants.Lying between those two extremes, the Lakeshore Nature Preserve serves as a ”convenience store” stopover site.  Located within the city of Madison, this Important Birding Area is a place where birds can rest for a few days and easily replenish some fat or muscle, or both, before continuing. The Preserve offers a variety of habitats, fresh water and a variety of food sources, including fruit and insects (although with our cool, slow spring, insects have been slow to emerge).

Both leaders are expert birders-by-ear. Roma Lenehan recorded observing 65 bird species, and that doesn’t include the accipiter and the gulls we couldn’t identify! Some of the highlights were sighting  sora in the Class of 1918 Marsh, 

• sora in class of 1918 marsh
• four great egrets flying overhead,
• an osprey perched in a tree along the shore of University Bay,
• a veery singing its downward spiraling song,
• SEVEN wood ducks and two belted kingfishers in the Picnic Point Marsh,
• a red-tailed hawk sitting in a pine tree near the site of the Edward and Alice Young farmhouse
• a flock of cedar waxwings in the old orchard field (aka East Savanna)​

The attendees were respectful and cooperative and very appreciative of the variety and number of birds they saw and heard with Abel and Lenehan. Report and photos by Friends host Doris Dubielzig.

The Seed Fair for gardeners at the Eagle Heights Community gardens was held outside the Community Center on a beautiful, sunny spring day. For many years, the Friends have contributed educational exhibits on topics such as soil or pollinators. This year's exhibit focused on songbirds in the gardens and the Preserve. Exhibitors Gisela Kutzbach, Tom Morgan and Paul Noeldner showed human-made housing for bluebirds, purple martins and wrens, all cavity nesters, as well as birds nests, such as a robin nest and the tiny hummingbird nest. Gardeners had fun playing a bird bingo game and enjoyed learning the names of birds observed in the gardens. Another challenge was building a wren nest from sticks in an open wren box. Also, for gardeners who wished to install a wren house on the plot, the Friends distributed copper plates with a small entrance hole that is big enough for wrens but too small for house sparrows. Photos Kutzbach and Morgan.

The Annual Meeting 2022 was held in-person, after two years of zoom meetings during the pandemic. About 70 people attended and another 20 joined the live streamed meeting on Zoom. 
Drawing point was our keynote speaker Janice Rice, Ho-Chunk Nation tribal member and lecturer at the UW -Madison Information School. President Olympia Mathiaparanam addressed attendees via Zoom, streamed on screen at the Arboretum, while Will Vuyk gave the Friends Annual Report in-person and remembered Lil Tong, who passed away recently. Subsequently, Kelly Kearns thanked departing Board members for their service, Eve Emshwiller, Dane Gallagher, Seth McGee, Olympia Mathiarapanam and Paul Noeldner. Friends Vice president Seth McGee introduced the new slate of candidates for the Board of directors and conducted their election. New to the Board are Reba Luiken, Diana Tapia Ramon, Cole Roecker, Josh Sulman and Tom Zinnen.  Also, MJ Morgan and Will Vuyk began their second terms, with Will being president elect. The entire event was organized by Olympia Mathiarapanam, Annual meeting chair, and Will Vuyk, MC. The technical feat of seamlessly switching the screen from Zoom to live Powerpoints was done by Anne Pearce. Report here by Gisela Kutzbach. Photos by Glenda Denniston and Gisela Kutzbach.

Preserve Director Gary Brown thanked the Friends for financial supported of the new Master Plan and introduced Preserve staff. Rhonda James, UW-Madison senior landscape architect, discussed the structure of the new Master Plan and invited the audience to attend the Master Plan Public Meeting on April 26, 2022 | 7:00 pm at Memorial Union.

Janice Rice gave the keynote address, Voices and Values of Teejop (Four Lakes): A Hoocąk (Ho-Chunk), Winnebago) Perspective. Janice, Peacemaker for the Ho-Chunk Nation Trial Court, wove together her academic findings with the voices of her Hoocąk ancestors. She traced her own cultural roots in the Teejop homelands and southern Wisconsin, illustrating her stories of Hoocąk leaders, villages and cultural values with photographs and maps. Ho-chunk villages once dotted the shorelines of the Four Lakes (Teejop). 
 
Rice also related the stories of repeated forced removal of the Ho-chunk people from their ancestral lands to reservations further west and their determination to return to their homes.  She explained the circumstances of the 1837 treaty that ceded all their lands in Wisconsin. The treaty itself was made under suspicious conditions, as the Ho-Chunk were not aware that it gave them only eight months to leave their ceded lands. The army attempted to remove the tribe to the Neutral Ground. Iowa, in 1841, but many Ho-Chunk came back to Wisconsin. Eventually, by the 1880s, the government decided to allow the Ho-Chunk to take up 40-acre farms and remain in Wisconsin. 
 
By contextualizing the landscape of Teejop with the deep histories, personal stories, and current vibrance of the Hoocąk community, Rice afforded us the opportunity to see the Preserve and the surrounding areas of Madison from a new perspective. As the Friends, we will strive to honor this perspective in our actions and care for the Preserve moving forward. 

​The sunshine brought out about a dozen people to our early spring migrants walk led by Friends board member Dane Gallagher and Friends host Anne Pearce. We were greeted at the Picnic Point entrance by singing song sparrows and spotted one in the grass in front of the stone wall. A great sign of spring!

While much of Lake Mendota is still frozen over, University Bay's open water hosted a raft of waterfowl. Luckily for us, the nearby ice kept the birds closer to shore, so we could see many of the ducks well without a spotting scope. A few stops along the Picnic Point path provided great looks at a variety of waterfowl, including American coot, lesser scaup, redhead, bufflehead, canvasback, and ring-necked ducks, in addition to the familiar mallards and Canada geese. Off in the distance, we saw two common loons, and even further away was a pair of common mergansers. We kept our eyes to the ice and the sky in hopes of seeing a bald eagle, but we did not see any today!

Back on land, there were American robins and common grackles searching through the leaf litter. In one sunny spot, sheltered from the north wind, we were greeted by several black-capped chickadees, including a pair that were going in and out of a tree cavity, possibly building a nest! We also had a very cooperative golden-crowned kinglet flitting around at eye level right next to the path. We watched a red-bellied woodpecker searching for food in the crevices of shagbark hickory bark and a few downy woodpeckers working along some twigs. Later in the walk, we happened upon a white-breasted nuthatch and talked about how they also search for insects in tree bark, though unlike their woodpecker friends, they do it with their heads pointed down!

While we enjoyed the sunshine and birds, the cold wind and icy lake definitely had people wishing for the warmer part of spring to arrive soon. Before we know it, we'll see even more birds and the spring wildflowers will add some more color to the forest floor. Report and photos by Anne Pearce.

​A small but enthused group of hearty nature lovers braved the winter cold on Sunday January 23 to join the "Winter Wonderland" 4th Sunday of the month Bird and Nature Adventure at UW Lakeshore Nature Preserve led by Paul Noeldner and Chuck Henrikson and Friends host Anne Pearce. Several other folks joined for short periods along the way before heading back someplace warm out of the chill wind. 

Most birds were taking shelter too but there were enough drumming woodpeckers that made appearances, cheery chickadees grooming oak treetop buds, chipping cardinals in bushes, and yank yanking nuthatches climbing tree trunks to keep cold fingers busy focusing freezing binoculars. 

Other Winter Wonderland Wonders the participants enjoyed were walking in sparkling white fluffy snow that blanketed tree limbs and pine boughs, talking about the beautiful fractal patterns of snowflakes and the safe sheltered subnivian (beneath the snow) layer that sintering (coalescing) snow  provides for hiding, feeding and shelter out of the wind for a host of wild things, seeing the freshly scattered tracks and trails of mice, voles, squirrels, deer, fox and bunnies that scampered about and dove into holes in the snow and cavities in logs and trees and looking them up in Critter Trax and iTracks apps, celebrating Squirrel Appreciation Day and admiring lofty squirrel dreys cleverly suspended in high branches, spotting an odd looking abandoned wasp nest missing the top half due to blue jays foraging for grubs, and scanning jagged ice edges on University Bay hoping to spot two Snowy Owls recently reported to be in the area from the frozen Arctic.