Field Notes from the Past #15

Being a continuation of field-journal entries from the springs of 1962 and 1963 when I was a budding ornithologist of just 15 or 16 growing up in the rural village of Galien in Berrien County, Michigan.

April 23 [1962], Monday

I saw my first Solitary Sandpiper today in what seemed to me as the most unlikely habitat to find a sandpiper in. I flushed the bird from a field of wheat stubble. The area from where the bird was flushed was the lowest part of the field and is always under several inches of water in the spring.

Migratory [Slate-colored (=Dark-eyed)] Juncos were seen again today, but in greater numbers.

I saw the male [Eastern] Bluebird perched on the wires above house #2. This is the first bluebird seen since April 8 (15 days). I didn't look in the house for fear I would scar[e] the birds away.