AuSable Valley Audubon

08/20/2026

Swift Night Out was a success. Thank you to all who attended. Thank you Larry V. for an informative talk on Chimney Swifts. Thank you Bookish, you are an amazing host. The bird trivia battle between The Loonies and the RedHeads was well fought (or played) with the Redheads gaining possession of the Wise Owl trophy. And finally so grateful that the stars of the evening, the Chimney Swifts (as well as a Night hawk) put on a great show. Also kudos to Forward Gas for letting us hang out in their parking lot.

08/20/2026

BIRD MIGRATION! The first bird surge of the season has brought much higher than expected bird activity Monday night. An estimated 232,000,000 birds are on the move, tracked by Doppler Radar moving South/Soutwest at 18 mph around an altitude of 2,100 feet. This data is according to BirdCast shows the highest concentration from the Great Lakes heading south across the Mississippi River Valley!

08/18/2026

If you are planning on attending, make sure you bring a camp chair so you will be comfortable well we wait.

TAWAS CITY – AuSable Valley Audubon (AVA) will host a “Swift Night Out” on Wednesday, Aug. 19 at 6:30 p.m. The group will meet at Bookish at Tawas Bay, 402

08/16/2026

Chimney Swift sneak peak! Join us on Wednesday for Bird Trivia and Chimney swift talk followed by an observation. Details in the comments.

08/12/2026

The Chimney Swift Nest Cam is now offline. On August 10, we learned that the nest at Otis Farm Bird Sanctuary had fallen during an intense rainstorm. We were able to get to the sanctuary in time to rescue two of the four chicks, but sadly, the other two did not survive. The rescued chicks were taken to Bird Center of Michigan where, thanks to the wonderful care of their team, they are recovering well.

We know many of you have been following these swifts from the very beginning, watching as the eggs hatched and the chicks grew. We are heartbroken that their story took this turn.

We are incredibly grateful that we had the live camera and, especially, to the viewer who noticed the nest had fallen and alerted us right away. Because of their quick action, we were able to rescue the two surviving chicks and get them the care they needed.

08/10/2026

In just over a week!

08/08/2026

Monitoring season is nearing an end here in Iosco county this season. As monitors , the heartbreak is real but the triumphs are worth every minute spent watching these endangered Piping Plovers.
Thanks to conservation efforts by many different organizations and individuals these little cuties are slowly increasing their numbers which is very welcome news indeed!
Please consider joining your local Audobon chapter; the rewards are many.

08/06/2026

Update #4 from last week's Kirtland's Warbler Conservation Team meeting in Grayling, MI:

We're sure you know from past posts that geolocators can collect approximate data on a bird's location while it is wearing the device. But through a recent technological advance the device now also collects data on barometric pressure. Information gathered from barometric pressure data will provide us with a deeper understanding of the movements of an individual Kirtland's Warbler by identifying the exact date and time a bird departs on their spring and fall migrations. In fact the barometric pressure data is so exact, researchers can determine when a bird was foraging for food in treetops because it can detect the oh-so-slight difference in the barometric pressure on the ground level and at the top of a 60-foot tree!

Photo Credit: Ward Laboratory, The University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign

08/06/2026

Update #3 from last week's Kirtland's Warbler Conservation Team meeting in Grayling, MI:

Preliminary results from a study that uses data retrieved from recovered geolocators that had been mounted on Kirtland's Warblers showed that the birds took a one-to-three week rest once they passed over the Appalachians on their fall migrations. What was interesting about this was that the locations of these layover spots seemed to align with established national forests. The birds likely stopped in these locations to refuel before they reached the Atlantic coast and entered into the most dangerous part of their migration -- the jump from the Carolinas to The Bahamas. We can't say for 100 percent certain that the data align with the borders of the national forests because the geolocators have an accuracy range of about 50 kilometers, but... Some additional sleuthing is necessary to really hone in on the locations. If we can accurately identify the locations, we can work to protect them for future migrations.

Map image: Cornell Lab All About Birds https://tinyurl.com/kiwa-migration

08/06/2026

Update #2 from last week's Kirtland's Warbler Conservation Team meeting in Grayling, MI:

We just learned that there are three races of jack pine trees. As we have discussed here previously, jack pines have serotinous cones, meaning they are held shut with a resin. This matters because each race has a different level of serotiny -- meaning that the cones will open to release their seeds under different levels of heat. The race with the lowest level of serotiny will open its cones on a hot summer day, while the cones on the other two will remain shut awaiting the intense heat of a wildfire to open.

Photo credit: Prairie Restorations