There are about 250-300 birds you can see in Michigan

By Dean Vaglia
Leader Staff Writer
Bird-watching can be a fun, engaging and accessible hobby. From watching a feeder to spotting what flies by the porch, birding can give you an appreciation of the many birds around your home.
“I love sitting on my deck just for an hour or two in the evening enjoying the birds that come to my bird feeder,” Daryl Bernard, Seven Ponds Nature Center executive director, said.
But if you want to start seeing more birds, Bernard’s message is to get out and find them.
“The birds that come and feed on the seed in your backyards are a fairly small subset of the kind of birds you could possibly encounter if you go out looking for them in Michigan,” Bernard said. “There’re about 250-300 birds you can see in Michigan in a given year if you go out to pursue them, and most of those will never come to your backyard.”
In order to promote casual Oxford-area birders into taking a more adventurous approach, Bernard visited the Oxford Public Library to give a talk on birding titled “It’s a Big Backyard Out There – Bird-watching Beyond the Feeder.”
“The fortunate thing is (that) from this spot where we are standing right now, there are a lot of places where you can go and see birds that are only 15, 20 minutes away,” Bernard said.
In order to see rare and hard to spot birds like the Long-eared Owl, American Woodcock and Eared Grebe, you do not have to travel too far. Oakwood Lake Township Park, Orion Oaks County Park and Addison Oaks County Park all provide good opportunities to see wild birds without venturing too far from home.
If you do not mind traveling a bit farther, Lake Erie Metropark in southern Wayne County is famous for its hawk sightings and Lake St. Clair Metropark in Macomb County is what Bernard calls a hotspot for bird sightings.
Bernard recommends people try bird-watching at wastewater treatment sites, particularly Muskegon County’s facility.
“Wastewater treatment plants are awesome places to go birding,” Bernard said. “Gulls and shore birds and waterfowl tend to love sewage ponds, so birds are always trying to find ways to get into wastewater plants. And the Muskegon wastewater plant is phenomenal — miles and miles of ponds and fields and woodlots, and all you have to do to bird there is stop by their office and sign in, and you can drive anywhere in the plant.”
Bernard also recommends birding at the Seven Ponds Nature Center, which organizes birding expeditions around the county. Places they have visited include the Rio Grande Valley in Texas and Monterey on the California Coast.
“The one great thing about birds and bird-watching is that birds are everywhere,” Bernard said. “No matter where you go on this planet —from the desert to the grasslands, up in the mountains, in the heart of a city, in your suburbs, even out on the open ocean — birds will be there.”