Rain, rain, rain

We got rained out yesterday. We got at least an inch and a half of rain, so now most of our sites are swamped. Here is a picture of one:

I don't have rubber boots, but I might need to get some. My shoes are pretty smelly from being soaked all the time. Can you tell this site is in the Chicago area? Doesn't look too urban, until you see things like this (near one of the best birding spots we've found so far):

The technique we use to survey birds is called a point count. We stand at one location for 10 minutes and record every bird we see or hear, and estimate how far away it is, and in which direction it is singing or calling. Sometimes, in the early morning, it's CRAZY loud and difficult to tell so many songs apart. A busy point count could have 30-40 birds. Other times, usually later in the morning, they stop singing, and we could have as few as 5-10 birds.

Because the birds are migrating right now, there are LOTS of different species just passing through and also some that are here to stay for the summer. Right now, we are getting to the end of the yellow-rumped warblers, which are the earliest warblers to come through on their way to northern Canada. 

Lizzie randomly selected about 30 forest patches in the suburbs of Chicago for her study. She used GIS to select patches classified by satellites as forested. Then she classified each one into "urban" or "suburban" based on the amount of impervious surfaces and population density around each patch. Based on the data we gather, she is going to look the effects of the level of urbanness, the size of the forest patch, and the proximity to Lake Michigan on migrating birds. The western shore of Lake Michigan is a hotspot for migrants because many birds follow the shore as they fly north. Do these forested patches actually make good habitat for migrating birds? That's what we will find out.