March 2024 - January 2025 MBWeekends
~ Our 39th Season ~
• Minnesota Birding Weekends •
Minnesota Birding Weekends continues to offer unique, modestly priced weekend (and weekday) birding tours throughout Minnesota since we originated in 1986. Since then, we've had more than 9,000 registrations (MBWeeks included), over 450 MBWeekends, and a composite list of 371 species seen in the state.
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This MBWbirds website also includes...
In addition to our MBWeekends, a selection of out-of-state MBWeeks continued for one
FINAL SEASON – our 35th – in 2023-24. There have now been more than 125 MBWeeks since the first one in February 1988, with 730+ species now on our composite list.
• A Birder’s Guide to Minnesota
The 5th edition of A Birder's Guide to Minnesota has now been published and became available in early November 2022 ... along with a Second Printing with minor changes in May 2023. A series of updates has started and is now an ongoing work in progress for this newest edition: these Corrections and Additions will provide those using this book with the most accurate and up-to-date information as it becomes available. And please note that several more entries were added on March 22, 2024.
This series of 70 bird identification articles is still available in a print edition, with 100+ photographs added and new covers in the 3rd printing. These articles were originally published in The Loon, journal of the Minnesota Ornithologists’ Union, 1995 - 2012.
Municipal sewage ponds (also known as sewage lagoons, settling ponds, wastewater treatment ponds, etc.) are often productive birding sites. Accordingly, an expanded checklist of Minnesota’s 400+ known sewage ponds (now with a link to maps with the locations all the ponds) is included here.
Here are checklists with the 371 species recorded on MBWeekends (all within MN) and the composite MBW list of 727 species (i.e., MBWeeks & MBWeekends combined).
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For additional information, contact: Kim Richard Eckert, eckertkr@gmail.com (email);
218 349 5953 (cell/text); 1921 W. Kent Rd., Duluth MN 55812 (U.S. mail).
Also available are GUIDING SERVICES for those interested in a group tour in Minnesota or in other states and provinces in the U.S. and Canada. (Non-Minnesota tours would be of primary interest, since the out-of-state Minnesota Birding Weeks are being discontined.)
And finally, what would any self-respecting website be without the obligatory BLOG
...especially this website which always has believed in Social-Media Distancing from Facebook and all the other nonsense out there.
MBWbirds.com
Mottled Owl
(Jerry Pruett photo)
Bare-throated Tiger-Heron
(Jerry Pruett photo)
The schedule has now been published for our
39th SEASON of MBWEEKENDS
~ March 2024 – January 2025 ~
And note that the first MBW of the season took place in late March:
for the summary, see mbwbirds.com/traverse-grant.html
(written by Junior Tour Leader Wanna-Be John Quinn)
Also see the MBWeekends page
~ mbwbirds.com/mbweekends.html ~
with the registration status of each MBW as of April 3
Our registration procedure for the 2024-25 MBWeekends
continues as in recent years, and for complete information
on registering for MBWs, see:
mbwbirds.com/mbw-registration.html
~ APRIL 3, 2024 ~
(previous update March 22)
Scott Meyer photo
This series of Corrections and Additions continues
to be updated, now that this guide is in its Second
Printing (which includes several minor changes in
the text since the First Printing, a new cover, and
non-spiral binding).
For the most recent updates and additional
information on this new edition and the 2nd
printing, see: mbwbirds.com/abgtm.html. Be
sure to note the comments on the QR links
to county maps (which have far more detail
than the base maps on the pages), and on
how to download any map in advance for use
when you're in areas without cell service.
ANNOUNCING ... THE END OF AN ERA
Please note that the February 2024 South Texas MBW
(see MBWbirds.com/texas-2024.html for the summary)
was the final MBWeek, with none scheduled
for the 2024-25 season or thereafter.
After 35 seasons (beginning in February 1988),
more than 125 MBWeeks, and 732 species,
I have decided to retire from scheduling MBWeeks.
See mbwbirds.com/mbweeks.html for the summaries
of this final season of MBWeeks.
(Note, however, I still intend to do two more years
of MBWeekends – through January 2026 – to reach my goal of completing 40 seasons of MBWs.)
WHAT'S NEW IN THIS and RECENT UPDATES . . .
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IN MEMORIUM . . . A PHOTO GALLERY OF RARITIES
FROM OUR FINAL MINNESOTA BIRDING WEEK:
SOUTH TEXAS, FEBRUARY 2024
Roadside Hawk
(Jerry Pruett photo)
Gray-collard Becard
(Raymond Tervo photo)
Cattle Tyrant
(Raymond Tervo photo)
Brown Jay
(Jerry Pruett photo)
THE SET OF CORRECTIONS AND ADDITIONS TO
A BIRDER'S GUIDE TO MINNESOTA
WAS RECENTLY UPDATED IN LATE MARCH 2024
~ also seen but not photographed: Fan-tailed Warbler ~