Fall birding trips

I always get a bit excited prior to any change in season, but the approach of fall seems to hit me the hardest of all the seasons. Perhaps it’s the child in me still anticipating a return to school in the fall or perhaps it’s because I grew up around people for whom fall was the big season – farmers who were about to harvest their crops and hunters who eagerly anticipated getting out into the fields. Mostly I suspect it is something primeval, something buried deep in my genes. Whatever it is, I put this drive or energy or whatever you want to call it to work by getting out with the binoculars and spotting scopes for some fall birdingwatching.

I rarely see the variety of bird species in the birding binoculars and birding spotting scope during the fall migration as I do in the spring migration, though in some years, what I manage to see for variety of birds in the fall is not that far behind what I see in spring. I don’t mind that at all, though, because birding in the fall months for me is as much about being outdoors when Nature is at its most glorious as it is about adding birds seen to a list. In fact, some of my best memories include fall birding trips, especially fall trips to watch migrating waterfowl.

If you own a spotting scope, you owe it to yourself to go to the nearest reservoir or lake in the fall when the ducks and geese are flying. Take a lawn chair and a thermos of coffee, choose a location where you can see a large expanse of water, then sit back and enjoy the show. No better way to enjoy a crisp fall day in my book.