As the sun set on January 31st, I fully planned to go back to just “Staying Local” – my Big January had been a fun ride, but it wasn’t sustainable and sooner or later I would need to let it go. And if I was going to do much birding outside of Oakland, it was going to be with the intention of filling in my eBird map. With that in mind, I started my February in much the same way that I had the year: visiting local parks including Orion Oaks County Park. While I hadn’t requested any days off I still found myself with a fair but of time in the first few days of the month, and by the end of the day on the 4th I was sitting at a reasonable 41 month birds.
During this time I found myself looking at that eBird Top 100 for the year (a lot) and I saw my name sitting atop the list, and my competitive nature yearned for me to continue the obsessiveness that had put me there regardless of the irresponsibility of doing so. Fortunately, my rational side was winning and as I headed into the 5th I *planned* to spend the day birding around Oakland County, but as was beginning to present itself as the pattern for 2022, my plans didn’t work out very often.
At 10:29am on the morning of the 5th, my phone pinged with a notification from Michigan’s recently-launched Discord platform: Gyrfalcon at Elizabeth Park in Trenton, Wayne County. Now, as I mentioned in Becoming A Birder, for most of my life I thought birds were kinda lame. Gyrfalcon, however, was one bird that I never thought were lame. Gyrfalcons were the bird I thought was cool before I thought birds were cool. I needed to see that bird, so I hopped in my car and raced through Oakland County into Wayne, and spent the rest of the 5th and all the spare time I had during the sixth unsuccessfully searching for the bird. Thankfully, on the 7th a consolation prize became available when I went after a Red-throated Loon in Macomb County, and on the 8th I was able to pick up a first-of-year Double-crested Cormorant and my Lifer Ross’s Goose on another trip to Wayne County.
Just like that I was up to 88 species for the month and now I obviously had no choice but to go for 100 again. And if I did it in January, and I was going to do it in February, and it would be fairly easy from March through November… well, then I guess I should definitely go for that insane idea of hitting 100 every month that I had flirted with back in late January. And then, continuing to look at the eBird Top 100, where I had now remained in the top spot for Michigan since late January, I figured that maybe I could search out month birds that would also be year birds! Not that I was doing a Big Year or anything, of course! I was just… dabbling in chasing birds. Extensively. Okay maybe not just dabbling…
After not doing much birding on the 9th, 10th, or 11th, I woke up outrageously early on the morning of the 12th. See, I had places to be and birds to see – birds that were just over six hours away. Thankfully, shortly after waking up I was able to pass back out in the passenger seat of my dad’s Subaru and leave to him the wretched task of a drive in the dark up I-75. Aren’t I such a great passenger and son?
After a few brief stops along the way, we finally arrived at our destination at about Noon. Holy Cross Cemetery in Marquette, Michigan, where a Townsend’s Solitaire had been being seen for quite some time. It didn’t take much searching to find the bird, and with daylight yet to kill we headed west towards a legendarily infamous spot – Peshekee Grade Road. Our target there were some Black-backed Woodpeckers which are uncommon but regular there, and while we didn’t find success with the woodpeckers we did snag my Lifer Boreal Chickadee and my first-of-year Ruffed Grouse.
We spent the rest of the evening birding the area around Marquette, and by the time we settling into our hotel for the night I found myself at 98 species for February. The next morning we packed up and, instead of staying in the area as we had originally planned, headed towards home. See, the previous evening a report came out that a Varied Thrush had been seen in Mackinaw City just south of the Mackinac Bridge, which almost halfway home from Marquette. The only problem with that Varied Thrush, though, was that there was pretty much no information regarding it’s location, and rather than just accepting that it wasn’t meant to be my dad and I took that as a challenge and set to looking for it throughout the neighborhood where we knew it was located. Eventually, after finding another car parked outside a house with a feeder setup, we learned that we were indeed in the correct location as well as that the homeowner was welcoming to visitors. We also learned that the bird had just been seen, and after a short wait I added my third Lifer of the road trip.
Rather than heading straight home, I managed to talk my dad into following the roads west along the coast of Lake Michigan towards Seng’s Marina in Manistee, where a Barrow’s Goldeneye had been spending the winter. Finally, after finding the Barrow’s – which was my forth Lifer in about 28 hours – we headed home, arriving shortly after dark. Those of you paying astute attention might realize that between the 98 species I hit before we left Marquette combined with the Thrush and the Goldeneye put me at 100. This obviously means that I’m done with the extreme for the final two weeks of February, right? It’s not like I’m going to look at the Michlisters birding records database and think that the February Big Month record of 111 is within reach, right?
Oh boy, here it is. This is the moment where I think my year finally descended into madness. Back in January I had been competing primarily with myself to see how many species I could tally for the month. Eventually I was competing with Brandon Aho and Justin Labadie for that top spot, too, but it was still just what had been happening during 2022. With the discovery of the possibility of breaking a record, the bar was raised and the Big Year Rubicon entered the horizon.
The morning after returning from “The Solitaire Quest”, I dipped over to a random frozen ditch near Seven Ponds Nature Center where an overwintering Wilson’s Snipe had been seen the previous day. After sniping the miserable shorebird my dad and I headed back to Harsen’s Island to try for the overwintering mixed (but predominantly Red-winged) Blackbird flock we had missed in January, this time connecting with it and adding Rusty and Yellow-headed Blackbirds to my year list.
The next morning I did what might be the stupidest thing I did throughout the entire duration of 2022 – make a three-and-a-half-hour drive across the state for a couple Scoter. After that trip, though, my month ground to a halt and heading into the 28th I was stuck at 109 species for February – and Brandon Aho was on my heels just a bird or two behind! Thankfully Leap Day Eve kicked off with a wild goose chase, where I headed to Wayne County successfully tracked down the bird that had become my first birding nemesis – a Greater White-fronted Goose. The first-of-February birds came pouring in after that: Gadwall, Killdeer, Northern Mockingbird, Northern Pintail, and a first-of-year Cackling Goose brought me to the total I would end the month with, 115 – four higher than the previous record (per MichListers) set by Scott Jennex in 2010. My two-month total of 136 species also left me retaining my top spot in the state, and I was beginning to seriously obsess over retaining that top spot.
With March coming I was no longer under the illusions – or perhaps more accurately delusions – that I’d been under to start February. This train wasn’t stopping anytime soon, especially as I looked at the MichListers March Big Month record of 123 and thought “I can totally beat that!” I was, however, still under the delusion that I wasn’t doing a Big Year, but bit-by-bit other birders in the state realized what I hadn’t yet, and it wouldn’t be long before almost every time I introduced myself to someone they would say the same seven words: “You’re doing a Big Year, aren’t you?”
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Follow me on my journey to see 100 species in every Lower-48 State during 2025, experience some of the incredible places and events in American birding, and meet and bird with as many local birders as possible along the way.
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