A morning at Forest Park

Scott and I went for a walk at Forest Park Nature Center last week. When we walked past the nature center, a turkey was on the feeder. I didn't have my camera set up yet and missed that shot. But I took several of the bird as it wandered up the bluff behind the nature center. Then a doe with three fawns, a band of about 20 turkey toms, and some dragonflies and butterflies and beautiful prairie flowers made it a lovely morning!

Emiquon Grows More Beautiful With Every Passing Day

One morning in August, I visited Emiquon and tooks some photos from Thompson Levee:

Dragonflies, Butterflies, & Skippers--IWIN Class at Lost Mound

The last week in August was hot and humid in Illinois, and that is the week that the Illinois Natural History Survey (INHS) held their summer Illinois Wilds Institute for Nature (IWIN) Workshop, Dragonflies, Butterflies, and Skippers, at the Lost Mound INHS field station. 40 or so adults from all over Illnois (and one couple from Iowa!) braved the steamy weather to learn more about these wonderful creatures.


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Originally uploaded by jward199

Damselfly Wheel at Mississippi Palisades

Golden colored damselflies mating in wheel position. I couldn't keep them both in the plane of focus. First one, then the other, then the male flew them to another blade, without losing their wheel position, however, it was out of my reach.

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Originally uploaded by jward199

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Is this a Blue Dasher? Those green eyes! I have no notes and no other photos. How beautiful, though unidentified.

Originally uploaded by jward199

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Here is a pair of Common Green Darner dragonflies in wheel position, from the side.

View from below of the mating green darners in the wheel position.

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Originally uploaded by jward199

Common Green Darner Wheel--Lost Mound

Close-up, cropped view of the male, then a cropped view of the male clasping the female's head during mating.

Common Green Darner Wheel--Lost Mound
Originally uploaded by jward199

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Originally uploaded by jward199

A tiny green tree frog hiding in the cool shade of the milkweed plant.

Lily Pads at Mississippi Palisades

Lily pads, each their own little world, floating on the shallow backwaters of the Mississippi.

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Originally uploaded by jward199

Stop the Mine at Banner

Click here to sign the petition.

The Illinois Department of Natural Resources has issued Capital Resources Development Company permit to operate a surface coal mine on 643.2 acres (Proposed Permit Area) of property south of and adjacent to the Village of Banner.

We believe that the IDNR issued this permit without due consideration of its ecological impact and that, if the mining proceeds as proposed, it will be in violation of Bald and Golden Eagle Protection Act and the Migratory Bird Treaty Act.

We are sending this petition to the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service to ask them to investigate and stop this mining activity before it destroys sensitive habitat between Banner Marsh State Fish & Wildlife Area and Rice Lake Conservation Area, and area, where Bald Eagles roost in the winter and nest in the spring and summer, where migratory birds, including thousands of Geese, Ducks, Coots, Cormorants, and Pelicans, stop over each spring and fall.

The proposed mining plans include blasting the coal from the ground during the winter months, when eagles would be roosting nearby. The blasting will surely disturb them. Eagles begin their nesting activities in the winter. The blasting at the proposed mining site would surely disturb nesting eagles.

Please help us stop the destruction of Eagle Nesting and Roosting habitat. Sign this petition and then, for even greater impact, send a letter directly to the regional USFWS office:

Field Supervisor: Richard Nelson
e-mail: RockIsland@fws.gov or MidwestNews@fws.gov
1511 47th Avenue
Moline, IL 61265
Phone: 309-757-5800
Fax: 309-757-5807
TTY: 1-800-877-8339

Send the letter certified for even greater impact. Thank you for helping to call attention to this important issue.

Click here to sign the petition.

Great Blue Heron at Bells Landing

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Originally uploaded by jward199

A Great Blue Heron stood still as I drove past the small pond on the way to the boat ramp at Bell's Landing.

Great Egret at Mendenhall Road

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Originally uploaded by jward199

I stopped by Mendenhall road on my way back to Peoria. The water is down again and egrets and herons have returned.

Osprey at Nest

I walked along the dike at Banner Marsh to check on the osprey nest. One of the adults was sitting on the edge of the nest. He or she spotted me and flew out over me in a threatening way. I retreated behind the tree line. After a few minutes of photographing a Goldfinch, I went back for another look at the nest, trying to stay behind the trees. The bird spotted me and again flew out over me in a threatening way. I didn't want to disturb it any more than I already had, so I walked back to the car. I think there must be babies in the nest, although I didn't see them. I'm surprised that they haven't fledged by now. This nest is very large and deep enough to hide the young birds. From the adult's behavior I'd say the babies are still in there.

Eight-spotted Forester Moth at Emiquon

This butterfly turned out to be a moth. It was wandering around the milkweed along one of the old farm canals on the east side of Thompson Lake, near the now under water Pumphouse Road.
Alypia octomaculata; Owlet Moth Family Noctuidae; Forester Moth Subfamily Agaristinae
From eNature.com (Click title above to link to the article).
"Adults fly in bright daylight and are often mistaken for butterflies. The caterpillars spin thin cocoons of silk and litter or wood chips on the ground or in tunnels cut into wood. There is 1 generation a year."

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Originally uploaded by jward199

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Originally uploaded by jward199

Thousands of Bank Swallows were swarming over the waters of Thompson Lake, landing briefly in the few trees and shrubs that still exist along the farming canals in the center of Thompson Lake.

Black-necked Stilts at Emiquon

This summer of 2008 a dozen or more Black-necked Stilts have been inhabiting one of the canals left from the farming where Thompson Lake now resides. I was fortunate to catch a ride on a tour given by The Nature Conservancy after a day of volunteer work planting Cardinal Flowers in the wet prairie around Thompson Lake.

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Originally uploaded by jward199

Emiquon Prairie Road

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Originally uploaded by jward199

As the storm passed through the Emiquon valley, a golden light seeped in over the prairie.

Emiquon Valley Views

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Originally uploaded by jward199

Looking towards Canton from the Prairie Road, just after a great thunder and lightning storm passed over Emiquon.

Muskrat at Emiquon, Thompson Lake

Muskrat at Emiquon, Thompson Lake
Originally uploaded by jward199

This muskrat had his/her eye on me as we passed the den in our pontoon boat.

Spotted Sandpiper with Black-necked Stilt at Emiquon

Spotted Sandpiper with Black-necked Stilt at Emiquon
Originally uploaded by jward199

A Spotted Sandpiper was peeping around with the Black-necked Stilts at Thompson Lake, Emiquon Preserve, on July 11, 2008.

Wood Duckling Emiquon

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Originally uploaded by jward199

This little Wood Duck was kind of late in responding to the take-off call from the mama. But his eyes show his intention to flee, which he presently did!

Another Juvenile Eagle Being Harassed by Little Birds

This young (third year?) eagle was on a tall snag at Woodford State Fish & Wildlife Area. Red-winged blackbirds hounded him until he flew away. As he flew past, it looked like the eaglet was holding something small in his foot, possibly a baby bird?

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Originally uploaded by jward199

Eaglet Chased by Kingbird!

My friend Ed and I visited the Eagle nest on Friday, July 4, hoping the eaglets would still be returning to the nest to feed. Fellow eaglet watchers assured us that the adults continue to bring food and drop it off on both the current and old nests. As we waited behind the blind across the highway from the nest site, one of the eaglets flew in toward the nest with a Kingbird right on him. It looked like he had something in his foot, perhaps a baby Kingbird? But no, it wasn't anything at all. The poor eaglet was trying to come back to his nest and the Kingbird was protecting his nest area, and both nests happened to be near each other, unfortunately for our eaglets!

Two Kingbirds are on this baby eagle, one on his head and the other at the tip of his wing, you can just see the tail.

The Kingbird hangs on and rides on the back of the eaglets neck!

Our baby eaglet finally loses the tenacious Kingbird.

Once more the Kingbird lands on his back.

Our young eaglet finally gets away!

Environmentalists and Banner Residents Oppose Mine Site for Good Reasons

I've been reading comments to some articles in the Peoria Journal Star regarding the proposed mining site near Banner, Illinois. Several comments to the stories indicate that some readers think it is fine to mine an area and reclaim it later, pointing to Banner Marsh as an example. I would like to point out that there were many, many years when the property that is now Banner Marsh was totally unsuitable for people or wildlife to inhabit.

 

Originally, the property that is now Banner Marsh consisted of several bottom-land lakes connected by channels to the Illinois River. Interspersed between the lakes, known then as Kelsey, Slim, Murry, Long and Scotts, were low ridges of land covered by a heavy growth of bottomland timber.

In 1910, a drainage district was organized. The Banner Marsh area of the river's floodplain was drained and leveed, enclosing about 4,500 acres. The levee broke in 1926 and 1943. It was raised and broadened after the big flood of 1943, and the river has remained on the outside since.

Sometime after that, the farmland became a strip mine, destroying any possibility of returning the land to its former configuration as a series of lake connected to the river. The strip mine operated for about 30 years. Then in 1973, the Illinois Department of Conservation purchased the first parcel of the 6,500-acre area, and 20 years later the Army Corps of Engineers spent 15 million dollars to reclaim it, starting in about 1992. It took about 10 years to do so. During all that time, from 1943 through the rest of the century, the land was in wretched condition.

The proposed mining permit area is about 600 acres, of which 400 acres are to be mined. Some of this land is farm land, some farmed wetland that floods almost
every year, some is wetland scrub/shrub, and some is wetland forest. This area is currently providing habitat for wildlife, even as it is farmed, habitat that will be destroyed during mining operations if it is allowed.

Mining is planned to take place for 5 to 10 years, depending on what company official statements you read. (The permit is for 5 years, but once a permit is granted, it is usually renewed without serious examination for another five years.) Reclamation will take at least 5 years. So we are looking at 10 to 15 years before it begins to revive to a state similar to Banner Marsh. This lengthy period of time will disrupt many sensitive species who depend on the habitat along the Illinois River corridor to survive.

* There is an American Bald eagle roost within two
tenths of a mile of the mine site, and Eagle Nests in the Rice Lake area adjacent to the site.

* There are three known osprey nests in the entire state of Illinois, one of which is in the west side of Banner, and one of which is near the proposed mining site at Rice Lake.

* Short-eared owls winter in the area, roosting in the Rice Lake area and possibly in the permit area and hunting the wide-open wetland of the the adjacent(from an owl's point of view) Banner Marsh on late winter afternoons and evenings.

 
Walk with Me: Short-eared Owls at Banner Marsh

The mine discharge water will be routed to Rice lake, and will contain toxic heavy metals. These tend to concentrate up the food chain, so that fish, and birds which prey on the fish will probably be at significant risk for heavy metal poisoning, as will people who consume the fish. These metals include lead, cadmium, selenium, and arsenic. Fishing and hunting at Rice Lake could be discontinued for health reasons if the mine does operate and high levels of these metals are found in the fish.

There is some indication that there may be more economic benefit to the region if we promote ecotourism. There is a wonderful group of wildlife refuges between Banner and Havana, including the Nature Conservancy's Illinois River Project at Emiquon. Dixon Mound is starting to supervise new archaeological digs in the area. The Federal Fish and Game people, the Nature Conservancy and the State fish and wildlife conservation officers are working together to provide coordinated use plans and interpretive areas for many of the protected wildlife areas (like Chautauqua and Emiquon Wildlife Preserve). People from Chicago drive down to the area frequently to view the wildlife that is thriving along the river.

Of course, the real goal of the mining company may be to get a small permit first, degrade the wildlife areas substantially and do preliminary water control on the site at this mine, and then convince the state to sell the mining rights to Rice lake itself. If that happens, we will have a huge, ugly strip mine providing jobs and polluting the Illinois River for the next thirty years.

Remember, the DNR experts who have granted this permit are largely from the Office of Mines. The Illinois Natural History Survey biologists are now associated with the University of Illinois, and other Conservation Officers have been shifted out of the Department of Natural Resources.

The major input to the decision was from the mining perspective. The Conservation Officers at Rice Lake were very much against the proposal initially (several years ago), but there has been a deafening silence since. One assumes they have been at some risk for their jobs. Some of the data offered by the petitioners against the mine came from the former supervisor of Rice Lake.

The people who live in the village of Banner will have this mine on their doorstep, in some cases within fifty yards of their back door. Their property values will plummet. They all oppose the mine. About 70 wells in the area may be at risk.

This mining permit was granted by the DNR in error, and needs to be revoked.