Official Newspaper of Eddy County since 1883
Official Newspaper of Eddy County since 1883
On this particularly busy day at the Potholes and Prairies Birding Festival, birders gather with their scopes and binoculars hoping to spot rare species of birds often seen in our area.
"Spragues Pipit. Baird's Sparrow. Le Conte's and Nelson's Sharptail sparrows. Chestnut Collared Longspurs. See them. Hear them. And check them-and some 320 other fascinating species of birds-- off your life list."
These words from the Birding Drives Dakota website introduce the 15th Annual Potholes and Prairie Birding Festival, which will take place June 13-17 in Carrington and the surrounding area. You may have heard of bird walks and birding trails, but the Birding Drives Dakota website says "out here in the prairie pothole region in North Dakota, where the refuges and prairies are so expansive the birding resources call for drives rather than walks!"
Birding Drives Dakota is a non-profit organization that promotes nature-based tourism in North Dakota. Starting in 2003, it organized the Potholes & Prairie Birding Festival, which has since grown to attract birders from across the country. The event is filled with bird watching tours and seminars, as well as social and cultural events. The festival offers several different venues where participants learn through various art forms including photography, historical storytelling, music, drawings and theater.
They've recruited top biologists and ornithologists (the branch of zoology that concerns the study of birds) who contributed to the design of full-color booklets containing guided maps of drives, in some of the best birding areas in the world right here in central North Dakota.
Bird watchers gather from many states to participate in the four-day festival that takes them through our wetlands and wavy, open meadows to attend the tours, seminars and other activities. Highlights for the participants include annual sightings of almost 150 bird species in the wide-open spaces that is the beauty of North Dakota.
This area of the Prairie Pothole Region in North Dakota has even been listed in two bestselling books, Fifty Places to Go Birding Before You Die: Experts Share the World's Greatest Destinations and the New York Times bestseller, 1000 Places to See Before You Die: A Traveler's Life List.
While the festival itself is the attraction that brings out-of-staters to North Dakota, the registration information encourages participants to check out other wildlife attractions in the area before they leave, including Chase Lake National Wildlife Refuge, which supports the largest North American nesting colony of the American White Pelican; the Arrowwood National Wildlife Refuge, with 15,934 acres of lakes, marshes and prairie grasslands, where visitors can take a 5.5 mile auto tour and many birds can be seen and photographed.
Other recommended wildlife areas include Long Lake National Wildlife Refuge, the Valley City Wetlands Management District, the Coteau Region, the Edward R. Brigham III Alkali Lake Sanctuary, the Jamestown Reservoir, Pipestem Reservoir, the James River as an important migration corridor for many birds, the Lake Juanita area and interestingly enough, the Jamestown sewage lagoons. Apparently, sewage lagoons are important stopover points for many species of waterfowl and shorebirds in the northern plains.
While in Jamestown, visitors are encouraged to visit the National Buffalo Museum and view the history of the white buffalo; Frontier Village and the World's Largest Buffalo; the Jamestown Arts Center, Fort Seward, the Stutsman County Memorial Museum with its Front Porch chats, the North Dakota Sports Hall of Fame in the Jamestown Civic Center and the beautiful St. James Basilica.
While in Carrington, organizers encourage a visit to the NDSU-Carrington Research Center, which features a variety of native and exotic tree species that make it attractive to migrating birds. Hawk's Nest Ridge offers a view of undeveloped land, on a butte 300 feet above the surrounding plains. It has one of the last remaining native stands of buffalo grass and oaks. Visitors can also visit the beautiful gardens at Dakota Sun Gardens and Winery or the historic Putnam House on Main Street in Carrington.
This area has become a worldwide destination for birders; if you're interested in birding or a great chance to photograph birds, visit the Birding Drives Dakota website, http://birdingdrivesdakota.com, and then take one of the drives for yourself. While you're at it, maybe you can visit one of the other suggested attractions in the area and get the chance to see these beautiful areas through the eyes of someone seeing it for the very first time.
