Blane Klemek

1 week ago | bemidjipioneer.com | Blane Klemek

Oh, glorious spring, my favorite time of year. While old man winter reluctantly and eventually takes a backseat to sister spring, we can revel in the annual renewal now upon us. On a recent solo drive to Roseau on State Highway 89 from Bemidji, I silently celebrated the many avian observations along the way. I observed a host of songbirds, a meadowlark among them.

2 weeks ago | bemidjipioneer.com | Blane Klemek

I recently joined a group of friends for our annual winter camping and fishing trip in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area wilderness. There were six of us this year. Sometimes, it’s as many as seven or as few as four or five. We gather in Grand Marais on a chosen late-March Thursday morning at Subway, have a quick bite to eat, and head up the Gunflint Trail in a procession of trucks loaded with our pulks and gear, full bellies and plenty of enthusiasm.

3 weeks ago | bemidjipioneer.com | Blane Klemek

Few North American songbirds have received as much attention by people as eastern bluebirds. The male’s musical song, beautiful blue plumage and rusty red breast, not to mention both sexes’ parental devotion to their young and their acceptance of artificial nesting boxes, make them a favorite of young and old bird enthusiasts alike. Here it is, barely spring in the Northland, and male eastern bluebirds are beginning to show up.

1 month ago | bemidjipioneer.com | Blane Klemek

Seasonal songbirds and other wild birds are trickling into northern Minnesota once again. Now that it’s officially spring, expect many more to follow. Already, I’ve observed a handful of migrants — American robins, horned larks, ducks, geese, trumpeter swans, sandhill cranes and just a few days ago, my first red-winged blackbird. As is the case with many birds, male red-winged blackbirds typically arrive at the northern breeding grounds well in advance of the females.

1 month ago | bemidjipioneer.com | Blane Klemek

Many communities throughout Minnesota host statues and monuments commemorating various iconic characters and animals. There’s Rothsay’s greater prairie chicken, Bemidji’s Paul Bunyan and Babe the Blue Ox, Baudette’s Willie Walleye, Alexandria’s Viking “Big Ole," the world’s largest loon in Vergas and the Iron Man in Chisolm, to name a few. A personal favorite and among my most endeared Minnesota mammal is Otto the Otter — also known as the river otter.