On this past arctic Monday afternoon, three volunteers were raking sticks and leaves (to facilitate planting seeds) around the four Saturday burnpiles in Somme Woods. A junco was busily finding food where we raked. Suddenly a kestrel dove at the junco, which niftily evaded it.
Kestrels aren't so much woods birds, but western Somme Woods is being restored to its original savanna state, so perhaps we should expect to see more of them. But the drama of the hunt - Wow!
It perched on a nearby snag, still on the hunt. Soon took off again, swooped down, caught a mouse and flew victoriously far out over Second Pond marsh. But it was just doing a victory lap, because it then flew right back toward us, landed atop the same snag, and let us watch as it tucked into a mousy feast!
"We must be doing something right," said Christos. The kestrel had flown in where Second Pond flows out into North Brook - the precise area where we cut brush and opened to savanna structure two days ago.
We didn't get photos but you can pretty much see what we saw in the spectacular Somme shots taken by Lisa Culp Musgrave.
Words by Eriko Kojima
Photos by Lisa Musgrave
Habitat by the Cook County Forest Preserves
