Vagrant bird returns once more to Sherburne County

Townsend's Solitaire, a bird of our western mountains, once again is being seen in Sherburne County.

These thrush-sized gray birds usually are a long way from Minnesota, not that we don't get a stray now and then. They breed in the northwest, wintering throughout the west as far south as Mexico.

Strangely, one or more solitaires have been visiting a park in Sherburne County since 2004 — 11 years. One bird with a bent sense of direction arrived that first year. One bird continued to return, as it has this year. Same individual? Unknown, but maybe.

Equally unknown is how a second bird and once a third also appeared at the park. The solitaires hung out together. Did each of those additional visitors have the same error in its migration program? Was the first bird persuasive: follow me?

Birds do go where they're not expected. Half the fun of keeping birding records are sightings of species out of place. Wind has been an explanation, birds simply caught up and blown away. Researchers say, however, that malfunction of the bird's sense of direction is the likely reason. Studies in Europe have shown that while a bird might fly the wrong direction, it is likely to fly only as far as it would have flown if it was on its proper course.

A Golden-crowned Sparrow arrived in Duluth this week. It returned to the yard where it spent last winter. Same individual? Well, yes, since the odds are long on a second sparrow migrating out of range to that particular yard. The bird can be expected to return each year until it dies. It's route, once flown, right or wrong, is embedded in its brain.

Solitaires were seen at least seven other times in 2014, in locations throughout the state. Reports came from Dakota and Redwood counties and Two Harbors, among other places.

The Sherburne bird (one so far) most recently was seen in Sand Dunes State Forest in Sherburne County. It was on the south side of 253rd Street near a stand of birch trees, about 200 feet before the road pavement ends.