The Birds Back Home
I've been a Florida resident, off-and-on, for several years now. My birding friends in Illinois sometimes seem envious of this. It is true that I see a number of species up-close-and-personal in Florida. But Florida isn't that different from Chicago and the surrounding region when it comes to birding.
Northeastern Illinois gives Florida a run for its money when it comes to birding. I'm in Glen Ellyn up North, and I have at least a dozen good spots I can get to to bird that are within 15 minutes of my house, including the Morton Arboretum, McKee Marsh, and Elsen's Hill. Except for the Arb, all of the sites are free. Here in Florida, there is often an entrance fee and usually a parking fee. Even then, the parks exist mainly to support a crowded beach or recreational facilities: soccer fields, tennis courts, etc.
I crunched some numbers recently to compare birding in Florida with birding in DuPage County. I used my Ebird records. I counted the number of species seen on "traveling" counts lasting at least an hour. For each area I had 25 counts (all DuPage counts were in 2021; most of the Collier counts were in 2021).
In Collier, I saw an average of 14 species; in DuPage, 15. Collier median was 14; DuPage, 13. Collier mode was 7; DuPage, 11.
In both counties I counted more than 20 species on six trips. The most seen in Collier on a trip was 30; the most in DuPage, 32.
The "best" area I've birded in Illinois has been Glacial Park in McHenry. On at least two occasions, I've seen 57 species. My best day at the fabled Ding Darling NWR on Sanibel Island in Lee County, just north of Naples, was 38 species.
What bolsters (inflates?) the Florida counts is my inclusion of the almost-weekly walks I take from my condo to the drainage canal a half-mile away. I include the birds I see around the lake; almost always I end up with at least 20 species, although seldom many more. Countering this are the numbers from "nature trails" in many of the local parks and "preserves" in the Naples area: it is not unusual to see and hear nothing!
I appreciate the opportunity to indulge my birding passion in both areas. My Florida experiences, though, affirm what Dorothy realizes at the end of "The Wizard of Oz": True happiness isn't somewhere over the rainbow; rather, "There's no place like home."
