CHICAGO (WBBM NEWSRADIO) -- Birders in Illinois are still on a high, because this past Saturday, many of them converged on a downstate lake to welcome a rare visitor who was more than a thousand miles away from her home.
Birders from Chicago traveled almost 300 miles to Carlyle Lake. But that was nothing, compared to the bird they came to see, the magnificent frigatebird, which had traveled about 1,200 miles.
Frigatebirds soar high above oceans, usually, with wings like pterodactyls. And sleep in the air.
“This is an oceanic bird," said Chicago’s longtime birder, naturalist, and author Joel Greenberg, who made the drive down to see the frigatebird.
“It is a bird of the subtropical salt waters of the America."
So what’s it doing so far from the subtropics - and salt water?
Greenberg said sometimes storms down that way bring the birds up this far.
“I don’t recall there’s been any major storm battering the U.S. right now…
“What makes this bird so intriguing to birders is that they do not stay around, in most cases," he said.
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Word got around fast this past weekend: strangely, an adult female magnificent frigatebird was circling the sky about an hour east of St. Louis.
“And there it was, just soaring overhead, going back and forth," Greenberg said.
And the magnificent frigatebird was accommodating, at least for a day. Greenberg said it was a “great day of bird chasing.”