ASHLAND – This year’s annual Bobolink Festival at Byers Woods Park will be held on June 22.
Beginning with a bird walk at 8 a.m., the festival also includes a family-oriented nature passport activity and prize drawing for a pair of new Vortex binoculars.
Why celebrate Bobolinks?
In 2022, the State of the Birds report measured the most threatened birds in the United States. Grasslands, like the mixed grass prairie at Byers Woods, are the most threatened habitat and Bobolinks are considered a tipping point species, one which is declining faster each year.
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Each year, over a dozen pairs of Bobolinks nest at Byers Woods Park, where they can be seen from May to early July. Other rare birds can also be found at the park, including state endangered Northern Harrier, and other species of concern: Sedge Wren and Henslow’s Sparrow.
By maintaining the old landfill cells as mixed grass prairie, Ashland County provides a safe
haven for these grassland birds to thrive. The annual festival celebrates the success of habitat conservation at Byers Woods and provides an opportunity for the community to learn about all of the remarkable species that benefit from the park.
Interesting facts about Bobolinks
- Bobolinks are social and prefer to nest in places where other Bobolinks have succeeded in the past. They prefer prairies but will also nest in hayfields. Bobolinks nest on the ground. This makes them vulnerable to early mowing. At Byers Woods, the grasslands are mowed in July, after the birds have already left the nest.
- Bobolinks are one of only two North American bird species to go through two complete molts in a year. The other species is the Franklin’s Gull. Female Bobolinks, which are tan and brown, decide if a male Bobolink is a good mate based on how long, and often, he performs the courtship flight.
- Speaking of the courtship flight, it usually ends with the male Bobolink “parachuting” or dropping nearly vertically from the sky.
- The scientific name of the Bobolink, Dolichonyx oryzivorous, means “long-clawed rice-eater.”
- They are part of the blackbird family Icteridae, which includes the much more abundant red-winged blackbird.
- Bobolinks were a popular subject for poets like Emily Dickinson and William Cullen Bryant.