This week, a little saw-whet owl turned up behind Laura's backyard.

Saturday morning was a splendid start to the month, at least on Laura's corner of Peabody Street.

Baseball players sometimes get hit by pitches--nowadays no one more than Laura's favorite player of all, Anthony Rizzo. But those players have a much greater survival rate than the hapless dove who got beaned by a baseball. (The accompanying blog post has a LOT more information than I could fit into the podcast.)

Laura's grandson Walter has a brand new name for her.

This is the fiftieth anniversary of Hawk Ridge Nature Reserve in Duluth. People will be celebrating this weekend.

Stony Point was filled with happy birders on Saturday morning.

It's hard to get anything accomplished when an extremely rare Fork-tailed Flycatcher appears.

Laura thinks the old rule about bringing hummingbird feeders in by Labor Day is ridiculous. She'll be leaving hers out until at least the end of November. She was still seeing a hummingbird on September 18.

Two of the greatest highlights of Laura's Alaska trip were Horned and Tufted Puffins. Puffins are popular enough that Alaska gift shops sold lots of them--but not one that Laura could find was one of these two native Alaskan species--they were all Atlantic Puffins!

The time around Labor Day Weekend is what Laura thinks of as the "Anything Can Happen" time of year. (The recording at start and finish is of a Semipalmated Plover, from the Macaulay Library of the Cornell Lab of Ornithology. The Cedar Waxwing recording was made my Lang Elliott.)

How do we encourage declining birds to start using newly-restored habitat? Daniel Wanschura's "Points North" podcast for Interlochen Public Radio about Dustin Brewer's Michigan rail study can be read or heard at the IPR website [here.](https://www.interlochenpublicradio.org/show/points-north/2022-08-19/thin-as-a-rail)

Where to go to see the three species of puffins.

The features that make puffins so distinctive are also what allow them to live their oceanic lives.

How did puffins get their scientific and vernacular names?

Laura is entranced by two tiny beings this month: hummingbirds and her grandson Walter.

Was falling down hard while photographing a bird worth it?

After the big boat trip to Kenai Fjords National Park, there was still a bit of birding to do.

The birds Laura saw on her Alaska boat trip into Kenai Fjords National Park were even more thrilling than the humpback whales.

The boat trip into Kenai Fjords National Park was the most beautiful and exciting part of Laura's Alaska adventure. The first part of the morning wasn't even spent with birds, but rather, a splendid mammal.

The Kenai Peninsula was a great place for memorable birding for Laura.