Itasca County and Chippewa National Forest Birding
Most of the residential areas in Grand Rapids are quite forested with pines and hardwoods. There are a lot of planted crabapple and mountain ash trees as well. You could drive these residential areas in and around Grand Rapids for hours without seeing all the feeders. Two places worth trying if you bird Grand Rapids are Township Road B and Veteran’s Park. Township Road B runs north from Hwy 169 on the east side of town near Itasca Community College. This road runs along the Prairie River and there is an access where you can scan the river. Even though the road is less than a mile, there are birdhouses, fields, and unusual habitat due to the North Central Research Station plantings. You should find open country birds such as Bobolinks, Eastern Meadowlarks, Savannah and LeConte’s Sparrows here. If you drive west on 169 and turn down the main entrance to the college and follow the road all the way through the gate (which is closed in the winter), you will pass some apple trees and large pines and eventually end up at a small, dense spruce bog with a boardwalk. Even if the birding doesn’t turn out to be productive, at least you’ll learn the bog vegetation from the interpretive signs.
Veteran’s Park is located along the Mississippi River and Hwy 2. Take Hwy 2 southeast from Hwy 169 and turn west at the first stoplight. This entrance is closed during the winter. If it is closed, you can still continue on and turn left at the next stoplight on River Road and take the next left to the small parking lot where you can walk across the bridge. This park has some huge pines and is a great spot to scan the river and look for migrating warblers. The DNR headquarters across the Hwy 2 from Veteran’s Park often has Pine Warblers and winter finches in the huge pines and spruce out front.
There is a trail system near the high school west of Hwy 38 at the north end of town (last stoplights.) The airport in town has hosted a Northern Hawk Owl previously. Of course, there are also 6 lakes (McKinney, Ice, Hale, Forest, Lily, Blandin Reservoir) easily viewed from in town. There are also sewage ponds in Grand Rapids. The ponds are along River Road (CR 3), 1.1 miles SE of Airport Rd. Essentially they are directly across from 23rd Avenue SE.