Horicon Marsh

This is the 14th year that we’ll be going as a group to Horicon, one of Wisconsin’s premiere birding hotspots. If you would like to carpool or caravan, meet at the Hwy 20 Park and Ride at 7:20 AM (Racine County). If you would like to meet us at Horicon, we will meet at the Auto Loop Trail parking area off of Hwy 49 at 9:00 AM. (At the map link below, this is the parking lot located at the Redhead Hiking Trail Trailhead, meet at the northside of the lot.) From there we will caravan to bird other locations.

In past years, the trip has included a stop along highway 49, where we’ve parked our cars and birded from the side of the road. People will set up their spotting scopes to look for shorebirds on the mudflats, Black Terns, Great Egrets, Great Blue Herons, Black-crowned Night-Herons, American White Pelicans, coots, Pied-billed Grebes, a variety of ducks. You may get to see a Northern Harrier flying low over the marsh. Other stops have been Dike and Ledge Roads, where we have birded from alongside our cars. We have driven the Auto Tour Route, stopping for a walk on the boardwalk or along Old Marsh Road, where you may see Green Herons, Least Bittern, Belted Kingfishers, and Eastern Kingbirds.

In addition to food and cold drinks, bring binoculars, a bird book, a spotting scope if you have one, sunscreen, insect repellent, a hat or a visor, and a rain jacket just in case. Horicon is an incredibly beautiful place, and it is really fun to look at birds, especially birds that we don’t get to see everyday, with people who know what they’re looking at! If you have questions, need directions, contact us for questions.