Black-billed Magpie Firsts

Though a far cry from a true collections-oriented piece, I did want to share some local news that brought me back to a write-up I had done back in September. 

At that time last year, I had really only met black-billed magpies as a newly-sighted species – ​one who was utterly difficult for me to catch on camera while futilely chasing several different birds across the landscape from South Dakota towards Montana. And before then, I had truly only known them as a unique species represented in the Museum's own collection by a single specimen. 

Yesterday, local ornithologist Ryan Brady served me with another black-billed magpie first. In his own magpie write-up, Brady shares how this "unchaseable" species has, for the first time on record, been observed nesting in the state of Wisconsin. Read Brady's piece below, then visit the Museum beginning this May for a sure sighting of a black-billed magpie specimen in our Collections Room.