The documentation contained on this page was put together by Brock and Elizabeth Wilkinson. We're a pair of married birders living in central Illinois. Although we were familiar with many species of birds and casually observed them from time to time, we didn't consider ourselves serious birders. For a couple of years prior to 2025, Elizabeth goaded Brock (who wasn't ready to call himself a birder) with offhanded comments about how his facsination was eventually going to turn him into a birder. Elizabeth was right.
In March of 2025, we purchased a Nikon COOLPIX P950 camera to carry with us while we went hiking. As Elizabeth predicted, we began taking photos of the many birds we encountered on our walks. We dabbled with uploading the incidental images to eBird before deciding to commit to keeping complete checklists. April of 2025 was the first month we began compiling complete checklists for upload to the Cornell Lab of Ornithology's eBird website. Although we certainly had an interest in birds prior to April of 2025, we both consider this month our transition from casual encounters to birding.



eBird Checklist Number - S224734596
This is our first complete eBird checklist.



eBird Checklist Number - S224995319



eBird Checklist Number - S225382201



eBird Checklist Number - S225690659



eBird Checklist Number - S225968980



eBird Checklist Number - S226196972



eBird Checklist Number - S226481113



eBird Checklist Number - S227459463


eBird Checklist Number - S227644748



eBird Checklist Number - S228024261



eBird Checklist Number - S228361147



eBird Checklist Number - S228677074



eBird Checklist Number - S229381112



eBird Checklist Number - S229814073



eBird Checklist Number - S230233177



eBird Checklist Number - S230658649



eBird Checklist Number - S231022775
We watched a couple groups of canada geese fight with each other over a spot on the banks near Leo's perch.



eBird Checklist Number - S231390757
A tornado warning was issued to the west of the nature center when we did this list. It's confined to the area near the front of the nature center. Minutes after we left the scattered clouds turned into a cold front with strong winds.