Oakdale Park - Birding Review

Site Name: Oakdale Park

Site Location: Washington County; Oakdale, MN

Site Directions: From the north take 50th street south off of Hwy 36. (Same intersection as Fleet Farm.) Take 50th street to a right turn on Hadley Ave. The park will be on your right 1 mile or less down. From the south you can take the county road 5 exit from 694 and go West. The first right should be Hadley and you go north for about a mile and a half, the park is on the left.

Site Parking: The above directed parking location is an ample parking lot with direct access to the paved trails.

Other Entrances/Access: This park is a large piece of land in the city and offers multiple ways into the park via trails that enter from various neighborhood locations. The main lot described above is the only one with dedicated parking for the park. Though a few good street spots are available near a playground, tennis, and basketball courts if you want to enter from the north side on Granada Ave North. This will grant you quicker access to the offshoot trail that ventures to the other side of Lake Mud Lake and the short peninsula trail. (Though it's worth noting this entire site can be birded pretty good when entering from any location.)

Site Features of Note:

1. The nature center when open is probably pretty solid for kids and they run programs out of this site moderately often.
2. The paved trails offer a good family and accessible set of options for those that want some good birding without having to go off road and trudge through the nasty.
3. The site is being actively managed with a lot of buckthorn and related invasive plant life being torn out. Not sure what this will do the birding over all, but I can't imagine it dragging it down. I only mention it as the activity last year did happen most of the summer so I'm sure a number of birds were disturbed. (Noted activity through 2014 into early 2015.
4. The limited swamp and marsh like areas on Mud Lake don't have great access without going off trail most of the time so tracking down the Sora and Virginia Rails I've often heard would be a challenge.


Birding Features and Birds of Note:

1. Mud Lake: The primary body of water at this location has not shown a great variety of migrant waterfowl as it is pretty shallow from what I've seen. By mid summer I can usually see a fair amount of exposed stumps and mounds. (Even being shallow I have also not found shorebirds to be interested in the site either.)
2. Pileated Woodpecker: The full spread of woodpeckers are pretty ubiquitous in the park with Pileated showing on roughly 50% of my trips to the park. A good city site to try and track down loud mouths of the forest.
3. Owls: Great-horned and Barred Owl were pretty regular in 2014 for me and my wife. I have found Great-horned in several locations for most of the park is worth looking at. Barred were found near a small pond in the southeast portion of the park.
4. Woodcock: I did find Woodcock performing mating flight and calls during 2014 spring season. This was in the small prairie that opens up just after entering the paved trails from the main lot.
5. Warbler: Migration is solid for warblers as this large expanse of green probably looks good from the sky compared to all the houses and highways. I often check this park out during migration on work week days where I have less time than normal since it can be covered pretty quick.
6. Broad-winged Hawk: I have also found Broad-winged Hawk to be using the park for hunting during the breeding season so I suspect they are nesting on site. My in forest finds have been centered on the same region as the Barred Owl near the small pot bunker type ponds in the southeast.