I spent the day at Long Point SP, Aurora, and the Montezuma area. The birding was OK, but early afternoon I decided to grab a cuppa at Dave's in Savannah, head to VanDyne Spoor Rd., and see if any SHORT-EARED OWLS showed up. I waited an hour, and the first 2 popped up at 1443. These were watched, with some interactions with a N. HARRIER, for a while. After Joe Brin left, another owl appeared; then a birding couple. After they left, the floodgates opened, as I began to hear some barking and hissing and noted a significant increase in owls. I did a final, careful scan at 1535 and tallied 8 OWLS.
Since there appeared to be a lot of light left, I zipped down to Rafferty Rd. (King Ferry), arriving there at 1630. Right away I spied a perched SHORT-EAR near the red barn, so I pulled off the road. Within minutes, I had 5 SHORT-EARED OWLS soaring about; 2 passed directly over my head at 20'. I think they had just come off roost as 5 minutes later only one was visible. I heard a new vocalization as one of the owls passed over the head of a light-phase ROUGH-LEGGED HAWK perched in a tree just to the south of the road. The hawk let out a call-it sounds much like that of the red-tailed hawk, but reedier. I counted 20 SANDHILL CRANES at Knox-Marcellus marsh. Steve Fast Brooktondale -- Cayugabirds-L List Info: http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsWELCOME http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsRULES ARCHIVES: 1) http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/maillist.html 2) http://birdingonthe.net/mailinglists/CAYU.html 3) http://www.surfbirds.com/birdingmail/Group/Cayugabirds Please submit your observations to eBird: http://ebird.org/content/ebird/ --
