Thousands of purple martins are staging and roosting in Todd county in the SW corner of Big Swan Lake on a large cattail bed, and just south of Willmar in the middle of a corn field. These roosts are impressive, and if you go driving in the vicinity of the roost the martins will be staging by the hundreds on wires before they fly to the actual roost site. The roost rings are showing up on Doppler radar at sunrise. I am the director for the Purple Martin Working Group for Minnesota and would like to know if any of you discover other PM roosts in the state. These two roosts were discovered just last year. There is another roost in upper spunk lake in Avon, and lake osakis, but they are much smaller than these.
Big Swan Roost: off of county rd. 102 west of burtrum, north of Grey Eagle at the public landing, binoculars fine, but better view by boat or spotting scope. This is the biggest roost of purple martins in Minnesota. Would love to hear back from anyone who could estimate the numbers.....we think 50,000+. Best time one hour before sunset till dusk. Willmar roost: smaller than the big swan roost but still several thousand birds present. Take hwy 71 south out of willmar, turn left on county rd 88. Look for a dirt road that splits two corn fields...the martins roost in the western corn field. Best time one hour before sunset till dusk. ---- Join or Leave mou-net:http://lists.umn.edu/cgi-bin/wa?SUBED1=mou-net Archives:http://lists.umn.edu/archives/mou-net.html
