Last week Eric Nelson of the USFWS and Mark Andersen of the Wisconsin
DNR counted an amazing 8,620 Bufflehead on Pool 9 of the Mississippi
River south of La Crosse, very likely a world record for this species.
The only high count that comes close that I've been able to find is a
4,000+ count from Kelley's Island, Lake Erie, Ohio a couple of falls
ago. The slow migration this season has allowed some large
concentrations of waterfowl to occur at favored staging areas along
their routes and is likely the cause of increased concentrations of
scoters on Minnesota lakes. Normally, scoter flights occur in the
Midwest on days with strong northwest winds and the birds move through
the Midwest relatively quickly in late October or early November on
their way to the Atlantic and to a lesser extent the Gulf coast.
Counts at the major seaduck observatory, Avalon, New Jersey were way
below normal in late October for scoters indicating a lack of strong
weather fronts and much open water up north. Bob Russell, USFWS
-----Original Message-----
From: John P. Ellis <[email protected]>
To: [email protected]
Sent: Sat, Nov 21, 2009 6:08 pm
Subject: [mou-net] Osakis Scoters
Yesterday's glassy water revealed one White-winged Scoter and 2
Black
Scoters on the Todd County side of Lake Osakis. There were 15 Trumpeters
also and close to 2000 ducks of various species. I did NOT see the
Pacific
Loon nor the Long-Tailed ducks earlier sighted. Turned up a Ruffed
Grouse in
Douglas. Today saw many fewer ducks, fewer Swans and only the WWScoter
(but
I did not look very long.)
John Ellis-St. Paul
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