A group of six U of M bird researchers spent much of Sunday birding the Mississippi River between St. Paul and Prescott, WI as well as the fields south and west of Hastings. The agricultural areas were almost completely devoid of birds of ANY kind (probably due to the very deep snow), except for the backyard birds near houses/bird feeders, and strangely, several big Mallard flocks feeding on a few hilltops that had exposed dirt. Here are some of the highlights.
Prescott, WI (marina south of downtown) - Trumpeter Swans, Hundreds of Common Goldeneyes, plus a few Common Mergansers, 1 American Black Duck, and a handful of Herring Gulls. We looked for a Harlequin duck and Barrows' goldeneye, but couldn't find any; maybe the first winter in a few years without either in Prescott?). Hastings - a couple hundred gulls between the lock and dam and the Hwy 61 bridge. We were able to find 1 first winter Thayer's Gull among the Herrings at the marina just upstream (north side of the river) from the bridge. I had a brief look at the Iceland Gull just downstream from the dam; unfortunately no one else in the group was able to see it before it disappeared into the other gulls and/or thin air. For what it's worth, this looked exactly like the individual I saw last week at the 494 bridge in South St. Paul. The small patch of open pond at Lake Rebecca Park (road to the dam) was loaded with Mallards and one probable Lesser Scaup that slept the entire time. Ag fields - Zero passerine activity in the fields or roads; no horned larks, buntings, shrikes, or anything after driving 20+ miles of gravel backroads. Only 1 Red-tailed Hawk on the whole route. The slow-ness was evident when the most exciting birds of this portion were a few pheasants near Hampton. Kaposia landing, South St. Paul - mostly the same waterfowl as before, plus several Hooded Mergansers, 3 Great Blue Herons, and a semi-aquatic turkey walking on the ice near the water's edge. We ended up with 29 species for 6+ hours of searching... It was a beautiful day to be out! Scott Loss St. Paul ---- Join or Leave mou-net: http://lists.umn.edu/cgi-bin/wa?SUBED1=mou-net Archives: http://lists.umn.edu/archives/mou-net.html
