A busy weekend has precluded me from posting this earlier Hey birders, A busy weekend has precluded me from posting this earlier. We had some spectacular raptor movement in the last week at the Bethany Hawkwatch in Mankato (http://hawkcount.org/bethany).
A total of 12 species and 1,500 birds were seen between Thursday and Saturday and another 100 birds today. Thursday we had 11 species with a record 6 Northern Harriers. Friday we were blown away by kettle after kettle of Broad-winged Hawks. The first birds were stumbled upon around 10:00am and over 600 passed over Bethany in the next two hours. I've never seen so many kettles or so many birds! We had 11 species that day as well. Saturday there was no full-time count, but students found over 100 birds again and my brief visit helped spot the second Swainson's Hawk of the day! Today we had over 100 birds again with some remnant kettles of Broad-wings making up the bulk of the numbers. Other non-raptor species included Double-crested Cormorant, Cedar Waxwing, Franklin's Gulls, and Ring-billed Gulls. Passerines in the yard today: Blue-headed Vireo, Eastern Wood-Pewee, Chesnut-sided Warbler, and Nashville Warbler. Happy birding! Chad Heins Mankato "But ask the animals and they will teach you, or the birds of the air, and they will tell you; Which of all these does not know that the hand of the Lord has done this?" --Job 12:7, 9 ---- Join or Leave mou-net: http://lists.umn.edu/cgi-bin/wa?SUBED1=mou-net Archives: http://lists.umn.edu/archives/mou-net.html
