I forgot to mention in yesterdays post that I saw a Merlin in the back yard of my in-laws house in Cloquet on 2/24. I knew it wasn't a common bird in the season but according to the MOU occurrence map this would be rare in Carlton county in the Winter. I was also intrigued when I looked at the Janssen and Glassel coloring books for the American Three-toed Woodpecker and saw that neither of them had seen this species in St. Louis county. I have birded St. Louis county more than any other and have not seen American Three-toed woodpeckers there either despite seeing many Black-backed Woodpeckers. I have seen three ATT Woodpeckers in Lake county, one in Aitkin and one in Crow Wing. I have seen several BB Woodpeckers in both St. Louis and Lake and singles in Aitkin and Carlton. In the coloring books of Janssen and Glassel they seem to see the ATT in more central counties than the far northern counties. I wonder if the Black-backed Woodpeckers are dominant over the other species and push them out of their strongholds. Or could it be that the ATT Woodpecker prefers areas that have more pine around than the extensive bog areas. When I saw a ATT Woodpecker in Montana last summer it was in a dry pine area that did not look like typical habitat and I believe they are much more common in the mountains of the west than the BB Woodpeckers are. I'm not really sure of the answer since I have seen the two in the same areas before and they do not appear to be too concerned about one another but it is a little food for thought. Cheers, Jason Caddy [email protected] ---- Join or Leave mou-net: http://lists.umn.edu/cgi-bin/wa?SUBED1=mou-net Archives: http://lists.umn.edu/archives/mou-net.html
