The Cannon River at Randolph's L. Byllesby was "Large Waterfowl Central" again today, with countless Greater-white Fronted and Snow Geese among the many Canadas and some Cackling Geese. Despite repeated effort, there was no determining the presence or absence of Ross'; between the wind and the heat waves, scope (and birder) just weren't able to do it.
There were, however, some good though brief looks at a pair of N. Pintails, and some frustrating glances at a couple of small, moderately short-billed, short-legged shorebirds. These were not Kildeer, which were seen in good numbers yesterday. There was no sign of the G. Yellowlegs we saw yesterday either. A stop at Randolph Industrial Park nearby yielded neither the N. Harrier nor the Rough-legged hawk we found hunting there yesterday, but there was a N. shrike at the pond by the church. It perched in small trees on the south side, then came to a post on the roadside, right by the car, where it stayed for many minutes, dropping once into the grass to hunt, then returning to the post. Its beak was slender, with a prominent hook. The dark eye-mask was also slender, with very discernible white along the ridge above the eye. The details were only visible because of its close proximity; it was having a tough time perching anywhere in that wind, never mind navigating to hunt. Earlier, another birder had been at the north pond watching what he had determined was a Loggerhead Shrike, that flew off when we arrived. That bird had been using a large muskrat mound in the middle of the pond as his look-out post. A return to the north pond found there was indeed a shrike using the mound as its "home-base". Its ID as a Loggerhead couldn't be determined because it was very active, but it was certainly fun to watch the hunt. It skirted the pond, perching on short grasses at times, dropping to the shore, and even landing on the ice at other times. In between forays it would return to the muskrat mound---but not long enough for a good scope-look. There was no telling if this was the same shrike we'd seen before, or the one the other birder had seen. Linda Whyte ---- Join or Leave mou-net: http://lists.umn.edu/cgi-bin/wa?SUBED1=mou-net Archives: http://lists.umn.edu/archives/mou-net.html
