This morning I found an Eastern Meadowlark at Schweigert WMA in Nobles County. There is a small parking area for the WMA on the south side of 1st St. (the Murray/Nobles county line) adjacent to some large cottonwoods and a stand of cedars; the bird was singing in the grassland to the south of the cedars.
Interestingly, our group found a meadowlark in Pipestone County yesterday morning on the east side of Woodstock WMA that was singing both a perfect Eastern song as well as another song that sounded a bit atypical. In the dim light I believe I saw yellow on the malar, fainter spotting on the sides of the breast, and more limited white in the rectrices which are all plumage tendencies of Western Meadowlark. We ultimately left the bird unidentified as we heard no other vocalizations. By contrast, today's bird in Nobles County showed plumage tendencies of Eastern (more extensive white in rectrices, no yellow in malar, heavier streaking on sides of breast), but the clincher was when the bird gave a towhee-like "hee" call which is characteristic of Eastern. Bob Dunlap ---- Join or Leave mou-net: http://lists.umn.edu/cgi-bin/wa?SUBED1=mou-net Archives: http://lists.umn.edu/archives/mou-net.html
