This morning, as my wife slept, I stole out to conduct my 20th annual Floodwood/Sax/Zim Christmas morning survey. It was a beautiful relatively warm, softly snowing day. As usual, I had the roads almost completely to myself. For the first time, I ran into another birder. Dr. Scott Loss, Minnesota's invasive worm expert, was visiting his wife's family coming from his college in Oklahoma.
Besides the common winter birds, almost all of the hopeful northern boreal species were absent. I saw no grouse, no hawks, no eagles, no crossbills, no finches besides Goldfinches, no Boreal Chickadees, no waxwings, nothing unexpected. I found one Northern Shrike on CR5 south of Meadowlands and south of Hwy 29. I found one Gray Jay. Scott found at least two more. I found two very mellow Great Gray Owls, one on Owl Avenue just south of Overton Rd, one on Admiral Rd just south of the feeders (thank you Scott). Scott found another on McDavitt, I believe. I found two Hawk Owls, one on Owl Avenue south of Arkola Rd (thank you, Scott), and the other on Arkola Rd, sw of the west railroad crossing. The only mammals were a white-tailed doe and a couple of Red Squirrels. The falling snow obliterated any tracks, Interesting reports from the Floodwood area that I heard about included: A moose on CR 8 east of Floodwood last summer. A cougar near Cromwell in October out in the bogs. Lots of Bobcats (or Lynx) and wolves in the area. Steve Weston On Quigley Lake in Eagan, MN [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
