(Posted by Jason Frank <[email protected]> via moumn.org) 6 BALD EAGLES, 3 CROWS and 2 RING-BILLED GULLS were on the rapidly shrinking ice at Bolland Slough along Lqp County Road 12, scavenging the winter fish kill. First COMMON GRACKLES and BROWN-HEADED COWBIRDS of the year along field edges.
Around 50 GREEN-WINGED TEAL found some open water on Lake Marge at Prairie Marsh Farm. 2 CACKLING GEESE in a small flock of GREATER CANADAS passed overhead. RED- TAILED HAWK pairs were in defensive mode around their nest sites. AMERICAN TREE SPARROWS were flitting in and out of the brush piles. An estimated 1,000 Mallards, 300 Canada Geese, and 700 Greater White-Fronted Geese occupied a half-acre of floodwater in a cornfield along Lqp County Rd 12, on the north side of the road 4 miles west of the intersection with Hwy 75. Ice out at Salt Lake, where an estimated 3,000 MALLARDS, 500 PINTAILS, 200 SNOW GEESE, and up to 1,200 CANADA GEESE have gathered along the western inlet and penninsula, along with roughly 300 GREATER WHITE-FRONTED GEESE, 8 COMMON MERGANSERS, 4 COMMON GOLDENEYES, and scattered groups of LESSER SCAUP and RING-NECKED DUCKS. There were 9 Bald Eagles, with 4 in adult plumage, in a flooded pasture half a mile east of the lake. Hundreds more birds are passing overhead. Mallards are the predominate species. Many hundreds of birds circling overhead, but not landing. A spectacular flock of approximately 10,000 SNOW GEESE (a third of them BLUE phase) were circling in cyclone formation descending upon a flooded cornfield along the west side of State Line Rd, 3 miles south of Hwy 212 at 4:30 this afternoon. I spotted a lone EASTERN BLUEBIRD perching in the cemetery just east of Dawson off Hwy 212 and another off Lake Rd, on the NW edge of Lac qui Parle State Park. Still lots of ice on Lac qui Parle itself; most of the fowl in that area are frequenting flooded fields. I found water striders in an eddy of the Lac qui Parle River, with crickets and spiders active in the grass and moths out on evening flights. Moths are swarming around street and yard lights; first BIG BROWN BAT of the year chasing them around 9:00 PM tonight. Jason Frank ---- Join or Leave mou-net: http://lists.umn.edu/cgi-bin/wa?SUBED1=mou-net Archives: http://lists.umn.edu/archives/mou-net.html
