I got a late start on my trip to the lake. It was mid-afternoon. Light snowfall had begun as I biked north on the path in Cass Park along Union Fields, and I thought maybe this was a dumb idea. Then I began hearing persistent "kleer" calls from a Northern Flicker ahead. What a treat in winter, if it isn't a Starling, I thought. I stopped near the Sycamore source of the sound and had the pleasant surprise of a decent naked-eye view of 2 Flickers moving about close together, but not good enough through the branches to tell their genders. As I unpacked my binoculars from the pannier where I'd stupidly put them for protection from snow, the Flickers flew to separate trees, #1 going east across NYS-89, #2 going north a shorter distance. With the binoculars I also checked out 2 silhouettes I had noticed in #1's new tree, and it turned out they were Flickers #3 & #4, but they were rather inactive, so I looked back at #1 and found that next to it was presumed Flicker #5. Double-checking that #5 was not really #2, I glanced back to #2's tree and saw no bird in it, but instead saw presumed Flicker #2 flying from that direction toward the tree with the other Flickers, alighting near #1 & 5. Checking back on #3 & 4, I found that they now were accompanied by Flicker #6 and were becoming more active. I scanned the tree again and the number of Flickers had finally stabilized at 6 but there was also a Downy Woodpecker. Then the Flickers began flying south to other less visible trees long the Inlet. I've seen Flicker flocks before, but I think more toward when I would expect migration. This was a bit of a surprise.
I found no rarities among the 14 species of waterfowl I saw on the lake, which was calm, but had limited visibility due to the snow falling. I enjoyed watching around a hundred Canvasbacks, some of which were close to the ice edge. A pair of adult Bald Eagles flew over. The first, which alit atop a tree along the west shore where I could scope it, was a bit gray on the face and had a few white flecks below the wings, so perhaps it was a young adult. About 2/3 of the gulls resting on the ice nearby decided to stretch their wings and fly around a bit as it came over, but they soon reassembled their ranks. The ducks seemed to react by swimming away. A presumed second adult (whose plumage details I did not see) was on a similar but slightly more northerly flight path a few minutes later, at which time I noticed that the first had departed, perhaps also to the north. --Dave Nutter -- Cayugabirds-L List Info: http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsWELCOME http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsRULES http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsSubscribeConfigurationLeave.htm ARCHIVES: 1) http://www.mail-archive.com/cayugabirds-l@cornell.edu/maillist.html 2) http://www.surfbirds.com/birdingmail/Group/Cayugabirds 3) http://birdingonthe.net/mailinglists/CAYU.html Please submit your observations to eBird: http://ebird.org/content/ebird/ --
