With the early February snowstorm, my birding got off to a bit of a slower start this month. I did not get out until February 11, but like this past January bird numbers and variety were good for the month. After my highest January species count last month, this month was my highest February species count with 46 species seen. Once again all my birding was done at Rapids Lake MVNWR with only a couple incidental sightings elsewhere. Highlights are below
Greater White-fronted Goose(~115 birds on February 28) Cackling Goose (February 27 and 28) Canada Goose (first northbound geese seen over Chaska on February 24, multiple flocks of 256 mostly northbound birds over the Rapids Lake area on February 27 and multiple flocks of 245 mainly westbound(but a little more variety in flight direction than the day before) on February 28) Trumpeter Swan (February 16, 20, 25, 27, and 28) Mallard (February 20, 27, and 28) Ring-necked Duck (February 28) Lesser Scaup (February 28) Common Goldeneye (February 16, 20, 27, and 28) Hooded Merganser (February 28)) Common Merganser (February 20, 25, 27, and 28) Sharp-shinned Hawk (February 11, 16, and 20) Northern Goshawk (February 16) Barred Owl (February 16) Short-eared Owl (February 11) Northern Flicker (February 11, 16, 20, and 25) Northern Shrike (probably the same bird on February 25 and 27) Horned Lark (February 20, 25, and 27) Brown Creeper (February 16, 25, 27, and 28) Eastern Bluebird (February 11, 25, and 27, high count of 11 on February 11) American Robin (February 11, 16, 20, 25, 27, and 28) Lapland Longspur (February 20 and 27) Snow Bunting (February 27 and 28) Yellow-rumped Warbler (February 11, 16, 20, 25, and 27, did not look for them on 28th, definitively 5 birds that spent the winter here with as many as 7, as of February 27 2 birds had molted to their breeding primaries with one of those 2 birds beginning molt on head and breast, one bird on February 27 had not begun any obvious molt) Fox Sparrow (February 11) White-throated Sparrow (February 11) Song Sparrow (February 16) Swamp Sparrow (February 11, 16, and 20) Purple Finch (February 11, 20, and 28) Common Redpoll (February 11, 20, and 27) John Cyrus ---- Join or Leave mou-net: http://lists.umn.edu/cgi-bin/wa?SUBED1=mou-net Archives: http://lists.umn.edu/archives/mou-net.html
