FreeLists / bristol-birds / [Bristol-Birds] Waterfowl migration continues to surge

["Wallace Coffey" <jwcoffey@xxxxxxxxxx>]

Area Birders:
It appears that the wintering population of Hooded Mergansers at Middlebrook 
Lake in Sullivan Co., TN and Clear Creek Lake in Washington Co., VA. left 
during mid-January to early February.  Most of the Hoodeds being seen in groups 
of less than a half-dozen are probably transients bringing up the tailend of 
the flight.  This is evident by their appearance on small ponds, rivers and in 
irregular scattered pairs and individuals.  Of course we will have stragglers 
for a few weeks.  I commented on this earlier.

Ring-billed Gulls have likewise drifted north.  The parking lots and shopping 
centers began to empty during mid-March and have been mostly bare since the 
third week of that month.  The big landfill winter population (300 to 500 
birds) in Bristol Virginia left about the middle of March.  Geoff Larsen called 
March 14 to report about 200 or more in a shopping center at Abingdon.  I think 
they are gone.  Middlebrook Lake seems to be empty.  About the only significant 
number left is a large remanent of this winter's influx clinging to Egret 
Island just above Musick's Campground.  Chris O'Bryan estimated about 170 birds 
there today (4/5) while we birded the site.  We should have stragglers for the 
remainder of the month or the first week of May.

I was at Crumley Pond, Paddle Creek Road, Sullivan Co. Tn this morning and had:

Green-winged Teal  3
Gadwall 2
Wood Duck  4
Mallard  2
Blue-winged Teal 1
Wilson's Snipe 1
Great Blue Heron 1

Central Holston, South Fork Holston River downstream from Holston Dam in 
Sullivan Co. I had an Osprey.  This afternoon there were 2 Blue-winged Teal in 
a puddle of a field along the road near the Central Holston Bridge.

Chris, Rick Knight and myself at Austin Springs, Boone Lake, Washington Co., TN:

Surf Scoter - 1 (second year male, same sex and age as bird at Steele Creek but 
not marked nearly as nicely as that birds -- so not the same individual.  And 
it has been a bit.)

Osprey - 1
Tree Swallows many
Double-crested Cormorants 9
Cliff Swallow  1
Red-tailed Hawk  1

Just above the new Bluff City bridge at the the small waterfront park,  a 
Canada Goose is sitting on a nest about 25 feet above the water over Boone Lake 
(South Fork Holston River) on an old stone bridge pillar of the East Tennessee 
and Western Carolina Railway.  We had a pair nest there about 10 years ago.

At Musick's Campground, South Holston Lake, TN, Chris and I had:

Lesser Scaup  16
Ring-billed Gull  170
Bonaparte's Gull  17
Double-crested Cormorants  3
Pied-billed Grebe  2
Mallard  4
Common Loon 1
a few Mallards
White-crowned Sparrows still evident in the campground.

Let's go birding.......

Wallace Coffey
Bristol, TN





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