[tn-bird] Black Terns @ Rankin WMA

From: Leigh Loveday <lkloveday@xxxxxxxxx>
To: tn-bird@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Date: Mon, 19 Aug 2002 06:08:21 -0700 (PDT)
3 Black Terns were seen Sunday morning flying overhead on the
pond side of the peninsula beyond the tipple.  Leigh & I both
locked our glasses on the closest one to us.  It was in
transition, between breeding & non-breeding plumage (Sibley?s
verifies August as the time for which this occurs).  Some
smaller terns were also seen amongst this group & were most
likely Least Terns, but we focused on the life birds (thanks to
all for posting about the Black Terns @ Rankin Bottoms, & James
Brooks excellent write-up on the TOS website). 

We ran into some folks from Waynesville, NC who were loading up
their canoes.  They had seen a group of 30 Black Terns on the
mud flats earlier that morning along w/ various plovers &
sandpipers.

Also seen on the pond side,  was a bird we tried our best to
make an American Bittern.  Turns out it was a juvenile
Black-crowned Night Heron (we saw 2 adults nearby soon
thereafter).  A very odd sight was seeing an Eastern Kingbird
swoop down on this juvenile b-c night heron, when it was perched
on a limb. The juvie ducked its head on 3 occasions to avoid the
wrath of the tyrant flycatcher (in Massachusetts this past July,
we saw E. Kingbirds chase/ dive bomb Least Terns). 

The Eastern Kingbirds were everywhere you turned (at least 50),
along with Green Herons (we counted 37).  A dozen Great Egrets
worked a 50 yd. stretch on the far side of the French Broad
River near the RR bridge.  Lots of Great Blue Herons around as
well.

Probably 100 or so shore birds were on the mud flats, but were a
little to far away for us to definitively ID w/ our scope.

Also seen:  2 greater yellowlegs,  3 blue gray gnatcatchers, 1
female summer tanager.

Robert & Leigh Loveday
Knoxville, TN




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[tn-bird] Black Terns @ Rankin WMA

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