DEC. 24, 2005 Hatchie NWR - Haywood Co. Paris Landing, Port Road, Britton Ford and Pace Point Henry Co. TN I made a run for Mike Todd's Western Grebes at Britton Ford but came up short on those two but I did manage 2 west TN year birds. A quick stop at Oneal Lake in Hatchie to see if the Vermilion has come back, produced 2 immature Tundra Swans. Pretty poor lighting and rain made for poor but IDable photos. There were also 2 adult Bald Eagles sitting in one tree and 4 Cackling Geese in with the Canada Geese. At Paris Landing there were tons of gulls and I located a 2nd winter California Gull just north of Gary's Landing and my second year bird was an immature Glaucous Gull sitting on the bar out from Paris Landing State Park. Loons were found in low numbers and all were Common. There were 14 in the Big Sandy Reach and 16 on the TN River side of Pace Point. I kept going back to Britton Ford looking for the Western Grebes but no luck. I did have 7 Sandhill Cranes, first found off the refuge and then back in the corn field, near the old LeConte's Sparrow site. There are thousands of ducks in all 3 bays but nothing more interesting than a leucistic hen Mallard to add to my off colored bird page. There also was a small, immature hawk that really has me scratching my head....no light, raining = poor photos! At the overlook, at the Big sandy Unit of TN-NWR, where the old maintenance shed was (they are building a big raised platform which is surely not needed at this location as you already have all the elevation you need, what a waste of good money???) I found an adult and a 1st year Golden Eagle, I got photos of the young bird in flight and perched. About 30 minutes later I found another adult with a sub-adult on the west side of Pace Point. I'm pretty sure the adults were not the same bird. There are more Goldeneye than you can shake a stick at but still not besting my personal high total of over 3,000 during the big freeze a few years back. Surely there is one Barrow's in there, someone needs to find it before year end. I still need a Long-tailed Duck for my WEST TN BIG YEAR, let me know if that or an Eared Grebe show up, preferably together ;o) Good Birding !!! Jeff R. Wilson / TLBA 6298 Memphis-Arlington Road Bartlett, TN 38135 =================NOTES TO SUBSCRIBER===================== The TN-Bird Net requires you to sign your messages with first and last name, city (town) and state abbreviation. You are also required to list the count in which the birds you report were seen. The actual date of observation should appear in the first paragraph. _____________________________________________________________ To post to this mailing list, simply send email to: tn-bird@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx _____________________________________________________________ To unsubscribe, send email to: tn-bird-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx with 'unsubscribe' in the Subject field. ______________________________________________________________ TN-Bird Net is owned by the Tennessee Ornithological Society Neither the society(TOS) nor its moderator(s) endorse the views or opinions expressed by the members of this discussion group. Moderator: Wallace Coffey, Bristol, TN wallace@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx _____________________________________________________________ Visit the Tennessee Ornithological Society web site at http://www.tnbirds.org * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Topographical Maps located at http://topozone.com/find.asp _____________________________________________________________