[TN-Bird] Kyker Bottoms
- From: Charlie <cmmbirds@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: TN-Bird <TN-bird@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>, ken Voorhis <ken@xxxxxxxxx>, jaimie@xxxxxxxxx, Colleen Moulton <kalmialatifolia@xxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Sun, 9 Jan 2005 14:08:25 -0800 (PST)
January 9, 2005
Blount County, TN
Hi folks,
This morning Tracey, Allan and I headed out to Kyker Bottoms for a
few hours. It was a GREAT time. Beautiful weather, good birds, and
we ran into some friends.
On the way, we stopped at the small pond behind Atlanta Bread Company
in Alcoa. We could not find the grebe Carol Gobert reported, because
it was socked in with fog. But we were happy to run into Carol and
chat for a couple minutes.
At Kyker (south Blount County, just west of US 129) we started on the
east side, by the barn. We immediately found a LOGGERHEAD SHRIKE, an
exquisite male AMERICAN KESTREL loads of sparrows all around, and
many ducks in the water. A RED-TAILED HAWK was perched on the
treeline and an invisible RED-SHOULDERED HAWK was calling. The
sparrows were mostly SWAMP with a lot of SONG, some FIELD and
WHITE-THROATED mixed in. I happily blundered upon the second-best
bird of the day while scanning with my scope - a gorgeous LINCOLN'S
SPARROW perched in the distance, right next to 3 Song Sparrows. Yes,
*second* best bird...
The waterfowl consisted of perhaps 40 RING-NECKED DUCKS, 2
BUFFLEHEAD, 6 AMERICAN BLACK DUCKS, a dozen GADWALL, 20 MALLARD, 9
NORTHERN PINTAIL, 25 or 30 NORTHERN SHOVELLER, 15 GREEN-WINGED TEAL
and 10 AMERICAN WIGEON.
At the small lot by the sharp turn we ran into David Trently and Tony
King, along with David's foster kids. That spot didn't have any
particularly exciting birds, but it was nice to catch up. David and
I did look at a likely female Red-winged Blackbird through the scope,
but it was too far away, and we had the wrong angle to positively ID
it. I'll get those later. And the kids had fun with the scope, as
well as the electronic door locks on our car! After trading
reconaissance, David and Tony went south and we went north.
Last stop was the big lot with the observation platform, where David
and Tony had a number of White-crowned Sparrows. Unfortunately, we
had a hard time with this species - just to show how much can change
in half an hour. We did have a nice "red" FOX SPARROW and more
Swamp, White-throated, field and Song. Just as I was about to give
up on the White-crowned, a medium black bird flew over the parking
lot. I was up on the hill, so I was eye-level with this glossy,
white-eyed bird - a BREWER'S BLACKBIRD! A good bird in the east, and
a state bird for me! A bit later I saw what was likely a Rusty, but
I didn't see it well enough. Well, 2 missed blackbirds, but I'll
happily take what I saw! Walking back to the car, we finally did get
a lone adult WHITE-CROWNED SPARROW.
My year total for Blount County is now 82 species.
Charlie
=====
**************************************************
Charlie Muise, Naturalist near
Great Smoky Mountains National Park
"Growth for the sake of growth is the ideology of cancer." -Edward Abbey
**************************************************
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