May 18, 2004 Ensley Bottoms Shelby Co. TN Dee and Dave Worley, members of the famed Bristol Bird Club, gave me a call yesterday as they were passing through on their way to Texas. I met them at 4 PM at Ensley and we had a nice evening of birding. One pair of Western Kingbirds was cooperative and with a little effort we had long, perfect eye level views of a Painted Bunting male at about 60 feet in bright sunlight. A Bald Eagle, Mississippi Kite and a Red-tailed Hawk filled our glasses, all in one field of view at one time. The "Pits" gave us great looks at all the species Mike and I had on Monday except we did not see the Sanderling but a Sora played peek-a-boo with us for quite a while. We also bumped up the Black-necked Stilt nest count from 20 to 25 finding a remote bunch in an area we could not get to on Monday. We witnessed two melee's between groups of unpaired Black-necked Stilts, both males and females participate and the sound is amazing but the acrobatics as the males dance and jump up and try to push the other birds down into the water is a sight to behold. At one time there 9 stilts in one fight. The females run about and mostly just add to the sound as the males thrash about. This just lets you know the almost human intensity these birds go through just to pick mates. We watched two pair of BN Stilts go through the mating ritual down to the "kiss" and another inexperienced pair try unsuccessfully to mate but the female held her head too high and the male fell off 4 times until both gave up and walked away, No kiss that time. The total numbers were way down but we experienced a wonderful migration as small groups of birds called and left flying low over us with a beautiful sunset illuminating them. We saw and heard the different calls of Semipalmated Sandpipers, breeding plumaged Dunlin and Short-billed Dowitchers, Stilt Sandpipers, Semipalmated Plovers, Lesser Yellowlegs, White-rumped and Least Sandpipers as they passed low over our heads, vaulting higher and higher; they will rest tomorrow somewhere much nearer the Canadian border and hopefully some other lucky birders will enjoy their presence. We finished off the day standing in a parking lot watching displaying "Bull Bats." Dave and I both are old enough to remember that as the only name for Common Nighthawks when we were kids playing ball under the street lights. They would stair step mount higher and higher and then plunge toward the ground almost exactly like giant Horned Larks but unfortunately there was too much noise pollution to hear the roar from their feathers as they abruptly pulled out of the death defying dive just in the nick of time. Aaah! to live life on the edge......... Another great afternoon as we watched Wind Birds heading north with the consolation that the first returnees will grace my glasses in just a little more 4 weeks;o) Good Birding!!! Jeff R. Wilson OL'COOT / TLBA Bartlett, TN =================NOTES TO SUBSCRIBER===================== The TN-Bird Net requires you to sign your messages with first and last name, city (town) and state abbreviation. ----------------------------------------------------- ---------------------------------------------------- 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 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * ========================================================