[TN-Bird] South West Tennessee

Jan. 26, 2003
Tipton and Shelby Co. TN

I started up in Tipton Co. and worked my way south to Ensley and Robco Lake 
on Sunday. After a great day on the other side of the river, Saturday with 
Anthony I decided to try my luck on the TN side.

Along the river there are many thousands of Ring-billed Gulls using the open 
sandbars that have finally stuck their heads and toes out of the water. More 
gulls, just like other species, prefer the toes to the heads of sandbars by a 
wide margin. Could it be a fetish thing? I only had a couple of hundred 
Bonaparte's and 3 Herring all day. We had had many Bonaparte's at Mud Island 
along with the multitude of Ring-billed on Saturday but not one was there 
Sunday.

The gorgeous male Common Merganser is still plying the waters at Dacus Bar 
and the single Snow Goose that we had Saturday had moved down stream to a 
dike. This bird must be injured. A few species that we had not seen Saturday 
morning on our short visit to the Mud Island parking area were 3 Least 
Sandpipers, a few Pipits and TWO SPOTTED SANDPIPERS that were chasing each 
other all over the sandbar. All along the MS River, Ring-billed Gulls are 
feeding at eddies but try as I might I could not pull out anything different.

A single White Pelican was loafing on Engineer's Bar. At Ensley on TVA Lake 
the ducks are wall to wall, with by far the majority being Lesser Scaup and a 
good number of Greater Scaup, both posed for some photos of their backs to 
compare the differences in the patterns of the vermiculation. Other waterfowl 
in the mix there were, Canada Geese, Mallards, Gadwall, Green-winged Teal, 
Hooded Mergs, Canvasback, Ring-necked, Shoveler, Wood Duck, Ruddy, and one 
female Pintail and a walk over to McKellar produced Bufflehead and a group of 
Redheads which have been hard to find anywhere this year plus a few DC 
Cormorants. Down at Robco Lake I added Goldeneye, a female Wigeon looking for 
a mate, Black Duck and a flight of Snow and Greater White-fronted Geese for a 
total of 21 species on the day, the same number but a different combination 
that we had on Saturday.

A Krider's that Anthony had on Friday afternoon was still present at Ensley 
but I could not find either of the dark Red-tailed hawks that have been 
hanging in the area. The only other bonus birds were 3 Western Meadowlarks 
and a few Laps in the fields. A cold Opossum ambling across the closely 
cropped grass at a sod field looked like he was not enjoying the cold snap 
very much.   

Good Birding!!!

Jeff R. Wilson
OL' COOT / TLBA
Bartlett Tenn.


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