[wisb] Kewaunee and etc
- From: Daryl Tessen <bhaunts@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: wisbirdn@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Thu, 3 Dec 2009 07:46:46 -0600
Yesterday, Dec 2, I spent the morning covering the "northern" part of
Lake Michigan. Starting in Green Bay where there are 8 Double-cr.
Cormorants by the mouth of the Fox River, no pelicans which is in
sharp contrast to previous years at this time. A Common Loon circled
and landed in the bay while I was there.
Algoma has some nice algae beach in the harbor but nothing on it.
Only a few gulls (standard) and of course geese.
Kewaunee has excellent algae covered beach, both in the harbor at the
park and at the park just south of the harbor. Two Dunlins were
present in the harbor. (These may be the same two that were there
about a week or so ago.) Very few ducks were present in the harbor
or on the lake. For that matter there also were only a few gulls
present (standard Ring-billed and Herring).
Point Beach SF was also very quiet, except for the Long-tailed
Ducks. While a few were in closer to shore, the majority were out at
the horizon. They took off at one point---flock after flock after
flock. There are at least 1000 in the area, probably more. Only a
few ducks were on the water or flying by. Three Glaucous and one
Great-blacked Gull were in close to shore. (Probably the highlight
was running into Charlie Geiger and birding with him.)
Two Rivers had 7 Great Black-backed and one Glaucous Gull, plus the
two standards.
It may be due to the mild weather (until now) but it seems strange
that in the past two days there were almost no rafts of ducks on the
Lake. Even more curious, at least to me, I saw only 40 Greater Scaup
between Harrington Beach and Cleveland on Tues, and only 4 flyby
scaup on Wed. Where are the ducks???? Normally one would expect to
see substantial rafts of divers, certainly at this early point in
winter. The one exception is of course the Long-tailed Ducks.
However the 1000 there yesterday, is a far cry from several years
ago, when 15 to 30,000 could be seen off Point Beach SF. Is this
pattern being noticed further north and south on Lake Michigan?
36 species for the morning of birding. I forgot to mention that two
flocks of Snow Buntings passed by (heading north) while scoping the
lake at Point Beach.
Daryl Tessen
Appleton, WI
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