Thursday (10/28) I observed a probable Osprey nest on South Holston Lake in Washington Co. This is the first significant evidence that the species may begin nesting in Southwest Virginia. The nest structure is in the top fork of a dead tree, towering above the canopy of national forest trees along the east shoreline just upstream from the Tennessee stateline. The bulk alone suggest that this is most likely an Osprey. Eagles usually nest under the canopy, down from the top of the tree. The nest I observed appears to have been only about half or more complete and probably not used. Unless, of course, it is the partial remains from an nest built two or three years ago. It is almost identical to the site location of a very large nest several of us observed earlier this year when we found it just upstream from U.S. 421 bridge along South Holston Lake in Sullivan Co., TN. Otherwise, 3 Eared Grebes were in the Painter Creek Embayment along with 3 Pied-billed Grebes. On islands in the vicinity of Cliff Island not far from Holston Dam, there were Ring-billed Gull 30, Herring Gull 7 and Double-crested Cormorant 2. The gull population has been slowly increasing. Hundreds of Canada Geese are frequenting the mouth of Spring Creek. A total of 78 Killdeer were seen in the Painter Creek and Spring Creek embayments. Let's go birding.... Wallace Coffey Bristol, TN ************************************************* BRISTOL BIRDS NET LIST Bristol Birds Net Photo Gallery located at: http://f2.pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/jwcoffeyy/album?.dir=/efd5 This is a regional birding list sponsored by the Bristol Bird Club to facilitate communications between birders and bird clubs of Southwest Virginia and Northeast Tennessee. -------------------------------------------------- You are subscribed to Bristol-Birds. To post to this mailing list, simply send an email to: bristol-birds@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx To unsubscribe, send an email to bristol-birds-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx with the one word 'unsubscribe' in the Subject field. -------------------------------------------------- Wallace Coffey, Moderator wallace@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx (423)764-****