7 December 2003 Limestone, Washington Co., TN Late this morning and early this afternoon, Alice Loftin and I visited Keebler Road and nearby areas in the Limestone community of Washington County. On Keebler Road, I observed (heard, actually) two Lapland Longspurs, along with four Horned Larks and two American Pipits. The pond on Keebler Road that has been productive of shorebirds lately was empty of birds today. After leaving Keebler Road, we worked our way toward Telford, stopping briefly at the pond on Powell Road near West View School. This site often yields nothing but Canada Geese and feral Mallards, but today there were five Greater White-fronted Geese along with fourteen Canadas. I observed the birds with binoculars for about twenty-five minutes at close range in good light. Initially they were standing and walking on the shore. Shortly thereafter, they slept for a few minutes. A few minutes later, they entered the pond, swam for a short time, and then returned to the shore. Two of the birds displayed significant black barring on the belly and appeared to be adults. The other three appeared to be immatures in a post-juvenal plumage, having already attained white marking at the base of the bill but not yet having developed black markings on the belly (one bird did show a trace of barring, though). The bill color on all five birds was deep pink tending toward orange. This, along with the dark color on the upperparts, suggests the Greenland race. However, since there is variation and overlap in field marks among the three races, I do not wish to speculate too far on this. Rick Knight of the Herndon Chapter was also able to observe the geese later in the afternoon. Don Miller, Greeneville, 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 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * ========================================================