[TN-Bird] Re: Lake County blizzards!
- From: kde@xxxxxxx
- To: Tennessee Birds <tn-bird@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Fri, 6 Feb 2009 11:00:34 -0500 (EST)
Wow. Just... wow.
Must have looked like the scene from 'Planet Earth'.
One day in Feb back in the early-1990s (have the exact date at home),
at Cherokee Dam in Jefferson Co, TN, I had an astounding number of
gulls. I estimated 1-2 million. I only had my binoculars with me
so couldn't pick through them well. Much of the lake was covered
with huge rafts of gulls. There's a large cove where Mossy Creek
enters the lake across from the dam (about 1 mile away). From the
dam, that area was just whited-out... a fog of birds in the air,
on the water, and on the shore and islands. They were peeling off
from this area and flying NE up the lake. I was there about 2 hours
before sunset and the stream of birds going up the lake never stopped
and never reversed course. Most I could see were Ring-billed but I
estimated 50,000 or more Bonaparte's and a handful of immature
Herring. I also remember 2 large, paler 1st-winter birds that I
wasn't able to ID... have always wondered about those two.
I returned first thing the next morning and there wasn't a gull
in sight.
This was before the days of TN-birds or even Valley Birds and
before I had gotten active with TOS so I haven't told many people
this story.
Dean Edwards
Knoxville, TN
On Fri, 6 Feb 2009, Mark Greene wrote:
> February 5, 2009
> Reelfoot Lake area
> Lake & Obion Counties
> ?
> The process of getting electricity back to the customers in Obion county is
> winding down and our crews were moved yesterday into Lake County to assist
> crews there. While driving around the south end of Reelfoot Lake I witnessed
> the largest concentration of gulls that I have ever seen at Reelfoot Lake in
> my 20 years of birding there. It looked like a blizzard in the air and just
> as many sitting on the ice where the lake was partially frozen. I didn't have
> time to scope them as I was working but no telling what could be out there!
> ?
> Then while we were working in the Gray's Camp area on the west side of
> Reelfoot Lake I saw the most Snow Geese that I have ever seen in Tennessee.
> They passed over constantly flock after flock heading north all the way until
> dusk. Some of the flocks literally stretched from horizon to horizon. I
> estimated that some individual flocks contained over 25000 geese! The total
> numbers that I estimated that passed over us from 2pm til dusk was
> approximately 700,000 birds!!! I counted an astounding 387 Ross's Geese in
> the flocks and I'm sure I probably missed many as they were just too far
> away!! Definitely an amazing spectacle!
> ?
> Good birding,
> ?
> Mark Greene
> Trenton, TN
> Gibson County
>
>
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> -------------------------------
> Assistant Moderator Dave Worley
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> __________________________________________________________
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=================NOTES TO SUBSCRIBER=====================
The TN-Bird Net requires you to SIGN YOUR MESSAGE with
first and last name, CITY (TOWN) and state abbreviation.
You are also required to list the COUNTY in which the birds
you report were seen. The actual DATE OF OBSERVATION should
appear in the first paragraph.
_____________________________________________________________
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
------------------------------
Assistant Moderator Andy Jones
Cleveland, OH
-------------------------------
Assistant Moderator Dave Worley
Rosedale, VA
__________________________________________________________
Visit the Tennessee Ornithological Society
web site at http://www.tnbirds.org
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
ARCHIVES
TN-Bird Net Archives at //www.freelists.org/archives/tn-bird/
MAP RESOURCES
Tenn.Counties Map at http://www.lib.utexas.edu/maps/states/tennessee3.gif
Aerial photos to complement google maps http://local.live.com
_____________________________________________________________
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