[TN-Bird] Mississippi Quickie
- From: OLCOOT1@xxxxxxx
- To: tn-bird@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Sat, 11 Jan 2003 06:59:09 EST
Jan. 10, 2002
Tunica Co. MS
Ken Allen flew in today from Florida, to do some rambling through MS, TN and
ARK. I took off at 2:30 PM and we went to Tunica Co. It was a great afternoon
to say the least. I saw a Western Meadowlark fly across the road and we
pulled over for a look. In the scope we could see the details but it was hard
to concentrate because in the same field of view were Horned Larks, hundreds
of Lapland Longspurs, Harriers and thousands of Snow Geese. Harrier numbers
are definitely up and again Red-tailed Hawk numbers are down.
While changing locations, Ken caught a glimpse of a white bird in a ditch as
we passed and said it looked like a Cattle Egret. We searched around and
indeed found one Cattle Egret. I was tooling down another road when I spotted
a dark Red-tailed Hawk chasing a smaller raptor that didn't look right. We
turned into a pull off and jumped out just in time to see a Harlan's Hawk
after a Merlin under a load. The Merlin had a large rodent in tow and looked
like a lumbering transport. The Merlin made it to the tree line and the hawk
gave up. We ended the day with 3 dark morph and a Krider's among the
Red-tailed Hawks.
I looked up from the hawk chase and here in front of us was an immature
TRI-COLORED HERON flying across the water and disappearing. After a short
search, I was able to get some photos. I had seen on MS-Birds where someone
had found this bird on Sunday and Gene and Shannon Knight had relocated it
again on Wed. I had not noted the location but TLBA lucked out again. Later,
we were to find a couple of Great Egrets so we had Great Blue, Great Egret,
Cattle Egret and Tri-colored Heron in January in North Mississippi.
We located a group of Sandhill Cranes and more Laplands, Greater Yellowlegs
and thousands more Snow, Ross's and Greater White-fronted Geese. Finally I
found a distant group of Laps that we could get close to and sat 40 feet from
them with hundreds packed tightly feeding in the rice stubble. The males' are
wearing into their colorful finery, nicely. Largest flock today numbered only
1500.
We traveled back at dusk to try again to locate the roosting area of the
Sandhill Cranes. I have never been able to trace the birds that go north to
their roost but we were successful in following a group of 30 to 40 going
south, clanging, chuckling, and chortling their way to a roost site in a
stand of Tupelo Gum at a slough. Success at last.
We changed mode and started looking for Harrier roost sites and got to a good
site just in time to see the last Harrier go to ground and the Short-eared
Owls pop up. At three locations we had over 19 Short-eared. The best of show
were not the ones that fluttered by as we sat quietly but the ones that let
us creep up on them sitting in the roads with our lights on high beam. In the
dark, through the windshield, I hand held my digital and got decent shots of
these beauties. If interested drop me a note and I'll share. They are not
great shots but the subjects are nice.
Today, into Arkansas to meet Kenny and LaDonna, to search through the Laps
and look for Sandhill Cranes. Sunday to Reelfoot for
whatever...................Free at Last, Free at Last, Free at Last!!
Good Birding!!!
Jeff R. Wilson
OL' COOT / TLBA
Bartlett Tenn.
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