April 13th, 2019
Victor and I headed West Friday afternoon with plans to spend a few days
in Northwest Tennessee focusing on post-flood shorebirds. We had a slight
change in plans when Mike found the MARBLED GODWITS (well worth the stop)
at the pits in Memphis, but still made it up here by mid-afternoon today.
Best bird of the day was a RUFF in Lauderdale County. From Halls
Tennessee we headed West on 88 and almost immediately ran into shorebirds.
With between 5 and 10 k shorebirds in the area we never did get much
further. The Ruff was at mile 7 (exact location on ebird) with large
numbers of Pectoral Sandpipers and Lesser Yellowlegs from 1 p.m. up until
6:20 p.m. when we saw it leave along with the masses.
Other shorebird highlights were a total of 530 LONG-BILLED DOWITCHERS, two
SHORT-BILLED DOWITCHERS, a STILT SANDPIPER and a BAIRD’S SANDPIPER also on
HWY 88 West in Lauderdale County, a phemale WILSON’S PHALAROPE, a heard
only UPLAND SANDPIPER and two DUNLIN along the Great River Road in Dyer
County. All told we had 18 species of shorebirds so far counting the
Marbled Godwits from yesterday.
We began the the morning in Meeman Shelby with 15 warbler species, best
of which were SWAINSON’S, TENNESSEE, ORANGE CROWNED, NASHVILLE, FOS
REDSTART, HOODED, KENTUCKY and finally some BLACK-THROATED GREENS.
Complete lists are on ebird. Good birding! Ruben Stoll, Centerville
Tennessee.
