[TN-Bird] River Watch - SCOTERS!
- From: OLCOOT1@xxxxxxx
- To: tn-bird@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Mon, 17 Oct 2005 00:21:46 EDT
Oct. 16, 2005
Mississippi River,
Ensley Bottoms
Shelby Co. TN
The first pass through on Mud Island found little activity on the river with
just the cast of regulars but even lower numbers of swallows and swifts. A
few ducks and coots were still floating the river but nothing flew by during
my 45 minute watch.
At the pits, I found very little change in numbers or species with 4
Westerns that stood for photos, 3 Greater Yellowlegs again going and coming
from
Horn Lake Slough, 11 Lesser Yellowlegs, down to only 1 Stilt Sandpiper, 2
Wilson's Snipe along with the Pectoral Sandpiper that has hidden with them in
the
same small pool all week. TVA Lake held an expected significant increase in
coots and the Gadwall.
I pick up some strings of DC Cormorants heading south along with a dark
morph Red-tailed Hawk, my first of season. I decided to head back to the river
and spent 3 enjoyable hours watching the world do its thing.
Everything got up a little late today and headed south, 11 flotillas of 315
American Coots drifted by on the water, while 17 groups of DC Cormorants in
undulating skeins that contained 1245 birds headed to their wintering grounds.
Also seen were 23 Ruddy Ducks, 4 Gadwall, 9 Shoveler, 24 Pied-billed Grebes,
17 White Pelicans and 1 Ring-billed Gull. Raptor wise, there was the resident
Osprey, 3 adult Bald Eagles, 3 Red-tailed hawks, 1 Sharp-shinned, 3 Turkey
Vultures and 2 adult Peregrines that played tag for over 5 minutes before
streaming south one behind the other.
The Best Birds of the afternoon were 2 Least Sandpipers and 8 Sanderling
that ran the sandbar after flying in low over the water and THREE dark ducks
that also were seen far up river and followed until they landed just across
from
the north end of Mud Island.
These three birds turned into, 2 female SURF SCOTERS and a female BLACK
SCOTER which floated around behind one of the dikes until chased away by some
boaters. They were there long enough for a few distant ID photos. I had a
Black
Scoter in the exact same spot but 3 weeks later just last year. What a great
day to watch the River traffic...............
Good Birding !!!
Jeff R. Wilson / TLBA
6298 Memphis-Arlington Road
Bartlett, TN 38135
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