Oct. 31, 2004 Riverport Road Shelby Co. TN After being in Texas last weekend and seeing over 300 Scissor-tailed Flycatchers on one short stretch of roadway and hundreds more spread all across the area, it was a real surprise to find one still left this far north. It seems they have had an exceptional year and during the past week have been reported all across the eastern US. While traveling to the pits down Riverport Road today, I looked up on a wire and there sat an immature bird. I made a quick turn and pulled up and started taking a few shots. A car pulled up and parked almost under the bird and a man with field glasses got out. I thought he had seen the bird fly down and walked over to his car. He was looking in the wrong direction and had not seen the bird flycatching down the levee just below us. The guy was visiting Memphis from the University of Washington in Seattle and was just out for a little eastern birding. The bird put on a show for us and we continued down to TVA Lake and The Pits. A few Ring-necked Ducks had dropped in overnight and the Snowy Egret had reappeared. While scanning we had over 450 Greater White-fronted Geese and 205 Snow Geese pass over calling and jostling for positions in skeins and arrowheads. The flycatcher was still in the same area when I left later in the afternoon, it is flycatching from both sides of the road at the first large open water on the south side of the road as you go toward Ensley Bottoms. Good Birding!!! Jeff R. Wilson OL'COOT / TLBA Bartlett, 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 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * ========================================================