April 25, 2004 Ensley Bottoms, Shelby Co. Tipton and Lauderdale Co. I ran the river early Sunday and had a single Common Tern doing its thing up and down off Mud Island. At Ensley the Bald Eagles still sit tight and with the leaves closing in I decided to take a photo from over a quater of a mile. The bird was checked 3 times over a few hours and never moved. Where there were few Bobolinks Saturday, they rolled in flocks Sunday and I got a few portrait shots as they sang. In one plowed field, I found a few Golden-Plovers still in mostly basic plumage but the big surprise was a leucistic, all creamy white Red-winged Blackbird. After shooting her, I found another one at the other end of the leucistic range building a nest. The pure white bird was being harassed by everyone and the pale bird was chased by the Bobolinks. Blondes do attract them males. I'll let you know when I post shots of both beauties. The Western Kingbird was still flycatching from a tree line south of the plant. Hope others soon join the bird for nesting duties. Painted Buntings have arrived with 2 singing males at the most reliable location. I found none on Presidents Island but spent little time there while searching through the doves. The relentless rain of the last few days has soaked the spread fields and stopped the trucks from running at the lagoons. The southwest storms sweeping through Saturday night, swept most of the Lesser Yellowlegs away along with all of a few other species seen on Saturday morning but did drop in a basic plumaged Dunlin, a Willet and 2 Short-billed Dowitchers bringing the weekend total of Wind Bird species to 19 at the pits. The dowitchers were a great study of a dark plumage seldom seen over this way. I just had to take one very distant photo of a Lesser Yellowlegs, Solitary Sandpiper and Blue-winged Teal feeding in the edge of one lagoon with a Pileated Woodpecker not 2 feet away chopping on a fallen log. A rare combo shot any day. 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 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * ========================================================