April 3, 2010 Greene County: Bridge Burners Boulevard and other points in the western portion of the county Yesterday evening, while passing through Greene County, David Kirschke phoned me to say that he had seen a dowitcher at Bridge Burners Boulevard a short while earlier. He indicated that he had studied it carefully for quite some time and believed it to be a Short-billed. This morning, I visited the site and was fortunate to find the bird again. After examining it with my scope at 30x-35x for about ten minutes, I also concluded that it was a Short-billed. The bird was very dully marked, still mostly in basic plumage. I was able to determine the species on the basis of overall body shape (long and pointy, with no indication of a humped back), overall pale gray upperparts (showing some obviously white feather edgings), streaked face (rather than smooth gray feathering), well-defined breast streaking and spotting (rather than smudgy gray coloring), well-defined barring on flanks (rather than smudgy markings), and thick white barring on the tail (creating a very pale effect, very unlike the dark tail of Long-billed Dowitcher). Thanks, David, for the heads-up on this bird. It's a rare treat to find one in Greene County. Also present today: Wood Duck (3) Blue-winged Teal (10, Bridge Burners Blvd.) Green-winged Teal (3, Bridge Burners Blvd.) Northern Harrier Sharp-shinned Hawk Greater Yellowlegs (7, Bridge Burners Blvd.) Lesser Yellowlegs (6, Bridge Burners Blvd.) Pectoral Sandpiper (12, Bridge Burners Blvd.) Wilson's Snipe (5) Eurasian Collared-Dove (Town Hall, Mosheim) Purple Martin (6) Tree Swallow (251) Northern Rough-winged Swallow (5) Barn Swallow Chipping Sparrow (5) Savannah Sparrow Swamp Sparrow White-crowned Sparrow (3) Don Miller Greeneville, Greene Co., TN =================NOTES TO SUBSCRIBER===================== The TN-Bird Net requires you to SIGN YOUR MESSAGE with first and last name, CITY (TOWN) and state abbreviation. You are also required to list the COUNTY in which the birds you report were seen. The actual DATE OF OBSERVATION should appear in the first paragraph. _____________________________________________________________ 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 ------------------------------ Assistant Moderator Andy Jones Cleveland, OH ------------------------------- Assistant Moderator Dave Worley Rosedale, VA -------------------------------- Assistant Moderator Chris O'Bryan Clarksville, TN __________________________________________________________ Visit the Tennessee Ornithological Society web site at http://www.tnbirds.org * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * ARCHIVES TN-Bird Net Archives at //www.freelists.org/archives/tn-bird/ MAP RESOURCES Tenn.Counties Map at http://www.lib.utexas.edu/maps/states/tennessee3.gif Aerial photos to complement google maps http://local.live.com _____________________________________________________________