Hiwassee Refuge, owned by the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency, is one of two featured field trip sites for the Tennessee Ornithological Society's 2005 Winter Meeting at Dayton, Jan. 28-29-30. Viewing of thousands of migrating sandhill cranes, waterfowl, golden and bald eagles, and a variety of local wildlife species is scheduled for both Saturday and Sunday at the Hiwassee Refuge located on Highway 60 between Dayton and Cleveland. It is a major refuge for reintroduced, and endangered whooping cranes that now travel unassisted from Wisconsin on their migration to Florida as part of the Eastern Whooping Crane Partnership project. This Meigs County sites is the home of the Hiwassee Refuge, a favorite stop each fall and late winter for over 50,000 migrating sandhill cranes. These birds make the Hiwassee Refuge their stop from nesting grounds in the north to wintering spots in Florida and Georgia. This is certainly a magnificent sight and a must-see for birders. The Hiwassee Refuge is a key site for the Whooping Crane Eastern Partnership. It is a stopover and wintering area to restore the world's most endangered crane to the eastern United States. Typically in the winter months, 90 to 100 different species of birds can be seen in the refuge including rare and endangered Whooping Cranes, Bald Eagles, Golden Eagles, Great Blue Herons, Northern Harrier, Red-tail Hawk, turkeys, vultures, gulls and more. Biologists/naturalists Charlie Muise and Daniel Moss will lead field trips to this area both Saturday and Sunday starting at 8 a.m. from the meeting headquarters at Dayton. Muise will lead the Saturday (Jan 29) trip and Moss will lead the Sunday (Jan. 30) trip. Don't miss visiting the TOS website at: http://www.tnbirds.org/Winter05-meeting.htm for more details and excellent maps of the areas. Let's go birding.... Wallace Coffey Bristol, 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 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * ========================================================