Within my local patch (suburban Fairfax County), there is a small private
lake. It has been short of water all summer, and now has considerable exposed
mud, with a fair mass of vegetation. When I visited it this morning, it had a
couple of Canada Geese, a female Wood Duck, a Green Heron and - a nice
surprise - a Solitary Sandpiper (with a limp). While I was watching the
latter at a distance, it appeared to being harassed by a couple of small
birds, continually bombing it. When I got closer, the small birds turned out
to be Eastern Phoebes and the sandpiper was totally ignoring the 'bombing'.
What the phoebes seemed to be doing was sweeping down to catch flies and
other insects being disturbed by the sandpiper.
Stephen Eccles
You are subscribed to VA-BIRD. To post to this mailing list, simply send email
to va-bird@xxxxxxxxxxxxx. To unsubscribe, send email to
va-bird-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx with 'unsubscribe' in the Subject field.
