TNA posting March 26, 2007
Magee Marsh birds seen in the past week by several birders.
1. Trumpeter Swans - several small groups being very vocal!!!
2. Tundra Swans - the large flocks are getting smaller by the day.
3. Canada Geese - many
4. Mallards
5. N. Shovelers
6. Ring-necked Ducks
7. Gadwall
8. Lesser Scaup
9. Green-winged Teal
10. Blue-winged Teal
11. A. Wigeon
12. Hooded Mergansers
13. Common Mergansers
14. A. Coots - population is growing
15. Pied-billed Grebe - 2
16. Bald Eagles - seen everyday
17. Red-tailed Hawks
18. Red-shouldered Hawks - migrating through
19. Turkey Vulture
20. American Kestrel - 1
21. Killdeer - many now.
22. Tree Swallows - numbers growing everyday
23. Great Egrets - 3
24. Great Blue Herons - 6
25. Eastern Phoebe - 4 on the boardwalk + others!
26. Golden-crowned Kinglets - more each day, boardwalk
27. Ruby-crowned Kinglet - 1
28. Carolina & Winter Wrens - boardwalk
29. American Woodcock - close-up on boardwalk at 18
30. Brown Creeper - on boardwalk
31. B.C. Chickadee - loop trail
32. Downy, Flicker, & Y.B. Sapsucker - boardwalk
33. Hermit Thrush , A. Robins - boardwalk
34. E. Bluebird - tower
35. Y.R. Warbler - 1st warbler of the year for Magee Marsh!!! (boardwalk)
36. E. Towhee, N. Cardinals
37. A. Tree, Song, Field, White-throated, Chipping, and Swamp Sparrows
38. D.E. Juncos
39. Short-eared Owl - causeway in the evening
40. Rusty Blackbirds - boardwalk
41. Red-winged Blackbirds & Grackles- everywhere now
42. Ring-billed & Herring Gulls
43. Wood Ducks - more each day
44. N. Pintails - 1 or 2 still (flyovers now)
Its good to be back working at Magee Marsh for my third year. Chris Knoll
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listserv March 26
Subject: Magee area Fox Sparrows
From: Kenn Kaufman
Date: Mon, 26 Mar 2007 19:42:46 -0400
The Lake Erie shoreline in northwestern Ohio at the end of March has to be
the best place and time in the world for seeing Fox Sparrows. Today (Monday
March 26th), Rick Nirschl reported seeing or hearing about 70 Fox Sparrows
along the bird trail at Magee Marsh. I only spent a brief time along the
west end of the boardwalk so I only saw about 20 Fox Sparrows there, but I
had another 50-plus in thickets along the Wildlife Beach, about a
quarter-mile east of the east end of the boardwalk. So there are clearly a
lot of individuals around. This kind of concentration would be considered
quite unusual in most places; Fox Sparrow is usually uncommon everywhere,
seen in small numbers, seldom more than a dozen in a day.
The last couple of springs at this time I've been interested to see how the
migrating Fox Sparrows are concentrated along the immediate lake shore.
Even a mile or two to the south, far fewer individuals are seen. These
migrant birds seem quite shy, flushing well away from the boardwalk at
Magee, so it takes some careful attention to even notice that they're
around, but they're beautiful enough to be worth the effort. Today a
number of the Fox Sparrows were doing partial versions of their musical,
haunting song, even in what I could only describe as the heat of the
afternoon.
Kenn Kaufman
Rocky Ridge, Ohio
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listserv March 26
Subject: Ottawa County Pectorals and others
From: Kenn Kaufman
Date: Mon, 26 Mar 2007 20:24:03 -0400
In Ottawa County (n.w. Ohio), just east of the entrance to Crane Creek State
Park and Magee Marsh Wildlife Area along Route 2, Benton-Carroll Road takes
off to the south. Just south of Rt 2 on both sides of Benton-Carroll is an
area that floods regularly and is often good for shorebirds and other
waterbirds. Today (Monday March 26), in addition to various ducks (such as
Hooded Merganser, not your typical flooded-field bird), there were five
species of shorebirds: about 10 Killdeer, 2 Wilson's Snipe, 5 Greater
Yellowlegs, 9 Lesser Yellowlegs, and 3 Pectoral Sandpipers. None of these
is unexpected for the date, as all should be here by late March. Eastern
Meadowlarks (at least 2) were calling from the adjacent fields. In a
partially flooded field just to the south I saw at least 300 Rusty
Blackbirds along with Red-wings and others. It seemed like a plausible spot
to look for Brewer's Blackbird, but in a careful study I couldn't pull out
even one Brewer's.
Pectoral Sandpiper merits an additional comment because it's in a different
category from most of our early spring migrants. Across all groups of
birds, most of the species that come north early are those that spend the
winter relatively close to us: most ducks, geese, Killdeers, American
Woodcocks, Eastern Phoebes, Tree Swallows, Red-winged and Rusty Blackbirds,
Yellow-rumped Warblers, Hermit Thrushes, etc., etc., all are common in
winter in the southeastern United States. For that matter, so are Wilson's
Snipes and Greater and Lesser Yellowlegs. Pectoral Sandpiper, on the other
hand, doesn't winter regularly anywhere north of the Equator -- its main
wintering range is in southern South America. It may show up in the same
damp fields as Killdeer and snipe, but chances are it has come ten times as
far to be here. The breeding range of Pectoral Sandpiper is mostly above
the Arctic Circle, so it's hard to understand why it starts north so early.
It's especially interesting to compare its timing to that of White-rumped
Sandpiper, which has similar wintering and breeding ranges but migrates
north much later; peak numbers of White-rumpeds here may occur in the first
week of June! At any rate, among our early migrants, Pectoral Sandpipers
(and the American Golden-Plovers that should follow shortly) deserve special
credit as our first arrivals from truly southern latitudes.
Kenn Kaufman
Rocky Ridge, Ohio
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TNA posting March 26
A few new arrivals today. Brown Thrasher singing at the entrance to Magee off Rt. 2, and on the bird trail, Hermit Thrush, Yellow-rumped Warblers and Swamp Sparrows.
Other birds on the bird trail: ~ 70 Fox Sparrows, 5 Winter Wrens, 3 Sapsuckers, 10 Brown Creepers, 6 Phoebes, 3 Towhees ( all males ), 1 Woodcock, Rusty Blackbirds, lots of Flickers, Golden-crowned Kinglets, White-throated Sparrow and Chipping Sparrow.
Duck numbers are down considerably but there was a good flight of raptors.
Butterflies today: Mourning Cloak and Eastern Comma.
