Hello, All:
It was somewhat quiet out there for shorebirds today, as expected from a report from Dean earlier in the week.
We did see 4 RED-NECKED PHALAROPES at the central dam of the irrigation reservoir, and 3 KILLDEER further along but that was it for the day on our travels up to Wasa.
Beautiful day though, slight wind only in the morning and it got up to 19 degrees celsius.
I haven't been seeing many swallows around lately but we scraped up a couple of BARN SWALLOWS at the Wasa Motel.
AMERICAN ROBINS are flocking up, as are YELLOW-RUMPED WARBLER, and we did catch a brief glimpse of a WILSON'S WARBLER in non-breeding plumage at that lovely backyard in Wasa. Also there, was an adult CEDAR WAXWING feeding a fledged young. They bred a bit later than usual, I think!
The vast majority of the ducks we saw were either young ones or adults still in eclipse plumage. Only the NORTHERN PINTAIL and a couple of the RUDDY DUCKs showed any hints of breeding plumage.
Not the huge numbers of CANADA GOOSE around, either. Not like the last time I was out at the reservoir when there were several hundred.
It was a good year for CHIPPING and VESPER SPARROW, though, wasn't it!
Number of Checklists: 15
Number of Species: 61
102 Canada Goose
1 Wood Duck
1 American Wigeon
38 Mallard
33 Northern Shoveler
2 Northern Pintail
5 Green-winged Teal
4 Ring-necked Duck
10 Lesser Scaup
40 Bufflehead
33 Common Goldeneye
3 Hooded Merganser
44 Ruddy Duck
1 Common Loon
2 Pied-billed Grebe
1 grebe sp.
1 Great Blue Heron
2 Turkey Vulture
4 Osprey
1 Bald Eagle
1 Northern Harrier
5 Red-tailed Hawk
13 American Kestrel
3 Merlin
8 American Coot
4 Killdeer
4 Red-necked Phalarope
4 Rock Pigeon
2 Eurasian Collared-Dove
1 Belted Kingfisher
2 Hairy Woodpecker
9 Northern Flicker
3 Western Wood-Pewee
1 Western Kingbird
1 Cassin's Vireo
2 Blue Jay
8 Black-billed Magpie
26 American Crow
46 Common Raven
2 Barn Swallow
12 Black-capped Chickadee
4 Mountain Chickadee
13 Red-breasted Nuthatch
8 Western Bluebird
10 American Robin
2 European Starling
6 Cedar Waxwing
1 Common Yellowthroat
19 Yellow-rumped Warbler
1 Wilson's Warbler
28 Chipping Sparrow
87 Vesper Sparrow
18 Savannah Sparrow
15 Song Sparrow
22 Dark-eyed Junco
3 Red-winged Blackbird
2 Western Meadowlark
36 Brown-headed Cowbird
1 House Finch
8 Pine Siskin
2 American Goldfinch