I've never birded Stearns County much, but decided since I'm living here for a while, I should. Wow - it's a big county! I had a great time, and discovered several WMA's and WPA's that I'll definitely visit again in the coming weeks.
The most interesting birds were at my first stop - the Albany Sewage Ponds. As the day progressed, I saw lots of birds, but nothing unexpected. Albany Sewage Ponds visit took a whole hour. Horned grebes - about a dozen birds were fun to watch. Ruddy ducks (my favorite) were numerous. Ten waterfowl species total. Bonaparte's Gulls - FOY - about a dozen. Ring-billed gulls were common. Cliff Swallows - FOY, and just 3 birds. Tree swallows are numerous. Grasshopper sparrow was calling from across the road. Vesper was there too. And then there was this little shorebird - a peep - all by itself. I thought it was a semipalmated sandpiper, but after showing a photo to a few people, and getting a couple of different opinions, I'm not sure. If you'd like to see a photo, let me know. I got a really good one. Please be kind and forget that my last job was at Bear River, the shorebird capital of the western hemisphere... Red-necked grebes on Kranz Lake - just south of Albany - and also on Upper Spunk Lake. And just a little farther south, a lark sparrow. Forster's tern numbers are building here on Upper Spunk Lake and two Caspian terns showed up last evening. I thought it was a little early, but, there they were. I noticed quite a few people on the lakes south of Richmond already have their hummingbird feeders out. Do they know something I don't? Or are they still hanging there from last fall? Betsy Beneke Avon, Stearns County ---- Join or Leave mou-net: http://lists.umn.edu/cgi-bin/wa?SUBED1=mou-net Archives: http://lists.umn.edu/archives/mou-net.html
