Following up on the recently discovered presence of Bell's vireos in an undeveloped industrial lot next to the Xcel power plant, I had a dismaying revelation last week. I arrived to find the greenbelt border of trees and bushes almost totally razed, and the adjacent flats, which had been thickly overgrown with scrub plants and studded with large puddles, was now plowed over with sand and dirt. Only one of the several Spotted Sandpipers made its presence known, though the Kildeer still seemed to be occupying the flat industrial roof on the next lot. The Bell's Vireos were nowhere in sight, and the noise of the equipment made it impossible to listen for them.
However, I've returned a few times since, when construction preparations were at a standstill. All 3 times I've detected the Bell's voice in the grassy tree and shrub-line that rings the holding pond on the Xcel plant property next door. Perhaps that was their living area all along. Perhaps nesting was not interrupted. We also checked on the old power plant grounds, and found a pair of BROWN Thrashers, the male teed up and singing, the female carrying food. Linda Whyte ---- Join or Leave mou-net: http://lists.umn.edu/cgi-bin/wa?SUBED1=mou-net Archives: http://lists.umn.edu/archives/mou-net.html