Yesterday and today (April 5 & 6), there was a Minn Birding Weekends trip to Nobles and Jackson Co's, highlighted by a pair of Great-tailed Grackles in Worthington. This is apparently the first Nobles County record of this species, although its occurrence here is not surprising given that it has been recored in each of the 5 counties which are adjacent to Nobles. A singing male was first found Saturday morning along the shore of Lake Okabena at Ehler's Park on South Shore Dr, and it was joined later by a female a few blocks away to the SE at the south end of Lake Street just before it dead-ends.
Also of note this weekend in these 2 counties: - There were only modest numbers of migrating geese, which presumably have already gone through for the most part: only 1 Ross's Goose was observed (flying NW over Worthington this morning), just a handful of Cackling Geese were seen, a few small Snow Goose flocks and some larger numbers of Gr White-fronted Geese were still passing through. Good numbers of ducks (18 species) were found at several locations with open water. - Greater Yellowlegs at Indian Lake (Nobles Co) and Baird's Sandpipers at the S end of South Heron Lake. - Lone Franklin's Gulls flying north over Worthington and Heron Lake. - Other early migrants were Tree Swallow, Anerican Pipit, and Yellow-headed Blackbird. Kim R Eckert, Duluth http://www.mbwbirds.com ---- Join or Leave mou-net: http://lists.umn.edu/cgi-bin/wa?SUBED1=mou-net Archives: http://lists.umn.edu/archives/mou-net.html
