Last weekend was the 39th annual Salt Lake Birding Weekend which takes place in two western Minnesota counties, Lac Qui Parle and Big Stone. On Saturday, in spite of poor weather predictions over 90 birders found 124 species of birds with an additional six on Friday and seven on Sunday for a total of 137. This year even though we found 16 species of shorebirds they were not found in any quantity compared to other years. American Avocet's and Willet's were only seen of Friday. We didn't find any plovers, other than Killdeer. Terns were also hard to find. We did have good luck with waterfowl including Common Golden Eye and American Black Duck. We also found Snowy and Cattle Egret and White-faced Ibis. A number of birders found Bald Eagles and Great-horned Owls on nests. We found three birds that are usually found later in the year, Black Tern, Least Flycatcher and Black and white Warbler. Looking at past years lists I could only find 3 or 4 times they have been seen this time of year. The most unusual find of all was a Say's Phoebe found by Steve Weston's group. This is the first time it's been found by the Salt Lake birders. A complete list is available, please email me directly. Ken Larson
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