I started the morning by walking the Baldwin Preserve on Irish Settlement Rd. Going east from the parking lot, on the main trail, I noted that about 90% of the bird singing was coming from the scraggy property just to the north. The FLLT "managed" property was almost silent. I finally heard a HERMIT THRUSH, and later near 6-Mile Creek heard a voluble WINTER WREN and a distant LA. WATERTHRUSH.
I then spent about an hour watching over a wetland near Hammond Hill SF. I heard one call from a VIRGINIA RAIL, and had a pair of WOOD DUCKS swimming about in an abandoned beaver pond there. The highlight was noting a MINK coming to the bank with what looked like a meadow vole, swimming to a small island, and disappearing for 15 minutes. Meanwhile a MUSKRAT swam in and began patrolling the island edges. I was beginning to be concerned for the muskrat as the mink appeared again, but not to worry. Muskrat took out after the mink and chased it down the pond edge. Mink gone, muskrat continued its patrol. Ten minutes later, the mink suddenly erupted from the water, running across a raft of old beaver branches with the muskrat in hot pursuit, teeth clicking. On my way back to the road, I saw a NORTHERN GOSHAWK spiraling slowly overhead doing the "tail-flagging" display, a courtship display where the feathers at the base of the tail are puffed out showing two broad white patches on either side of the bird's fuselage. Steve Fast Brooktondale -- Cayugabirds-L List Info: http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsWELCOME http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsRULES ARCHIVES: 1) http://www.mail-archive.com/cayugabirds-l@cornell.edu/maillist.html 2) http://birdingonthe.net/mailinglists/CAYU.html 3) http://www.surfbirds.com/birdingmail/Group/Cayugabirds Please submit your observations to eBird: http://ebird.org/content/ebird/ --
