May13 7:15 - 11:30am Lake Byllesby To say that birding at Byllesby lately has been slow is an understatement. Thus, I arrived early knowing that last night's big blow from the south would deliver shorebirds to Byllesby. I wasn't disappointed. The winds were very strong for the first hour and it was rather chaotic trying to get on the swirling masses of birds which seem to land only for brief moments. By 9:00am the winds moderated greatly making viewing much more comfortable. In all, there at least 1500 birds present, but counting was all species was impossible. Of 18 shorebird species, some interesting ones included:
Hudsonian Godwit - 2 (they stayed for about 5 minutes). Willet - 8 Sanderling - 2 Stilt Sp - 40 Both dowitchers White-rumped Sp - several Bairds' Sp - several Wilson's Phalarope - 30 Dunlin - several Least Sp - ~1000 Semipalmated Plover - ~ 300 (nope, no Piping) Also Common Tern - 8 Forester's Tern - 10 Franklin's Gull - 40 Black Tern - 15 (flock flyover - getting to be a tough bird in Dakota in recent years) ~1500 swallows of all species on the big lake and also roosting/feeding on the mudflats - great show. Jim Mattsson Eagan ---- Join or Leave mou-net:http://lists.umn.edu/cgi-bin/wa?SUBED1=mou-net Archives:http://lists.umn.edu/archives/mou-net.html
