Mountain Bluebird at Middle Creek WMA

     On Wednesday and Thursday of this week a Mountain Bluebird was found and seen by many at Middle Creek WMA. Our own Nick Pulcinella and Holly Merker were able to locate the bird and add it to their state list. Unfortunately Sharon and I arrived around 2PM on Thursday afternoon and spent 4 1/2 hours there searching for the bluebird but only found Eastern Bluebirds. However the waterfowl and other birds were well represented. We were able to find an amazing 22 species of waterfowl located throughout the refuge. Highlights were 5000  Snow Geese, 4 White-winged Scoters, 2 Long-tailed Ducks, Wood Ducks, Mute Swan, Northern Pintail, 1 Canvasback, 1 Redhead, 100 Ring-necked Ducks, both Scaups and Common and Hooded Mergansers. Also reported was a Red-breasted Merganser but we didn't find that. A Horned Grebe was present on the small pond near tour stop #1.
      It was now getting late in the evening and we were at tour stop #3 watching a Northern Harrier flying over the fields when Sharon asked what are those two other hawks. I took a look and was surprised to see a Short-eared Owl hunting over the field. Then I saw the other supposed hawk and I was shocked to see it was a Sandhill Crane flying into and landing in the pond. What a nice surprise.

Short-eared Owl (click to enlarge photos)

     Other birds that we saw were 65 Wilson's Snipe, several Ring-necked Pheasants and 1 Wild Turkey. Horned Larks were in the corn stubble, as were a few Eastern Meadowlarks.

Ring-necked Pheasant

     Although we missed the Mountain Bluebird, the bad weather proved once again to be an excellent birding day.