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Under Construction

I have been away from my blog for quite awhile. Life happens.
I have not been birding much since the birdathon in mid May. Again, life happens. It's been a great run, but I think I will have to drop out of the chase and just casually add species from here on out. We'll see what happens.

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Lake Barber and Metro additions.

Wednesday January 3 I worked a split shift today at Metro. Two Black Vultures flew over my head near Colerain Ave. and I-74 as I was headed to the end of the line. After my morning work, I had some time so I went to Lake Barber Park (near Evan's Landscaping off Roundbottom Rd. in Newtown). Five Long-tailed Ducks were reported here on the Cincinnati CBC. When I arrived, I found that most of the eastern lake was frozen over and only a lone Mute Swan standing on the ice. I walked back to the car and grabbed the scope, and decided to find the western lake that I saw on the map. As I walked I added White-breasted Nuthatch. When I arrived at the western lake, I found some open water and flushed a group of Mallards out toward the other distant ducks and geese. Fifteen Tundra Swans stood on the ice. With my scope I scanned the raft of ducks. Among Canada Geese and Mallards were Redheads, Bufflehead, Common Goldeneye, Gadwall, Northern Shoveler, Greater and Lesser Scaup, Ruddy Ducks and A...

Day Two - January 2, 2018

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Hooded Mergs and Rumors of Long-tailed Ducks

When I arrived at Lodge Pond at Fernald Preserve early this afternoon, another birder was standing there photographing ducks, geese and swans. There was a wide variety of ducks, a few geese and several Mute Swans. I quickly found a pair of Hooded Mergansers, a waterfowl species that has eluded me all month. Had I been five minutes too late, I would have missed them because after a few ducks went airborne, I couldn't relocate the mergansers. After a brief celebration for finally getting these birds, the other birder informed me that he had 3 Long-tailed Ducks about an hour prior at the Lost Bridge gravel pits. So instead of walking the path around Lodge Pond as originally planned to look for some much needed icterids, I decided to go on this chase. I feared that he had misidentified the pintails there. When I arrived at Lost Bridge, the numbers of geese and ducks were way down from previously. We have had rising temperatures and with that thawing ice and more places with open wate...