[Birdtalk] In search of the hooded mergansers

[Connie McManus]

I took the day off from work today and went looking for the hooded
mergansers that was reported to have been in Wellsville. I couldn't find the
pond, but I did get in some good birding.
After being unsuccessful in Wellsville, I headed back to my neck of the
woods -- College Ward.  There is a pond that is close to the road.  I'll
have to get back with you on that road as I don't know the name off-hand.  I
call it Olsen's Pond after a family named Olsen who live there.  They were
kind enough to allow me to walk through their field to get a good view of
the pond.  There were:

Trumpeter swans    4 (2 adults, 2 immatures)
Tundra?  swan          1 adult ----this guy was solitary and had a much
shorter bill than the swans in the group of 4, so I'm ASSUMING  this is a
Tundra.
gadwall               250
green-winged teal  200
buffle heads         10
lesser scaup       200
Northern Shoveler  8 male/female pairs (16 birds)
American Goldfinches   12
House Finches   7
Canadian Goose 1 --- this one was solitary & had the elongated white mark on
his head.  I looked like the goose that someone shared a photo of recently.
Red wing blackbirds   2
Northern Harrier   1

I decided to check out the Benson area and as I traveled through the
farmlands of College Ward, Young Ward, Spring Creek and eventually over to
Cornish and Benson:
Red-tailed hawks   4
Ferruginous hawks  2
Rough legged hawk   1
Northern Harrier  5 (daily total of 6)
Horned Lark   535 (3 different flocks)

At the pond across from the Logan landfill,  I took my life in my hands and
stood along the Valley Hyw just to look at the gulls.  I'm not certain of
what gulls I saw, but there were abount 100 gulls in the pond.  I saw what I
thought was 2 THAYER'S GULLS, but Im not familiar with gulls yet.  Other
birds:

Wilson's Snipe  4
Semipalmated Plover  2

When I finally got to Benson Marina, It was frozen over as was the Benson
Oxbow.  There was one spot in the oxbow pond that had some open water 1
(one) AMERICAN COOT was there.  I wondered if he wasn't stuck in the ice.  I
hope not.

I called it quits at that point and headed home.  When I turned down 3200
West, perched in a tree in the middle of a field was 1 (one) BALD EAGLE
adult.

I had a happy play-hookie-from-work-birding day.

-- 
Connie McManus
Nibley, Cache County, Utah
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