Stopped by the causeway at the south end of Cobbossee today. Draw down is well underway, with lots of exposed mud flats in Dismal Swamp.
Nothing extraordinary, but big numbers of waterfowl, and no sign of the swan I saw Saturday. (We saw that by boat, about 2 miles north of the causeway in a part of the lake with no good shore access.)
A mostly complete list, in rough order of abundance:
Common merganser—probably feasting on all the fish that have been flushed off the now-exposed mud flats.
Canada Geese—at least two size classes in distinct and separate flocks. I’ll leave the subspecies ID to those who know what they are talking about.
Mallard
Bufflehead (a first for me at this site)
Black Duck
Hooded merganser
Crow
Snipe (pair)
Great Blue Heron (single)
Bald eagle (single—pushing the ducks around to make them a lot more visible)
Also many gulls, but too far away for me to ID.
Conspicuously absent were coots that were there in numbers last week, and common goldeneye, which were abundant on Saturday. Also did not see GW teal or ringnecks, although there were some good-sized groups of assorted ducks too far away for me to ID in the relatively heavy rain.
There was a big flock of birds that had at least some Canada Geese and some gulls out near the south end of Sheep Island. There may have been some light geese mixed in with them, or perhaps it was bad visibility, old eyes and wishful thinking misinterpreting gulls and geese sitting close together.
Jeff Reardon
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