Dear OKBirders, I spent the day afield yesterday with my avid birder nephews from Michigan. After nabbing their lifer Lewiss Woodpecker at Lake Carl Blackwell on Saturday, we planned to spend yesterday (Monday) in an effort to find them a Greater Prairie-Chicken. We were successful in that regard, thanks to a male perched on a utility pole right along the highway a few miles south of Grainola in Osage County. That was a thrill and a half, and the boys got some terrific photos to commemorate the occasion. The real story of the day, however, was the abundance of raptors. We left Stillwater heading up Rt. 177 toward Ponca City (Noble County), headed east toward Kaw Lake on Rt. 11 (Kay County), and then traveled north on Rt. 18 at Shidler, up to Grainola, down to Foraker, and through the Tallgrass Prairie Preserve to Pawhuska before heading back west on Rt. 60 (Osage County). We completed the loop by peeling off south on Rt. 18 through Fairfax and Ralston (Pawnee County) before hooking up with Noble County again on Rt. 15 heading west. We stopped counting as we headed back south on Rt. 177 in Noble County. In all, we counted along 157 miles, 89 of which were in Osage County. In addition to the aforementioned Prairie-Grouse, 3 Loggerhead Shrikes, and 7 Tundra Swans, the real stars of the day were raptors, and we racked up impressive counts for several of them: Red-tailed Hawk - 149 Rough-legged Hawk - 6 Northern Harrier - 55 Bald Eagle - 31 American Kestrel - 32 Most of these birds were observed in Osage County, and not necessarily on the Preserve. The complete trip list is below, with annotations indicating locations for notable sightings. Good birding, ~Tim OConnell Stillwater 29 December 2014 Roadside surveys - Noble, Kay, Pawnee, and Osage counties, OK Observers: Tim OConnell, Matty Hack, Benjamin Hack Pied-billed Grebe – 3 Double-crested Cormorant – 3 Great Blue Heron – 2 Cackling Goose – 5 Canada Goose – 582 Tundra Swan – 7 (Tallgrass Prairie Preserve) Mallard – 150 Canvasback – 3 Ring-necked Duck – 64 Lesser Scaup - 3 Bufflehead – 1 Common Goldeneye – 49 Hooded Merganser – 1 American Coot – 450 Killdeer – 1 Ring-billed Gull – 1 Bonaparte’s Gull – 6 Greater Prairie-Chicken – 1 (perched atop utility pole south of Grainola, Osage Co.) Bald Eagle – 31 (30 of those in Osage Co.) Northern Harrier – 55 (52 in Osage Co.) Cooper’s Hawk – 1 Red-tailed Hawk – 149 (104 in Osage Co.) Rough-legged Hawk – 6 (Osage Co.) Red-shouldered Hawk – 2 Prairie Falcon – 1 (Osage Co.) American Kestrel – 32 (23 in Osage Co.) Rock Pigeon – 8 Eurasian Collared-Dove – 5 Red-bellied Woodpecker – 3 Northern Flicker – 2 American Crow – 18 Blue Jay – 13 White-breasted Nuthatch – 1 European Starling – 397 Loggerhead Shrike – 3 Northern Mockingbird – 7 Eastern Bluebird – 26 American Robin – 9 Northern Cardinal – 1 American Tree Sparrow – 10 (Osage Co.) Smith’s Longspur – 1 (Osage Co.) Eastern Meadowlark – 35 Red-winged Blackbird – 70,000 (Noble Co., Sooner Lake vicinity) Brewer’s Blackbird – 15 Common Grackle – 3 Brown-headed Cowbird – 1 American Goldfinch – 1 House Sparrow – 3
Posted on: Wed, 31 Dec 2014 04:22:46 +0000
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