[mou] Migration at Lac Qui Parle (long)

[JELLISBIRD at aol.com]

Went west today (Saturday) to Lac Qui Parle, via Swift County and up to 
Ortonville. Again there are many thousands of Geese and a good smattering of ducks 
in the open water areas and many flocks of geese and ducks going out to the 
surrounding fields to feed. The largest numbers are Canadas, all sizes, 
including lots of Cackling Canadas, (probably up to many hundreds.) I saw a smaller 
Canada (not a Cackling) that had leucistic plumage-everything was very pale but 
markings were distinct. The bird took off with others to go feed and it looked 
simply ghostly by contrast with other Canadas. There were several thousand 
Snow Geese (white and blue phases) and at least a few Ross's Geese in the area. 
There were hundreds up to 2000+ of Greater White Fronted Geese. Ducks were; 
mallards, hooded and common mergs, gadwell, both scaup,  (few)redheads, 
(few)canvasbacks, (few)gw teal, pintails, ring-necked ducks, coot, (few)ruddy ducks, 
(few)c. goldeneye and bufflehead. Saw a few Eagles, male Harriers, one 
Rough-legged Hawk, many Am. Kestrel and several Red-Tails. There was also a GB Heron 
and a good number of RWBlackbirds with a spattering of other blackbirds and a 
couple of Grackles. Quite a few Meadowlarks were on back roads intermittantly 
and there were thousands of H. Larks in groups up to a hundred. Only a few 
flocks were mixed with Snow Buntings and I saw no Longspurs. I didn't make it out 
to Brownsville or Mud Lake so I don't know if there is open water there.
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