Minnesota Statewide RBA

Previous reports: August 3 10 13 25 , September 10 17 23 , October 1 8 15 .
Other Hotlines: Minnesota Duluth/North Shore
-RBA
*Minnesota
*Minnesota Statewide
*October 23, 1997
*MNST9810.23

-Birds mentioned
-Transcript

Hotline: Minnesota Statewide
Date: October 23, 1997
Sponsor: Minnesota Ornithologists' Union (MOU)
Reports: (612) 780-8890
Compiler: Anthony Hertzel
Transcriber: Anthony Hertzel
Re-transcriber: David Cahlander (dac@skypoint.com)

This is the Minnesota birding report for Friday October 23rd sponsored by the Minnesota Ornithologists' Union.

Audrey Evers of Hoyt Lakes, St. Louis County identified a BRAMBLING at her feeder on October 22nd. This Eurasian finch would be Minnesota's fourth state record. Please call Audrey before visiting.

Peder Svingen found a RED PHALAROPE on October 23rd at the Crookston sewege ponds in Polk County. Check the fartherst northwest pond, which is situated down a hill and near the river there.

On October 19th, Peder Svingen and Karl Bardon found three PACIFIC LOONS on Lake Superior at the public access near 12th Street on Park Point in Duluth. On the 17th a TOWNSEND'S SOLITAIRE was found in west Duluth at the end of Peary Street. For additional information on these and other birds in the Duluth area, call the Duluth birding report at 218-525-5952.

A second TOWNSEND'S SOLITAIRE was reported October 19th by Bill Carlson about 20 miles west of St. Cloud in Stearns County. Go west of state highway 23 to highway 22. Turn south and go to Edgerton. Go west to Elk View Drive and turn north. The bird was seen feeding on juniper berries at 20792 Elk View Drive.

A LESSER BLACK-BACKED GULL was found by Paul Budde on Lake Calhoun in Minneapolis on October 21st.

A few interesting migration counts have been reported over the past week. On Tuesday October 20th, Tony Hertzel counted 1688 COMMON LOONS on Lake Mille Lacs in the central part of the state. As far as I know, this is the single largest count of loons on any one lake at any one time in the state of Minnesota. Just as interesting was the total of 230 BLACK SCOTERS counted from the lake access near the Carlsona Beach Club on the northeastern part of the lake. This is a record count of Black Scoters by nearly 200 individuals. Other interesting species recorded on this weekly census included a PACIFIC LOON, this at Wigwam Bay on the west side of the lake, 1014 BONAPARTE'S GULL, two very late CASPIAN TERNS, and 125 BOHEMIAN WAXWINGS at the end of Lakeside Drive. An equally impressive COMMON LOON total of 1599 was reported by Peder Svingen and Karen Sussman on their weekly census of Lake Winnibigoshish on October 21st. They also report a total 1226 BONAPARTE'S GULL. And on October 22nd, a conservative estimate of 25,000 blackbirds, most of them RUSTY BLACKBIRD, was seen in Wilkin County migrating over the prairies west of Rothsay.

A BLACK-BACKED WOODPECKER was found by Peter Neubeck on October 18th along U.S. highway 169 just south of Ely in St. Louis County. The bird was seen about a tenth of a mile north of township road 404. In Rochester, Olmsted County, a CAROLINA WREN was seen again at Leslie Kotkke's feeder on October 22nd. Please call Leslie before visiting. And a single SURF SCOTER was seen on Lake Buffalo in Wright County on October 16th.

For information on joining our state wide bird organization write the MOU at

10 Church Street SE University of Minnesota Minneapolis MN, 55455

or e-mail us at MOUMembers@aol.com. The next scheduled update of this tape is Thursday October 29th.

Send your rare and unusual Minnesota sightings to our electronic hotline: MnRBA@linux.winona.msus.edu. To learn more, send a message (the message being these two words: info end) to mnrba-request@linux.winona.msus.edu.




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