[mou] Buff breasted-Faribault County

[Dennis/Barbara Martin]

Visited Rice Lake in Faribault County today.  This is the lake that Don
Starkweather mentioned in a 8/21 e-mail that had been drawn down.

Found 12 species of shorebirds including Buff-breasted Sandpiper (2), and
American Golden Plover (1) for a total of almost 600 birds.  We don't know
if this is a high total or a normal number for this area or not as no one
else has posted any information on their visits to the lake.  We followed 4
sets of footprints down the west shore to reach a good viewing area for the
very large area of mud and there were enough prints going out from the
access to beat down a pretty easy to follow trail through the vegetation
that is growing up.

We would guess that this lake has been drawn down since early summer, if not
earlier, based on the amount of vegetation that has grown up.  Unless we get
some serious rain it will not come up any time soon, so later fall
shorebirds could be very interesting.

Of special interest was another albinistic shorebird.  We hadn't seen one of
these in 20 years and now two in one week.  This bird was probably a Least
Sandpiper but we do not know for sure.  It seemed to be the size of a Baird
Sandpiper  when it was next to Least and Semipalmated Sandpipers but it
clearly had yellow legs.  It did not seem to be a Pectoral Sandpiper because
of short legs and appearance of being to small for a pectoral.  We are
presuming that the white color made the bird seem larger than it actually
was.  If anybody else sees it we would appreciate your take on it.  If it is
not a Least Sandpiper then we presume that it is a very small Pectoral
Sandpiper.

Dennis and Barbara Martin
dbmartin@skypoint.com