Only In January!

Today I birded several areas in Warrick and Gibson counties. I started the morning at a small county park about 2 miles from home. Temperatures were in the lower 60's (that's right! lower 60's at 7:30am.) I had been in the park for about 1 hour when the storm sirens went off and the storms rolled in. Of course, there was very little bird activity at the park with only 9 species and 12 individual birds. Somehow I think they knew what was coming.
As I was headed back to the car before I got my tush wet, the cell phone rang and Steve Gifford wanted to know if I wanted to join he, Lee Sterrenburg and Kathy McClain on a trip around Gibson County.
So, off I went in a driving rain storm.
I hooked up with Kathy, Lee and Steve and we headed to Cane Ridge to look for rarities. What we found were thousands of Snow Geese, Mallards, Pintails, Shovelers and other ducks, geese and water birds. We totaled 36 species at Cane Ridge and the surrounding areas including at least 6 Bald Eagles.
After lunch we headed to the Fransisco Mine area, Wheeling Bottoms and the area surrounding Pakotak National Wildlife Refuge. Again, we were able to view approx. 30 different species including a juvenile Mute Swan.
As you can see by my yearly species count at the upper right hand corner of this page, my 2012 species total thus far is 85 species. 67 of those species have been found in the Gibson County area alone. Cane Ridge, Tern Bar Slough and the surrounding area is becoming a great place to find interesting birds this winter. If you have never been able to view large numbers of waterfowl and other water birds you must take a short trip to western Gibson County. It is absolutely terrific!