Friday, March 31, 2006

Birding around the pretty lake

When I go on walks around the lake at work, I see a lot of cool stuff, other than geese who are out to get me. The other day we saw what looked like a couple of male mallards, except they had white breasts, which mallards don't. They were Northern Shovelers. I wish I had had some binoculars so I could have gotten a better look at their beaks. Yesterday I saw a Double-crested Cormorant airing himself out, like in that photo. They're generally found in more coastal regions, so perhaps he was migrating? I'm also pretty sure I've seen Ruddy ducks in their winter plumage. Whatever I saw had a big white cheek patch like that and was a diver, and I didn't see anything else in the bird book that fit both of those descriptions. I should get a second pair of binocs to bring in here that I can bring with me on walks. I don't go too many other places where I get a chance to see water birds, so its a nice change.
I saw a birding blog listed under the blogger Blogs of Note that I'll have to check occasionally.

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