The weather was nice. The sun was even shining. All in all, it was a good weekend. I spent a good portion of the weekend driving a couple places to bird.
On Saturday (1/5), I headed a couple hours south to visit Goose Pond. I knew there would be a lot of Snow and Greater White-fronted Geese in the area in addition to the usual numbers of Sandhill Crane. I arrived at sunrise and began driving the area. There are still a number of duck hunters in the area. (When does this season end?) A lot of the various units were occupied with hunters. That wasn't really my problem though. My problem was that I was not finding much to photograph. What I did see was pretty distant and, generally, uncooperative. I spent a half day in the area and then headed home.
Sunday (1/6), determined to get some more shots, I headed a couple hours north to Salamonie Reservoir. The spillway there is known for attracting Bald Eagle in the winter. When I arrived, I found that the water was high and very muddy. We've had a lot of warm weather and rain this winter. The water conditions meant that there were very few eagles fishing there. I counted 4 (3 adult and 1 imm.) Bald Eagles at the spillway. A trip down the road to the town of Lagro yielded 6 more. After several hours in the area, I headed home and stopped in Fishers to check some retention ponds where American Wigeon had been spotted the day before. No luck on the ducks, but I did have a pair of Mute Swan. I'll take what I can get.
Thanks for reading,
Mike
Comments