Winsor Dam waterfowl continue

Common Goldeneye, Quabbin Park, Nov 6, 2011

Common Goldeneye, Quabbin Park, Nov 6, 2011

Wild Turkey eating crab apples, Quabbin Park, Nov 6, 2011

Wild Turkey eating crab apples, Quabbin Park, Nov 6, 2011

American Crows migrating, Quabbin Park, Nov 6, 2011

I began a chilly morning (around 20 degrees) at Winsor Dam.  The fog was too thick to see anything here at first light so I headed to the Route 9 marsh again and had a few birds there including Hooded Merganser, Wood Duck, Black Duck, Mallard and Canada Goose.  The road around the park continues to be closed to vehicles following the storm of last week.  I went back and forth between the marsh and Winsor Dam a few times and managed a few nice birds.  The number and variety of yesterday afternoon had been replaced by a smaller number of different birds for the most part.  A group of 33 Snow Geese that flew from east to west was a nice addition as were a group of seven Common Goldeneye.  A few Bufflehead remained as did a few Common Loons.  Overall I had a total of sixteen waterfowl species here between yesterday afternoon and this morning (if you count cormorants in that group).  Two goose species, nine duck species, two loons species and two grebe species.  I'm sure I could have gotten even more if I had access to other areas of the reservoir.  Besides the birds mentioned above I had a smattering of other birds of note today including Wild Turkeys feeding in crab apple trees at Quabbin Park and a male Ring necked Pheasant at Covey WMA that somehow had eluded hunters the last few weeks.  As an update regarding the ongoing work to get the area back to normal here a week plus since the major storm, the percentage of people in town without power is now down to around 10%.  I ran into Scott Surner at Winsor Dam and he just got his power back yesterday so we got lucky to get it back Thursday evening.  As I visit more and more areas the amount of damage becomes even more apparent.  It was truly a destructive storm.