I finished out the third week of February enjoying a warm day that eventually topped off with temps in the low 50's with abundant sunshine. I started and ended my day at Winsor Dam with the highlight at dawn being a large gathering of gulls numbering in the the hundreds with almost all that could be identified being Ring billed Gulls. I was unable to pick out anything unusual but it was worth the look nonetheless. I then headed over to Hadley with stops at the Honey Pot and various points along the river and then to Amherst mainly looking for waterfowl and finding a few large groups of Canada Geese but nothing rare among them. One of the fields in Hadley produced at least two American Pipits flying over and bringing me to my goal to get to a hundred species for the month in Hampshire County (with a week still left to go and more southerly winds likely to bring in a few other new species before the month ends).
Yesterday was a very cold day with lows around ten and highs that never got above freezing with a breeze. I reluctantly got out of bed and decided to try my luck back at Winsor Dam once again looking for unusual gulls. Mary was there when I arrived and thankfully the winds were light at the time but it was still damn cold. The gulls were around in numbers but the vast majority never came in close to try to pick out something unusual among them. I then tried a few areas along the Swift River but didn't mind too much and some areas that had been productive had frozen back up. At least it was sunny for most of the day.
On Saturday morning I made my way over to a very cold Winsor Dam before sunrise in the hopes of possibly finding some unusual waterfowl or gulls. There was not much for waterfowl but I noticed a bunch of gulls around and eventually a large group settled close enough on the ice to ID them to species. I scanned through the flock and found mainly Ring billed Gulls with a few Herring Gulls and then noticed a dark mantled gull in the group...a Lesser Black backed Gull. I got some good looks through the scope but my attempts to get digiscoped photos in the poor light were less than successful. The forecast called for snow showers and squalls later in the day but I knew I had the morning to enjoy some sunny weather. I headed over to Silvio Conte NWR-Fort River with my main target being an early arriving Eastern Meadowlark. As I was walking along the road I heard one singing and then eventually had at least six individuals around...a good count for mid February. I then checked a few fields in Hadley and Amherst as well as UMASS. No luck finding anything too unusual but there were quite a few geese around. With the Lesser Black backed Gull and the Eastern Meadowlarks I added species #98 and #99 for February in the county and broke my previous best February set last year.
After a long shift at work I got out on Friday morning and checked several spots on my way home without finding anything too noteworthy. With all the warm weather on the previous day and windy conditions a lot of water bodies had lost their ice so I was hopeful some waterfowl would be moving in. After I was back home I got some texts and messages from a few people telling me about a juvenile Greater White fronted Goose at the UMASS campus pond. With that sighting and an earlier report of a male American Wigeon there I decided to head that way around midday and quickly got both species (new for the year and the month for me). Before I headed back home I got a message about some Lesser Scaup on a small farm in Hadley. As the spot was on my way home I had to make a quick stop and quickly found five on the pond...a really unusual spot for the species.
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