After a dusting of snow overnight I had hopes that the precipitation that came in overnight might have put down some migrant waterfowl (and perhaps others) so I headed to Winsor Dam at first light and started scanning the water. I came across three Long tailed Ducks right away as well as a smattering of other species including dozens of birds that were just too far away to ID. I decided to leave the dam and head to Gate 5 and see if I could get a better look at some of the birds from there. I made the walk down to the water as quick as I could and started scanning and immediately started coming across noteworthy birds with many highlights including my highest count ever in the county for Horned Grebes with an amazing 114 individuals, blowing away my previous high count of 26 that I set back in December 2009. I also had at least eight Red necked Grebes, two Ruddy Ducks, two White winged Scoters and 62 Long tailed Ducks as well as other more common species. After about an hour at gate 5 I returned to Winsor Dam and could view some of the species from there although the numbers and diversity continued to drop as the day brightened up a bit and the precipitation lifted.
I tried a few other nearby areas for waterfowl and a small lake in Ware produced another ten Horned Grebes and four Red necked Grebes. A really spectacular day for both species and not one I'm likely to repeat again. I ended the morning with an impressive 18 species of waterfowl.
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