Lake Carasaljo | Jackson Liberty HS 2/8--Wood Duck, Horned Lark

Wood Duck

I circumambulated Lake Unpronounceable this morning. One advantage to having a large lake half-frozen is that it concentrates the waterfowl. Of course, most of the waterfowl is comprised of uninteresting Canada Geese, but floating in and out of all those jammed up geese I found my first Wood Ducks of the year, as well as Ring-neck Ducks, Hooded Mergansers, Lesser Scaup, Green-winged Teal, a hen Canvasback and even a couple of big drake Common Mergansers, a first for me at that site and notable to me because the only other example of the species I've seen in county this year was a look at a distant hen on Manahawkin Lake last month.  

Along the areas where the water is frozen, you can concentrate on finding land birds which were comparatively abundant. In all, 3.3 miles yielded 36 species, a veritable bonanza of winter birds for me. 

Canada Goose  200
Mute Swan  2
Wood Duck  2
Mallard  17
Green-winged Teal  3     Drakes
Canvasback  1     
Ring-necked Duck  14
Lesser Scaup  4
Bufflehead  1
Hooded Merganser  14
Common Merganser  2
Mourning Dove  3
Ring-billed Gull  100
American Herring Gull  5
Great Blue Heron  1
Bald Eagle  1
Red-bellied Woodpecker  4
Downy Woodpecker  1
Blue Jay  8
Carolina Chickadee  2
Tufted Titmouse  1
White-breasted Nuthatch  2
Brown Creeper  1
Carolina Wren  5
European Starling  4
Northern Mockingbird  3
American Robin  20
House Sparrow  5
House Finch  1     Heard
Dark-eyed Junco  15
White-throated Sparrow  6
Song Sparrow  8
Red-winged Blackbird  1
Common Grackle  3
Pine Warbler  1     Ground feeding with juncos
Northern Cardinal  4

Then, for the third time this year, I drove over to Jackson Liberty HS to scan the soccer fields. Finally, I found my Horned Larks for the year. As always, it is a wonderment that these fields, and not others all around, attract Horned Larks in large numbers each year. I counted 36 today, which explodes the eBird filter, but I have counted twice that number in the past. Unfortunately, my camera battery died up at the lake when I was trying to document the Canvasback, so I couldn't take any photos of the larks, but then, I have never been able to get a satisfactory picture of those very active birds on those fields. They take off en masse, then settle down just out of camera range and blend in with the brown grass. Walk the field toward them and see previous sentence. 

Common Mergansers

Hooded Mergansers