Logan Sewage Lagoons

Today I celebrated the end of my written comprehensive exams and took a break from studying for my oral comprehensive exam by joining the Bridgerland Audubon Society on a trip to the Logan Sewage Lagoons and a few other nearby hotspots. We saw a total of 58 species as a group, including several firsts of the year for me such as Willet, Caspian Tern, Marsh Wren, Black-crowned Night-Heron, and Tree Swallow. Ron Ryel alerted us to a Great-tailed Grackle nearby, a very rare bird this far north and one I had been waiting for to remove an annoying sp. from my list. Ron outdid himself by calling us again only a few minutes later to tell us about a male Eurasian Wigeon a bit further down the road, an even rarer bird here (photo above, at bottom left).

After the field trip dissolved around noon, Craig Fosdick, Keith Archibald, and I continued on to the Benson Marina, where we added Osprey and Common Loon to the list for the day. We also found a breeding-plumage Horned Grebe. This is normally a rare bird here, but this was our third of the week! Coincidentally, the same was true of a Hooded Merganser seen at the sewage lagoons - three individuals of a rare species in a very short time. On the way back from Benson, we saw our first Swainson's Hawk of the year fly over, and later a second Osprey.