<div dir="ltr">I reported earlier the results of the field trip on Sunday, but I have a few more observations. We did not find any Brewer's Blackbirds, at the couple of places we checked. Brewer's have excellent site fidelity, but were not at a couple of locations where I have found them for years. I am going to check a few more locations that I find them. This appears to be a nadir year for Dickcissels. Some years they are everywhere, this year there were few. The Shrike nest was a surprise and shows that few birders check out the Empire Substation these days. I remember Shrikes nesting there perhaps 10 or 15 years ago, until the landowner removed the tree they were using. <div><br></div><div>A couple of days ago I observed a mother Mallard and her brood of three or four wandering along the center highway barrier on I-35E in Mendota Heights. There was nothing that I could see to rescue them. The next day I looked for flattened ducks, but found none.</div><div><br></div><div>We have seen two mixed broods of woodies and hoodies on our lake. A couple of days ago, I saw one of the Wood Duck broods that after a couple of weeks still had a least one Hooded Merganser duckling in the mix. Usually they are off on their own by now. I hope to take a canoe out and see how many broods I can see. Hooded Mergansers are still flying into my Wood Duck boxes. We just had 17 Hooded Merganser young released on our lake. I want to see how they are doing.</div><div><br></div><div>Neighbors reported about a week ago that they counted 40+ bats leaving their bat house about the size of a wood duck box. Yesterday they counted about 80 and figured that the next generation was already flying. They fertilize their planters by a rotation that includes time beneath the bat house. </div><div><br></div><div><div><div class="gmail_signature"><div>Steve Weston</div>
<div>On Quigley Lake in Eagan, MN</div>
<div><a href="mailto:sweston2@comcast.net" target="_blank">sweston2@comcast.net</a></div></div></div>
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