Returning to Eagle Bluffs Conservation Area this morning, a friend and I found even less water than was present early this month. But the shallows that remain appealed to wood duck families and we encountered 32 of those attractive waterfowl, primarily along the central channel.
Other sightings of note included a Mississippi kite, a Cooper's hawk, a northern harrier, a pileated woodpecker and a mid-sized falcon (likely a merlin but too distant to identify). A fair number of great egrets, a handful of great blue herons, a pair of red-tailed hawks and a mix of songbirds rounded out the sighting of 21 species. As is almost always the case, red-winged blackbirds were most numerous.
Despite the dramatic loss of wetlands, it was a pleasant and somewhat productive visit from a birding point of view. Though no construction or farming activities were underway, this once fabulous floodplain refuge is in desperate need of a prolonged recovery.
