We drove around Crex Saturday afternoon and saw about the same mix and numbers of raptors that Jan and John did. Also, we saw, and heard, a few hundred Sandhill Cranes that had come in to roost by the Refuge Extension Flowage. It was getting dark by then and hard to see, but definitely down from the thousand plus we saw last time in mid-Oct. We were skunked on Short-eared Owls by the pump house, but did see one, first in the road, then flying around, at about the same spot as last time, along Main Dike Rd west of West Refuge Rd intersection.
Earlier, on the way to I-35 at Wyoming, we cut through the north end of Carlos Avery (enter off CR17 in NW corner /left at the Y, Wyoming Trail/out via Viking Drive) and saw four Rough-legged Hawks there, all before Pool 10 Rd intersection. We also saw another one before that along CR22 about a quarter mile west of MN65. Erika Sitz Ramsey, north Anoka County > On Sunday November 18th we stopped at Crex Meadows and drove the dike > roads around Phantom Lake and the Wildlife Refuge for about one and > one-half hours from 10-11:30. We counted 35 Rough-legged Hawks (many > actively hunting), 3 Bald Eagles, 3 Northern Harriers and one Red-tailed > Hawk. Also 3 Sandhill Cranes (flying), hundreds of Mallards and a > zillion Canada Geese, mostly at the park in Grantsburg. It was cloudy, > in the mid-30's and with a good breeze. The shallow pools were all > frozen but a few deeper pools still had some open water. Lots of deer > hunters but they did not seem to bother the raptors. > > Jan and John Green > > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://moumn.org/pipermail/mou-net_moumn.org/attachments/20071119/517766c7/attachment.html
