Got a couple good ones today. The listserves had a little gull at Shiawassee National Wildlife Refuge. After work I dragged Lise off her deathbed and we hightailed it over there. We got the gull within about 5 minutes of being there. While looking around we also found a red-necked phalarope and a bank swallow. That brings my total to 304, Lise’s to 289, and the family total to 305. The year is 2/3 over (66.67%) and I am at 86.86% of the goal and Lise is at 82.57%. We are getting there but old man time keeps ticking on. Hopefully we will pick up a few more fall migrants to beef up the list. Then there’s the screech owl that doesn’t seem to want to get counted.
Time marches on.
I monitor the listserves but rarely post to them. In listserve parlance I am a stalker. I have to be pretty sure of myself before I will post something. The little gull was first posted on the listserves as an immature, molting, black-legged kittiwake. A great find and people came running for it. Then closer observation of videos and photos, plus looks through lots of high end optics, revealed it to be a little gull. Both great birds but this was a birding faux pas. In all fairness these two look a lot alike and this was not something I would have had the cajones to call. The folks that thought they twitched a black-legged kittiwake in Michigan had to scratch that and come running back to twitch their little gull in Michigan. Lise and I got good looks at it and agree with the little gull. Twitch-a-oo! Time for some scrapple.
Ed's and Lise's Biggish Years 