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January 2007

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Rob Thorn <[log in to unmask]>
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Wed, 24 Jan 2007 22:03:14 -0500
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I spent a bit of time this morning visiting several sites on one of my OBBA territories, just to get a feel for what winters out there.  Grant's Run is a small stream in Grove City (southwest suburb of Columbus, DeLorme p. 68 B1) that runs through farmland and subdivisions to reach the Scioto River.  Notable along its length are three different wooded parkland areas, as well as the nearby major trash dump for Columbus ( a huge 200 acre affair nicknamed Mt. Trashmore).  The wooded parkland areas (Fryar Park, Indian Run Greenbelt, and Hibbs Rd.) all had the expected forest birds, and the first two also had Cooper's Hawks stalking the forest flocks.  More interesting were a few other observations:

1. Columbus commuters - large flocks of crows and gulls were flying out of south Columbus, headed for the trash dump.  It would appear that many of the crows from the renascent south Columbus roost now come here for breakfast, which would partly explain why we don't see the long strings of them flying through central & northern Columbus anymore.  The farmlands in northern Franklin & southern Delaware Counties that they formerly visited are now mostly subdivisions, so they've opted for the more open reaches of southern Franklin & northern Pickaway Counties.  The gulls (mostly Ring-billed, but with a few Herring) are probably coming off roosts along the Scioto south of downtown, and explains why numbers there have ben rather low this winter.

2. Fruit-eaters - Robins, Starlings, & House Finches were missing from most of the parklands I visited, but were numerous & conspicuous around fruiting trees in the subdivisions.  If I ever had any doubts about how these birds are surviving cold snaps here, they were allayed this morning.  It also makes me wonder if I wasn't glibly overlooking rarities that might have been lurking around these same landscaped areas.  Many of our sought-after winter birds - bluebirds, thrushes, mimids, solitaires, odd finches - are all fruit eaters in winter.

3. The once & future park - Hibbs Road is actually listed on the DeLorme page and has little to recommend it except for the fact that it borders a large swath of bottomland owned by Grove City and potentially slated for a park.  Right now the area consists of a huge field bordered by narrow riparian strips along Grant Run and the Scioto River.  It was infested with sparrows this morning (Song, White-throat, Tree, & Swamp), and looks very promising for field birds.  But fallow farm fields are pretty common hereabouts, and the better future for this area might lay in  mitigation wetlands.  Sitting at the confluence of Grant Run & the Scioto, the area looks ideal for sloughs.  Imagine a set of marshy & swampy wetlands stretching along the river here, re-creating a bit of the old Scioto bottomlands that stretched all the way from Columbus down to Chillicothe.  It was the second largest wetland complex in pre-settlement Ohio (after the Black Swamp), and is now virtually gone excep
 t for a few tiny fragments.  The area is still used as a corridor for herons and migrating waterfowl (there were even some Great Blues & ducks around this morning), so it's not much of a stretch to believe that "if we build it, they will come."


Rob Thorn
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EarthLink Revolves Around You.

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