FEB. 04, 2008 - Metro Parks Serving Summit County Ohio & Erie Canal Towpath Trail from the Mustill Store on North St. north to Bruegger's Bagels parking lot on Merriman Rd.
  TIME: 7:00am-10:55am TEMP.: 33-41 COND.: Cloudy & cold. FT. MI.: 4.0
  OBS.: Douglas W. Vogus
  I. MAMMALS: 2 SPECIES.
  1. Eastern Gray Squirrel - 3
  2. Red Squirrel - 1
  II. BIRDS: 33 SPECIES.
  (NOTE: ?= bird was seen but not sexed; *= bird was heard calling but not seen)
  1. Canada Goose - 115
  2. American Black Duck - 14 (7m,7f - Little Cuyahoga River)
  3. Mallard - 6 (3m,3f)
  4. Great Blue Heron - 4
  5. Sharp-shinned Hawk - 1 (juv. f)
  6. Red-tailed Hawk - 2
  7. Merlin - 1 (f or juv.)
  8. Ring-billed Gull - 2
  9. Mourning Dove - 4
  10. Barred Owl - 1
  11. Belted Kingfisher - 1 (?)
  12. Red-bellied Woodpecker - 6 (1m,1f,1?,3*)
  13. Downy Woodpecker - 8 (1m,1f,3?,3*)
  14. Hairy Woodpecker - 5 (*)
  15. Northern Flicker - 2 (m)
  16. Pileated Woodpecker - 1 (m)
  17. Blue Jay - 26
  18. American Crow - 631
  19. Black-capped Chickadee - 23
  20. Tufted Titmouse - 8
  21. White-breasted Nuthatch - 6 (2m,4*)
  22. Carolina Wren - 9
  23. Eastern Bluebird - 6 (5m,1f)
  24. American Robin - 35
  25. European Starling - 68
  26. American Tree Sparrow - 2
  27. Song Sparrow - 5
  28. White-throated Sparrow - 26
  29. Dark-eyed Junco - 4 (1m,2f,1*)
  30. Northern Cardinal - 51 (24m,11f,16*)
  31. House Finch - 7 (4m,1f,2?)
  32. American Goldfinch - 66
  33. House Sparrow - 31
  FIELD NOTES: From 7:15am to 7:40am just north of the Mustill Store I had 623 American Crows coming off roost. All flocks were coming west of the Towpath and were heading east, just north of downtown Akron. The flocks went in succession as follows: 46,122,104,67,74,
  28,53,23,19,21,19,10,16 and finally the last flock of 21 birds. The rest of my hike totalled only 8 more crows.
     The Merlin was either a female or juvenile bird perched in the large cottonwood and sycamore grove in the southwest corner of Valley View Golf Course near where the Little Cuyahoga River meets the main Cuyahoga River. The bird was divebombing 4 crows in what seemed like playful aerial attacks. One at a time, each crow would fly into the Merlin's "space" which would trigger a dogfight of Merlin chasing crow. After about 5 minutes of this the Merlin left the crows on a fast straight flight and I thought I was going to witness it snagging a small bird but instead it divebombed the juvenile sharpie that had flown into one of the cottonwoods on the golf course. The Merlin then went back to chasing crows and the sharpie stayed perched for over 20 minutes, seemingly reluctant to fly for fear of attack. Eventually one crow flew over to the sharpie and started to walk its way down to the hawk making it fly and now the crow was dogfighting the sharpie. Chasing and landing four
 times before the sharpie had enough of this "play" and flew across the Cuyahoga and disappeared into a spruce.
  Douglas W. Vogus - Akron, Ohio.


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