I was in the Magee Marsh/ Ottawa NWR this past weekend.  If there is any accessible habitat, I was unable to find it.  The estuary of Crane Creek was high with no exposed mud.  There were a lot of terns flying around.  There was no habitat in any of the accessible impoundments at Ottawa and no habitat at Metzger either.  I did see 2 Baird's sandpipers and a willet on the wildlife beach at Magee Marsh on Sunday and a single Baird's on Monday.  There were a handful of shorebirds at the extreme north end of the Adam Grimm area off Krause Road, but nothing unusual.  I was hoping for long-billed dowitchers somewhere up there and saw none.  Thank goodness the warblers and insects were good around there.  I had a prairie warbler and northern parula on the wildlife beach Sunday.  For those interested in insects, there was a striped saddlebags and several hundred black saddlebags on the wildlife beach Sunday and several southern dogface butterflies along the trail running north to the lake at Ottawa.  The striped saddlebags and dogface are both rarities in Ohio.
 
The thing that saddens me most is remembering the almost annual flocks of long-billed dowitchers that used to stage at Metzger.  Now I look out and see Phragmites spreading through the marsh.  What areas aren't densely vegetated have high water.  Hopefully the long-billed dowitchers are staging somewhere in the marshes.
 
John Pogacnik
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