With great early waterfowl being reported from lakes & reservoirs north and west of Columbus, I visited a few of the quarries along the Scioto River and Dublin Rd  hoping for some waterfowl action.  They were surprisingly quiet, with little in the way of interesting waterbirds other than a few Pied-billed Grebes.  Apparently, the rafts of waterfowl either haven't reached this far south yet, or they are by-passing the urban sprawl of Columbus.

The other point of the trip was to check the Shrum Indian Mound Quarry along McKinley Ave to look for roosting blackbirds and to estimate the heron rookery nest # from this past season (50+ nests was what I could count).  The blackbirds were virtually absent, with only a few grackles present, which parallels my recent experience at the Cremeans Water Plant roost in NE Columbus.  I've  checkied the Cremeans roost twice in the past week and had nothing.  Either the big flocks of blackbirds are still on their way to Columbus, or they're now avoiding the city (which seems unlikely).  Has anyone seen any big blackbird or grackle congegations around Columbus in the past 2 weeks?

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