I worked several areas along the Scioto River in Columbus today, starting at the Haul Rd quarries and going north through Berliner Park, Long St. dam, Watermark Lake & Marble Cliff, and finishing around Griggs dam.  Water level was high & fast, so waterfowl were hard to find.  Gulls were also unusually scarce; perhaps most of them are still up at Lake Erie.  As in recent days, landbirds carried the morning.  Birds of note included

Waterfowl - meager numbers, with a scattering of Mallards at most sites.  Black Ducks were at the Haul Rd quarries.

Grebe - 1 lonely Pied-billed was at Watermark Lake, the only waterbird on this huge old quarry lake.

Raptors - little other than some Red-tailed hawks.  This was one of the few days that I've not found Cooper's Hawks somewhere here.

Gulls - only small numbers of Ring-bills moving down the river, perhaps 20 all morning (which is very low here).

Hairy Woodpeckers - unusually widespread, with birds at every stop.  This is rather unusual here.

Sapsucker - 1 was calling along the Scioto River below Griggs dam

Brown Creepers - present at every stop, often in good numbers; the high was 6 below the Greenlawn dam in Berliner Park

Robins - the only common bird of the morning, with 30-50 bird flocks at every stop working over honeysuckle berries

Sparrows - Songs & White-throateds at every stop.  Berliner also had a Fox Sparrow and a Swamp Sparrow, along the bikepath near where the old sewage plant has been replaced by a grass field.  The new Impound Lot (south of Haul Rd) has a huge phragmites field that had another Swamp and several Tree Sparrows along with a horde of Song Sparrows.

Blackbirds - another slow day, with only a few Redwings flying south over Berliner Park

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