I found a bit of time this afternoon to check out areas along the Blacklick Greenway from Winchester Lakes to Chatterton greenbelt, then dropped over to Pickerington Ponds in the late afternoon to check for waterfowl & raptors.  Although many of the smaller ponds remain frozen, Winchester Lake and most of Pick Ponds had open patches of water, as well as all the waterfowl.  Along the bikepath the berry crop was essentially gone, so landbirds were very scarce.  Notables included:

Dabblers - Mallards, Mallards, Mallards...they were ubiquitous in any open water; Pick Ponds had 600+,nearly all in the WoodDuck-Arrowhead marsh area. To be fair, there were also 30+ Black Ducks and 10 Gadwall, but you had to search for them.

Divers - a big fat 0, unless you count the lone Hooded Merganser at Arrowhead marsh.

Other waterfowl - 25+ Coots at Mallard marsh, but no grebes anywhere (which is quite different from along the Scioto now).

Raptors - Gene Stauffer's eagle had skipped out from Pick Ponds by the time I reached them, but there were a few Red-tails there.

Owls - despite being around PickPonds for an hour near sunset, I had no Short-eared Owls.  I didn't check the field areas near Pintail Marsh or along Schoolhouse Road, however.

Brown Creepers - 1 at Chatterton greenbelt and another 2 along the Meadowlark Trail at Pick Ponds were notable

Kinglet - only 1 Golden-crowned was out, at Chatterton Greenbelt.

Blackbirds - a flock of 150+ flew over Wood Duck pond headed W; they appeared to be mostly Redwings.  The big field north of Winchester Lakes that had held a huge flock of Rusties 2 weeks ago was quiet today.

Sparrows - small #s of Song & Tree were all along the bikepath and at Pick Ponds. Winchester Lakes had a Swamp Sparrow, and the feeder at Wood Duck Pond (in Pick Ponds) had 1 White-crowned.  White-throated, however, were mostly gone from all this habitat, probably due to the berry crash.

______________________________________________________________________

Ohio-birds mailing list, a service of the Ohio Ornithological Society.
Our thanks to Miami University for hosting this mailing list.
Additional discussions can be found in our forums, at www.ohiobirds.org/forum/.

You can join or leave the list, or change your options, at:
http://listserv.muohio.edu/scripts/wa.exe?LIST=OHIO-BIRDS
Send questions or comments about the list to: [log in to unmask]