Paul Gardner and I, afflicted with cabin fever but leery of the weather, decided to bird near home on this very wet last real day of autumn. Paul's car leaks, so we didn't worry about getting the carpet wet, as it was marshy with water already. "Just say Noah to rugs" was the theme, and our interesting bird finds consisted almost entirely of hyenas' prey rather than lions'. Perhaps our best leonine find was Paul's 43 black vultures along Little Pine Rd near Conkle's Hollow in Hocking Co. We visited many other spots, but beyond that highlights involved refinding birds discovered earlier by others: the northern shrike and Am. white pelican at Deer Creek SP (the pelican was circling as if nervously, perhaps wondering if he'd loafed around too long), and at the Spencer Rd pond mentioned earlier by Eric Reiner, exactly the same geese he reported: besides Canadas, four blue-morph snows, one young white-morph snow, and an astonishing six Ross's geese (two seemingly first-year birds and four adults). This is a state record for Ross's, as far as I know, but we hear white geese are recovering in numbers on the Arctic breeding grounds. And it coincides with a delayed movement of white geese through the state over the past couple of weeks. If you go to see these birds, please park safely and do not inconvenience local folks. Oh yes, does anyone know the origin of this place's name as the "Brooks Nature Club Pond"? Bill Whan Columbus ______________________________________________________________________ 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]