Well, Sheryl raised some excellent questions. The roads are clean of snow and ice, but they are a little sloppy and wet. So your car will be dirty when you leave. The ice is gone for the most part so the birds are spread out a bit, but they are everywhere. I can't give many first hand sightings, as it is Junior Duck Stamp Season and most of the ducks I see in March are on 9x12 peices of paper. But I'll do my best. On our entrance road we still have a canvasback and sometimes two, a scaup, shovelers, a flock of trumpeter swans, and some mallards. On the refuge we have a huge variety everything already mentioned and tundra swans, pintails, coots, common and hooded mergansers. I'm sure there is more, I know there is more, but I haven't gotten any other reports and have been out of the office all day. Please if you do come, post so I know what was out there. I'm going to miss the tour as I'll be doing Jr. Duck stuff at the ODCCA show in Westlake. Have a great weekend, good birding, Rebecca Rebecca E. Hinkle Visitor Services Manager Ottawa National Wildlife Refuge 14000 West State Route 2 Oak Harbor, OH 43449 419-898-0014 ext. *813 ----- Forwarded by Rebecca Hinkle/R3/FWS/DOI on 03/16/2007 03:15 PM ----- [log in to unmask] 03/16/2007 08:29 To AM [log in to unmask] cc Subject From Sheryl Young Rebecca, Bill Whan wrote such a glowing promotion of this Saturday's auto tour (I loved his term Autowa, you should keep it!) that many of us are thinking of coming out this weekend. If you have the chance, could you please give us an update on the condition of the marsh (has it frozen over again) and the road conditions within Ottawa? If you decide not to post to Ohio Birds, could you please answer me personally? Thanks. Sheryl AOL now offers free email to everyone. Find out more about what's free from AOL at AOL.com. ______________________________________________________________________ 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]