Three hours is merely the time required to simply drive around and through the Big Island complex of properties, especially if one chooses to take in the 4 major private wetland developments surrounding Big Island that can be viewed from the road (I know of another to the southeast for which viewing is very difficult). This then is far from a thorough survey, ignoring entirely Unit G and only what is immediately visible from the road on units D & F (along Rt. 95). Also, of the three main wetlands along La Rue-Prospect, I had to forgo entirely the easternmost. Heavily vegetated, it nonetheless was full of water and the few coot I saw were probably a fraction of what was present. Waterbird totals: Canada Goose - 139 Trumpeter Swan - 2 Wood Duck - 2 Gadwall - 75 Mallard - 890 American Black Duck - 190 American Wigeon - 35 Blue-winged Teal - 65 Northern Pintail - 130 Northern Shoveler - 55 Green-winged Teal - 540 Canvasback - 8 (Unit H) Redhead - 480 (almost all Unit H) Ring-necked Duck - 1580 (almost all Unit B) Lesser Scaup - 715 (almost all Unit B) Bufflehead - 13 (almost all Unit B) Hooded Merganser - 16 (Hoch Rd.) Ruddy Duck - 90 >> virtually nothing left on Herr Rd. by contrast >>> I am struck by the number of bay duck in particular. I am left wondering wht kind of waterfowl numbers would have been present only a few weeks ago at the peak for many of these species. Pied-billed Grebe - 12 Horned Grebe - 16 American Coot - 1300 (almost all Unit B) Killdeer - 58 Greater Yellowlegs - 23 Lesser Yellowlegs - 3 Wilson's Snipe - 5 plus ... 6 Bald Eagles (incl. pair at nest) 1 Osprey (Unit B) pipits, longspurs, ... Vesper and Savannah Sparrows conspicuously in song. cheers Vic Fazio Tiffin, OH ______________________________________________________________________ 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]