Just talked with friends who live in Ontario near the latitude of Algonquin PP, and their weather closely resembles ours today, so this is a big system, It also resembles the weather we witnessed ~October 10 in 2007, when temperatures dropped precipitously and strong winds out of the N and W prevailed for days. While the timing is slightly different, this front could easily bring in unusual numbers of certain rare--or at least seldom seen--migrants from the northern prairie marshes, like Nelson's and Le Conte's sparrows and yellow rails, which were seen in 2007 in numbers unprecedented in recent years. So it may well pay to stay alert for these elusive visitors in the coming week or so. Spots along the Lake were productive two years ago, but Wayne County was even better, and Le Conte's were found as far south as Cincinnati. These species were found in fall across glaciated Ohio in similar weather conditions in years past. Productive habitats included marshes and wet spots, and damp pasture-like areas. Among the sparrows Le Conte's seemed to favor drier areas than Nelson's, and yellow rails, at least the healthy ones, were most often found by the luckier sparrow-seekers who inadvertently kicked them up. Unlike the rails, these beautiful sparrows can often be admired at leisure if you are careful. One is tempted to wonder if other scarce migrants from the north and west who pass through at this time, like Sabine's gulls, or long-tailed jaegers; possibly, but they are much more agile flyers, less bothered by strong winds, and seem to prefer travel across water. Still, if there are brisk northerlies on the back side of this low, they might be easier to see as they pass along the Erie south shore. Hoping this is helpful, and as my mom always said, wear your boots, 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]