The Lake Erie Islands Christmas Bird Count was held this past Sunday, December 20. This was the first year in a while that it was an international count with counters on Pelee Island. Kelleys, South Bass and Middle Bass Islands were covered. A total of 82 species were seen during the count. Birds of note were all 1 white-winged, 1 surf, and 5 black scoters, 5 long-tailed ducks, 7 killdeer, 1 dunlin, 1 purple sandpiper, 1 lesser black-backed gull, a count week long-eared owl, 5 northern saw-whet owls, and 29 hermit thrushes. The purple sandpiper was on South Bass Island. The owls were all on Kelleys Island. Also of interest were counts of 3217 bufflehead and 3255 common goldeneye. Species Canada Goose 421 Tundra Swan 302 Gadwall 93 American Wigeon 2 American Black Duck 316 Mallard 1895 Northern Shoveler 1 Northern Pintail 5 Canvasback 77 Redhead 16 Ring-necked Duck 1 Greater Scaup 180 Lesser Scaup 839 Scaup spp. 1571 White-winged Scoter 1 Surf Scoter 1 Black Scoter 5 Long-tailed Duck 5 Bufflehead 3217 Common Goldeneye 3255 Hooded Merganser 9 Common Merganser 859 Red-breasted Merganser 7092 Merganser spp. 982 Ruddy Duck 1 Divers spp. 726 Ring-necked Pheasant 6 Wild Turkey 150 Common Loon 1 Horned Grebe 3 Double-crested Cormorant 5 Great Blue Heron 2 Bald Eagle 7 Sharp-shinned Hawk 3 Cooper's Hawk 3 Red-tailed Hawk 4 American Coot 1 Killdeer 7 Dunlin 1 Purple Sandpiper 1 Bonaparte's Gull 1617 Ring-billed Gull 1972 Herring Gull 2241 Lesser Black-backed Gull 1 Great Black-backed Gull 92 Gull spp. 483 Mourning Dove 12 Eastern Screech-Owl 13 Great Horned Owl 10 Long-eared Owl CW Northern Saw-whet Owl 5 Belted Kingfisher 4 Red-bellied Woodpecker 34 Downy Woodpecker 105 Northern Flicker 11 Blue Jay 57 American Crow 97 Horned Lark 12 Black-capped Chickadee 438 Red-breasted Nuthatch 5 White-breasted Nuthatch 27 Brown Creeper 22 Carolina Wren 14 Winter Wren 4 Golden-crowned Kinglet 14 Kinglet spp. 1 Eastern Bluebird 6 Hermit Thrush 29 American Robin 385 Northern Mockingbird 1 European Starling 5884 Cedar Waxwing 6 Yellow-rumped Warbler 26 American Tree Sparrow 17 Song Sparrow 4 Swamp Sparrow 3 White-throated Sparrow 40 White-crowned Sparrow 5 Sparrow spp. 78 Dark-eyed Junco 50 Lapland Longspur 1 Northern Cardinal 203 Red-winged Blackbird 41 Common Grackle 8 Brown-headed Cowbird 50 Purple Finch 2 House Finch 124 American Goldfinch 56 House Sparrow 629 37005 82 sp John Pogacnik 4765 Lockwood Road Perry, OH 44081 (440) 259-2751 ______________________________________________________________________ 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]