This morning I began recovery work on the Old Sunbury Road (Galena, Delaware Cty) section of my Prothonotary Warbler nest box trail. Carnage would be a kind description of what the recent storm did to this area along the northeastern shore of Hoover Reservoir. The old road that goes north from the entrance to the Eastshore Yacht Club to the old bridge base at Big Walnut Creek had 14 large trees down across it. Many, many more were down in the habitat between the road and the reservoir’s shore. I lost some nest boxes but I don’t have a count yet as I didn’t feel like crawling over, under and through the fallen trees. The scene reminded me of the obstacle course I had to do when I was in the army. Reinstalling new boxes will be no better with all the downed trees. But the nest box trail will recover with some elbow grease and determination. I looked for the Bald Eagle nest but I could not find it. This is like looking for a Volkswagen bus in a tree, very hard to miss if it is there. I fear the nest went down, but with all the other fallen trees and branches who could tell if a nest were in the middle. At least the young eagles had fledged and to my comfort I found them perched in a cottonwood tree. The hike north along the nest box trail wore me down so I decided to take the easy route back to the car. Go along the reservoir shoreline since the water is down and the mudflats are exposed. This turned out to be a good choice as I found 8 species of shorebirds as I walked south to the car. They were Killdeer (80+), Lesser Yellowlegs (14), Solitary Sandpiper (3), Spotted Sandpiper (7), Semipalmated Sandpiper (10-15), Least Sandpiper (8-10), Stilt Sandpiper (2), and Short-billed Dowitcher (4 – still mostly in breeding plumage). The first wave of migrating shorebirds is showing up and their friends should be following soon. Final footnote, unusual for me, 1 Prothonotary Warbler. I think my guys headed south early after the crazy weather. Charlie Bombaci Hoover Nature Preserve ______________________________________________________________________ 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]