We visited the Columbus Upground Reservoir in NW Delaware County yesterday, and because it's still under construction couldn't get near enough to see much. Current plans are to flood it this fall. As an upground reservoir it does not sit on a natural watercourse, and will be filled by water pumped from the nearby Scioto River. It will eventually be joined by two other reservoirs nearby in time to come. The plans encourage birding as an activity, with prairie species in addition to migrant waterfowl, etc. See official statements at http://www.columbusupgroundreservoirs.com/pdfs/Upground2012.pdf and http://www.columbusupgroundreservoirs.com/ . If I understand correctly, this is the first of a trio of reservoirs which will store water pumped out of the Scioto, from which water will be pumped back to the river in times of the city's need. This first one covers 843 acres. It won't be connected to the existing reservoirs (except to O'Shaughnessy, which is pretty much only widened Scioto River downstream). Still, it will be one more large body of water in central Ohio; it should be up and running by the fall waterfowl migration. Apparently natural water supplies are not convenient for greening up the golf courses and lawns of the capital city. I'm guessing levels in this reservoir will be changing as it is artificially filled and drawn down, so water depth and extents of mudflats will change on a very different schedule than those of a place like upper Hoover Reservoir. So perhaps it will offer habitats to water-loving migrants such as shorebirds when other bodies of water do not. In the first years after Hoover Res was flooded in the mid '50s, reports of up to 30,000 waterfowl present at once were heard. As Hoover has silted up and suffered from increased chemical contamination, these numbers have declined steadily. The Hoover spillway, not the upper reaches, seems to have been the reservoir's first shorebird mecca, with many records of rarities in the first five years or so, but no more. Still, choosy visitors like royal tern and long-tailed jaeger have visited there in recent years. The new reservoirs up in NW Delaware County will be unique in the state--at least as far as I know--with giant grass-covered berms (as yet unmowed!), no dams or natural inlets or outlets, and a water-level regime that will depend more on browning grass in the Columbus suburbs than on natural influences. If nothing else, it should provide some unique habitat on a unique schedule, and we could learn a lot about birds by keeping an eye on it. It's only about half-way to Killdeer Plains from Columbus, and should have water this fall. 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]