Weekend Update

Dateline: 18-20 December 2021

Not real ducks

Saturday: rain, rain, and more rain; for birding, a total wash. Sunday: overcast, light wind, cold, occasional snow flakes. Not great for photography (bad lighting), but great for birding (ducks, ducks, and more ducks!) Monday: cool, eventually turned mostly sunny; nice day.

Meanwhile, Presque Isle State Park was back to 100% open, although with traffic control (one-way road + stop lights) between the Thompson Circle area and the Budny Beach area. Roads mostly in fine shape, trails muddy and very flooded where applicable. (E.g., Pine Tree Trail east trailhead: totally flooded; Long Pond Trail: totally flooded; Sidewalk Trail bay-side end: totally flooded.)

While the BirdingPI.com editorial staff continues pouring over Sunday’s pictures, here’s a few snapshots from a sunnier Monday.

Lovely Mallards, near Long Pond

Still plenty of Canadian Geese migrating:

Canadian Geese, Thompson Bay

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Seems like it’d be easier to take the beach, but who are we to judge? This trio of deer was spotted swimming/wading towards the Gull Point area:

Deer crossing Thompson Bay

Guess the deer are lucky shotgun deer season is over. For ducks, not out of the woods yet:

Setting decoys, Thompson Bay, north of North Pier Light
White-breasted Nuthatch, near Thompson Bay

Ok, credit where credit’s due, the above’s a nice picture.

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Ring-billed Gull, near North Pier
Flying Gull detail

Stayed tuned for Weekend Update Redux, aka “Swan Lake.” Spoiler alert: there’s swans.