Air Station Prairie, Techny North & Lake Opeka Wednesday 2-18-26

[Al Stokie]

Hello Bird People,

Yesterday I tried to find a Killdeer at 5 places but did not find any.
But the habitat looked good & Killdeer have been there often so I
decided to try some of the same places today.

Started again at Air Station Prairie & saw a large number of Mallards
in the east side pond but no Killdeer. Walked the trail where we
usually find Snipe but no Snipe just yet. But as I walked back to the
east pond I thought I heard a Killdeer & sure enough there was one
calling & circling the pond. So now I had my February shorebird & with
shorebird finding being easier from March through November I should be
ok on monthly shorebirds until December. Stay tuned on that.

Air Station Prairie (9:05-10:30 am)

Canada Goose (2) & Mallard (149)
Black Duck (3, plus a hybrid which looked like a Black Duck but had a
partial green head)
KILLDEER (1, heard & seen)
Flicker (1)
Robins (10), Starlings (~30) & Red Wings (4)

Techny North (10:30-11 am)

Great Blue Heron (1)
Canada Goose (21)
Mallard (28)
Common Merganser (10)
Red Breasted Merganser (1-M)
Red Tailed Hawk (1)
Killdeer (1, heard only)

Lake Opeka (12:30-1 pm)

Canada Goose (32)
Mallard (52)
Ring Necked Duck (1-M)
Goldeneye (34)
(Yesterday's male Bufflehead was missing today)
Hooded Merganser (1-M)
Red Breasted Merganser (16)
Ring Billed (9) & Herring (22) Gulls
House Sparrows (Heard)

So 19 species for the day. Bird-Of-The-Day to the hoped for Killdeer &
Runner-Up to
the Ring Necked Duck & the 2 Great Blue Herons.

And I will mention that I rec'd an email from birder Noel Zak so I
sent a "reply" message back but it did not go through, I don't know
why. So if Noel sees this report I did try & make contact.

Al Stokie
Local again in Cook County today