At Headlands Beach State Park, February's extra day provided eastward movement of American Crows that continued from 11:00 almost to 1:00 totalling 100 or more birds. Common Grackles, in smaller numbers, were following the same path. We saw a few hawks and Turkey Vultures as well, but they were quite high. A Cooper's Hawk and a red-tail were soaring over the freeway on our way out, so there probably was hawk flight earlier too. American Tree Sparrows were vocal and numerous, 40+ feeding in the dunes area. Shipman Pond was partly open and hosted among others Ring-necked Ducks, Hooded Mergansers and American Coot.

Highlights were two Bald Eagles, both immatures seen heading east, one about 11:00 and the other about 12:30 and a Fox Sparrow, our first for February.

At Eastlake there were coots and scaup and a few gulls visible out toward the ice, but it was mostly just a haven for fishermen. At Gordon Park, in Cleveland, we noticed some landscaping around the shoreway overpass that took out some of the small trees favored by wintering mockingbirds, but for now their favorites survive. In Lake View Cemetery we looked for Merlins in vain. The robins are still feasting among the crabapples there.

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Mixed flocks of vocal blackbirds announced the dramatic change in weather. We found Red-winged Blackbirds singing on territory plus Common Grackles and Brown-headed Cowbirds in a trip through southern Geauga County. Larger bodies of water are still frozen, but there were open areas of LaDue reservoir along Auburn Road where we saw one Common Merganser and 14 American Wigeon. Red-shouldered Hawks and American Kestrel were seen calling in various areas. Eastern Bluebirds were apparent, especially around the boxes at Eldon Russell Park.

Mostly in town, there were also migrant American Robins. Other migrants being reported locally that we did not find were Turkey Vulture, Killdeer and Eastern Meadowlark. House Finch have been singing most of the month, but today they seemed louder and were joined by other species such as Black-capped Chickadee and Song Sparrow. American Tree Sparrows and Dark-eyed Juncos were also heard.

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We finally got around to checking Lake View Cemetery again this afternoon and found not one, but TWO Merlins perched where we could see both. It is just amazing about Merlins here, so many wintering when they used to be a rarity just in migration.

With a Cooper's Hawk also around, it wasn't surprising we didn't see much else, but there were 40+ robins chowing down on crab apples, especially the ones on the ground that the snow melt was uncovering. The biggest surprise though may have been a big zero count of Red-bellied Woodpeckers. Maybe just the time of day, but we could hardly turn around without seeing them on the Christmas Bird Count.

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This afternoon a Merlin flew into a large tree in the front yard next door to our home in Cleveland Heights. We were able to watch while it ate the probable House Sparrow it had caught. The Merlin sat and preened, looked about a bit and finally flew off. While it was perched it gave no sign of distress on being closely watched. We are accustomed to seeing Cooper's Hawks (which are in the neighborhood too) and Sharp-shinned in the winter, but Merlins have before this winter only been seen in the neighborhood in migration.

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We began our part of the Cleveland Christmas Bird Count with a quick drive around parts of Lake View Cemetery before meeting our count team. We got a great start when we spotted a Merlin perched, just before sunrise. It had caught something which it had pinned down on a branch. It was spotted in flight twice more during the morning. The count area wound up with a total of five Merlin, a big increase over the previous high, and outnumbering the four American Kestrel.

Other big numbers for our count in Lake View were four Northern Mockingbird seen in two different parts of the cemetery and many more Red-bellied Woodpeckers than have been seen on our count before.

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Send mail to: Dick & Jean Hoffman (djhoff@ix.netcom.com)

Archived: Mar 6, 2000