The hands-down highlight of a few birding stops along the Connecticut R. 
in Norwich this morning was a lone (and probably lonely) Red-winged 
Blackbird singing with gusto along the RR tracks just north of the 
crossing with Kendall Station Road.  A White-throated Sparrow was also 
in the area.

Like many of us Upper Valley birders suffering from Champlain Valley 
Snowy Owl envy, I'm hoping that the weeks ahead may find a northbound 
bird stopping over locally.  Now is the time to look, and I did this 
morning, though without success.  I checked Farrell Farm, the fields 
behind Pirouette Farm on Hogback Road, Campbell Flats, and (later) the 
Jericho Rd/St area.  Although the timing and routes of spring migrant 
Snowy Owls in the Northeast don't seem to be well documented, satellite 
telemetry over the past decade by Norm Smith of Mass Audubon shows that 
northbound birds banded on the MA coast do occasionally cross over and 
stop in Vermont.  The timing is variable, but March and April are the 
most likely months.  Most of Smith's transmittered birds moved slightly 
to our east, but perhaps birds that winter further south and west are 
more likely to pass through VT-NH.

Check out the migration maps 
http://www.massaudubon.org/get-outdoors/wildlife-sanctuaries/blue-hills-trailside-museum/snowy-owl-project/migration-maps, 
and get out there to scan the fields and farm lands.  If there ever was 
a spring to find Snowy Owls moving through the Upper Valley, this it it!

Chris

-- 
Chris Rimmer
Vermont Center for Ecostudies
P.O. Box 420
Norwich, VT 05055
802-649-1431 ext. 1
www.vtecostudies.org

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