March was warm and vegetation was about normal to one week early. Development of vegetation slowed down in a cool April and May liberally sprinkled with storms, heavy rain, and cold fronts that produced loads of grounded migrants. Lib Toenes said that on Dauphin Island birding in March and April was the greatest in years although short on a few species. Best days were March 30, April 4,7,8,27 – all preceded by rain or north wind. Alice Tait came down from Massachusetts for six weeks at Dauphin, got 200 species and said that this was the best season in the ten years she has been coming to the island. L. A. Wells, of Columbus, Georgia, said of this “fantastic migration” that “it was late, had an eastward diversion from rains and floods in the Mississippi Valley,
and included three fortuitous weekends of clear weather after rains and rolonged low temperature”. Tom Atkeson reported nearly all of Wheeler Refuge under water, but fresh mudflat along White Spring Dike, coupled with stiff north winds and unusually cool temperatures, produced a “whole handful of goodies” including many shorebird records.
Author: Thomas A. Imhof
Volume Number: 21 Year Published: 1973
Issue Number: 1-2
Page Number: 12
Link to article: http://birdlife.aosbirds.org/1973/Vol 21 No. 1, 2_1973_p12-14.pdf
Link to the full issue of BirdLife: http://birdlife.aosbirds.org/1973/Vol 21 No. 1, 2_1973.pdf
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