Surner Birding: October Snowstorm-trick or treat

Black Scoter-Barton's Cove

October Snowstorm =”Nightmare”

I headed up to the Turner’s Falls Power canal on Saturday October 29th in hopes of locating the Pink-footed Goose that James Smith found earlier in the week . After an hour of scanning through the few hundred Canada Geese that were hanging out at the canal, I along with others came up empty. After departing the canal area I headed up to Barton’s Cove.The highlights were a frosty looking Great blue Heron, a female Black Scoter, a Brant and five American Coots. The Brant was especially nice since one can easily miss them here in western Massachusetts, and the American Coots……although there were only five, it has been a big year for them here in Massachusetts, with hundreds and hundreds being reported throughout the Baystate.

The main event was forecasted for Saturday night into Sunday morning, a rare October Snowstorm!

The storm began quite a bit earlier than originally forecasted- and by 8:30pm we lost all power, and power would not return until the following Saturday! I headed out early Sunday morning to plow out various locations in the Belchertown and Amherst area, and that’s when I quickly came to the realization that the area was hit extremely hard by this storm. The amount of downed trees, powerlines was nothing I have ever witnessed here in the valley. Despite the inconvenience of the situation, life does go on- but come Saturday afternoon both Valerie and I were very happy to get power and the internet back ON! Below are a few shots from the storm and recent birds.

Scott