109th bird count yields unique species

By Ken Johnston
Editor

Mark Johnson continued the tradition of years gone by over the Christmas season. He participated in the 109th Audubon Christmas Bird Count in the Morson and Gameland areas.
Johnson, who hails from St. Paul, Minnesota, travels here every Christmas to visit his sister who lives in Morson. He then does the annual bird count.
This year in the Morson area he counted 21 different species, noting, “The most unusual one we saw was two American Robins.” They also saw a Red-bellied Woodpecker.
In Gameland they counted 26 different species. “The highlight of that day (Dec. 15th) was seeing Hawk, Great Grey and Snowy Owls.” He also noted that a siting of a Hoary Red Poll was neat as they are usually found more north of here. “There are plenty of Red Polls here but the Hoary is not usually found this far south.” They saw the Hoary Red Poll at a feeder in Rainy River.
“The numbers were good even though it was a couple of cold days!” said Johnson.