Monday - Water Habitat

-5/24/2021
-6-11:30 am EST
-Shawnee Mission Park
-Overcast (40% cloud cover), Light 6mph SW wind, 80 degrees Fahrenheit
-wetland areas were primarily surrounded by tall grasses with scattered phragmites. Hard-wood forested areas were directly adjacent to many of the wetlands (i.e. red and white oaks, purple beech).
The riparian forests displayed the highest abundances.
There was also a distinguishable difference in the types of birds that I saw in each area. The waterbirds remained either on the water or on the shore, I primarily observed RW Blackbirds making use of shoreline vegetation, surrounding riparian forest had high density and diversity of songbirds, and surrounding parking lots and scattered trees in mowed grass had more generalist species like American Crows and European Starlings.
I also visited some of the surrounding grasslands which seemed to have significantly lower bird activity. The birds that I did observe here were primarily insectivores likes the Tree Swallow

I had a really good time, but unfortunately only saw a couple of water birds.

I'm still figuring out how to best utilize my guide apps, and was struggling to ID two of the birds that I took pics of. It looks like other inaturalists identified them as a brown-headed cowbird and an Eastern Bluebird, but I'm curious if you guys agree with these (because I wasn't sure that I did).

Posted on May 24, 2021 11:34 PM by ben__simms