First, I enjoy the tweeters postings and potshots.

Second, I just returned from a Portneuf Valley Audubon (Pocatello, Id) trip
to Bear River Migratory Bird Refuge in Utah. Excellent birding but a
significant amount of dead birds from what I understand to be botulism in the
mud of the refuge that becomes lethal in hot weather. Can anyone give me a
lay explanation of what seems to be a regular occurance in this area?

Begging Forster's Tern babies and adults being harried by gulls. While we
watched the score was 6-terns, 0-gulls.

The zebra marked young of the Pied-billed grebe are a hoot! No rarities of
shorebirds but far fewer species than a month ago:

American Avocet
Black-necked Stilt
Greater and Lesser Yellowlegs
White-faced Ibis
Cattle and Snowy Egrets
Long-billed Dowitcher
Marbled Godwit
Least and Baird's Sandpipers
Wilson's Phalarope
Long-billed Curlew in the grass

More small stuff than we usually see at this area:

Yellow-rumped Warbler
Savannah and Vesper Sparrows
Barn Swallows
Hundreds of immature and female Tree Swallows
White-crowned Sparrow
Wilson's Warbler
Orange-crowned Warbler

And the usual:
American White Pelian
Virginia Rail
GBH
Red-winged and "clouds" of Yellow-headed Blackbirds(most immmature
or female
Western Meadowlark
Common Raven
Ospray
Killdeer
Canada Geese (sparse)
MoDo
Northern Harrier (our only raptor of the day)
Marsh Wren
Earred, Clark's and Western Grebe
Green-winged and Blue-winged Teal
Northern Shovelers
and more eclipse ducks that I could not identify
American Coot (and a few old coots in the car)
DC Cormorant

Rain all around us but the Refuge was clear and overcast. Nice day.

Joan Bergstrom, Birding isn't a hobby,
Pocatello, ID it's a necessity for sanity.