Subject: Fall peeps
Date: Jul 1 20:23:53 2000
From: Constance J. Sidles - csidles at mail.isomedia.com


Hey tweets, Fall migration is here. Yipee. My husband John and I went down
to the Fill tonight and saw 8 LEAST SANDPIPERS, 2 WESTERN SANDPIPERS, 1
SPOTTED SANDPIPER (still in breeding plummage), and 1 COMMON SNIPE. They
were feeding like crazy on the north end of the main pond. Also on the pond
were 4 BLUE-WINGED TEAL.

I and John (especially) have spent the last 3 weeks clearing out whatever
purple loosestrife we could. John rented a gas-powered weed wacker 3 weeks
ago and wacked all the loosestrife on the north end of the pond. You can
see what dividends that paid today. It was glorious. During the last 2
weeks, we have pulled loosestrife from the water and around the verge. But
there is still way too much loosestrife clogging the mudflats. So we'll be
out next weekend wacking and pulling. John is hoping to rent a weed wacker
again so he can try to clear out the south end of the pond, which is pretty
thickly cloaked in loosestrife. I'll join him on Sunday.

If you'd like to help, just grab a handful of loosestrife and pull. I try
to make a point of pulling out at least a hundred plants every time I go. I
don't always hit a hundred (blisters sometimes intrude), but I figure every
little bit helps. I've heard that loosestrife-eating beetles have been
released on the site, and we do see signs of chewing on some of the leaves.
But if the beetles are at work, I'm sorry to say that they haven't had much
effect yet.

I think we could have a truly wonderful fall migration if we could clear
more mud for the birds to see as they fly over. There is so little habitat
left for them that I think even a tiny place like the Fill can help the
birds a lot. - Connie