Kearney Fall Field Days

The 2011 NOU Fall Field Days were held at the Iain Nicolson Center at the Audubon Rowe Sanctuary southeast of Kearney on September 23–25, and 55 members and friends were in attendance. The meeting was organized by Kent Skaggs. Field trip destinations included Harlan County Reservoir, led by Kent Skaggs; the Rainwater Basin, led by Paul Dunbar; Bittern\u27s Call WPA and Johnson Lake, led by John Murphy; and Sherman Reservoir, led by Robin Harding and Lanny Randolph. A final tally of 143 species was recorded Highlights included the Neotropic Cormorants at Harlan County Reservoir and Sherman Reservoir and the numerous Sprague\u27s Pipits at Prairie Dog WPA. On Friday evening, Paul Dunbar led an informal clinic on digiscoping, with a discussion of cameras, settings, and spotting scopes. On Saturday evening, Dr. Walter Wehjte of the Crane Trust at Wood River presented a program on using GPS transmitters to study Whooping Crane migratory behavior, survival, and winter habitat use. He explained how transmitters are used to track the migration of Whooping Cranes from their nesting sites at Wood Buffalo National Park in Alberta and the Northwest Territories of Canada to their wintering grounds in Aransas National Wildlife Refuge on the Gulf Coast of Texas