Why call them flocks when they look like clouds!

That was my EXACT thought today while I was at work.  Staring out the window and driving around...it looked like literally the clouds were black..and moving fast.  I guess they also looked like mosquitoes, but no one except northerners would really, truly understand what that one looks like!   Anyways, today was a pretty spectacular day. I saw approximately 11 different types of waterfowl (including swans and geese in that term, though I shouldn't), 7 of which I had never seen before!  Or at least known I've seen.

The day started off with me seeing what I thought were large buffleheads, but were actually hooded mergansers once I looked it up!  Buffleheads were close by.  Those little guys are one of my favourites, and are absolutely hilarious when they are making a show! I also saw my first Wood Duck, Shoveler  American Widgeon, American Coot, Gadwall, and Black Duck!  Green-winged teal and Mallards are also added in there.  They were really hard to take photos of being so far away, but I managed to take a good one of the Widgeon through a spotting scope I was looking at, what a beautiful bird.

Female and Male Bufflehead through spotting scope

I also had the pleasure of watching a Sandhill Crane fly over.  BOY do those birds make such a unique sound!  He landed in the marsh over, but I really hope that I see and hear another one at some point this spring.

Just as I was getting ready to leave I spotted a few ducks flying into the nearby pond.  Quickly I grabbed my camera, dropped to the ground and crawled out to the edge of the bank and managed to take this (below) shot before it realized that I wasn't a duck and flew.  It was another Hooded Merganser!  This one began showing off to me (as you can see it's head is all poofed up from it's display.

Hooded Merganser displaying

It was such an amazing day seeing so many different types of Waterbirds!  I can't wait to see more come in and the sky once again filled with little black dots!