March 6, 2009 Submitted by James Keighton
We had five golden eagle sightings this year, 3 of them right overhead. And then
Golden Eagles spent December in Doughton Park just south on the Parkway this year and one throughout December and January on
Cheek Mountain in the center of Alleghany County along with a Rough-legged Hawk, a first for Alleghany County.
I was pleased to see your gannet photo and study of gulls on the website miscellaneous
pictures. I, too got out to the shore this winter near Myrtle Beach (two weeks ago with several other Blue Ridge Birders)
and also saw gannets closer to the shore than I've seen before. This is was at Fort Fisher (from the gazebo) where we also
saw all three scoters (I had never seen Black Scoters before), both Common and Red-throated Loons, great rafts of Hooded Mergnasers
along with a few Red-breasted Mergansers, and a Long-tailed Duck. I attach my gannet photo and one of the Black Scoters which
also came unusually close to shore and a photo of a Purple Sandpiper on the breakwater at Huntington Beach.
I took some very distant photos of the Rough-legged Hawk, but one of our club
members and hawk counters, Harrol Blevins, took a better one which I will forward for evidence of our special winter visitor
on Cheek Mountain.
Rough-legged Hawk
© Harrol Blevins
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Rough-legged Hawk
© James Keighton
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Rough-legged Hawk
© James Keighton
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