A few weeks ago, before the weather turned colder, I was driving by Crystal Lake, when I caught sight of a few ducks out of the corner of my eye. With my binoculars in the car, I decided to stop and see what could be found.
In the little park by the swimming beach there were song sparrows, chickadees, robins, and cardinals. As I was walking toward the lake I flushed a kingfisher who flew off to a new distant perch while giving his dry rattling call. On the water there were Canada geese, mallards, common mergansers, and hooded mergansers. and a single ring-billed gull flying overhead.
The mergansers and kingfisher certainly made it a worthwhile stop and it made me wonder why Crystal Lake isn't birded often. Then a week or so later, I returned to find that ice had formed and was making the eeriest sounds of squeezing as ice slid against ice. There was hardly a bird to be found except a lone nuthatch calling from the pines. So I assumed that the lake is either a hit or miss, but regardless I'm going to try and check out Crystal Lake more often!
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