Date: 10/12/24 6:07 pm From: Vic Fondy via groups.io <treasurecreek...> Subject: [sd-birds] West of Belle Fourche
We birded from Belle Fourche west to Wyoming and back to Whitewood via Upper/Lower Redwater Road and backroads. The area west of Belle has extreme drought with most of the ponds dry, very few birds and not much to report. We did have our only sighting of the season of a Lewis's Woodpecker NW of Aladdin on Aikman County Road. Western Meadowlarks and Black-billed Magpies were abundant today. Northwest of Spearfish on old Belle Road were large flocks of European Starlings with hundreds of birds in every flock.
We have had a few migrants passing thru at our feeders 1.5 miles south of Whitewood including White-crowned ,White-throated, and Chipping Sparrows, and one Ruby-crowned Kinglet, The Spotted Towhees have not been seen since October 8 and have probably moved on.