ML168910461
Contributor
Date
Location
- Age
- Not specified
- Sex
- Not specified
Media notes
received word late last night that an AMFL was located in New Madrid county in the flooded areas that remain in the bottoms. I woke up at 5 this morning and headed down to the area I thought I knew what was being described to me as section 14....I figured out through my job where I needed to start looking. I arrived right at sunrise to bright orange horizon and a bright pink long necked bird in a vast expense of brown (mudflats). My optics were not cooperating very well at all as I'm sure most everyone in Missouri and practically the entire US population. AC and humidity do not bode well for glass. Back to the bird. It's about 100 years off of county road 733 which is off of WW. This is in the birds point new Madrid floodway. Areas are still having signs with flood recovery. This road wasn't too bad at all. I parked up the road about another 150 yards to give it it's space and it just kept feeding and feeding and feeding. I assume (how can you not) that this is the same bird observed last weekend in Dyer county TN that I missed being out of town. I'm actually totally shocked it's still alive. Hard to believe it's finding enough nutrients in our ecosystem.
Observation details
I received word late last night that an AMFL was located in New Madrid county in the flooded areas that remain in the bottoms. I woke up at 5 this morning and headed down to the area I thought I knew what was being described to me as section 14..My optics were not cooperating very well at all as I'm sure most everyone in Missouri and practically the entire US population. AC and humidity do not bode well for glass. Back to the bird. It was about 100 yards off of county road 733 which runs north of Hwy WW. This is in the birds point new Madrid floodway. Areas are still having signs with flood recovery. I spotted the bird with the naked eye from a 1/2 mile away. I proceeded to drive past the bird, turn the vehicle around and park in the middle of the county road and observe the American Flamingo from the comfort of my truck. I set up my spotting scope on my windshield and along with my iphone and leupold binoculars I spent 90 minutes watching the bright pink long legged black tipped curved billed beauty feed and feed until it and all the other shorebirds in the area flew off. I saw the black primaries in flight, but didn't capture any flight photos as I was more interested in what caused the rapid movement of everything (nothing spotted) I watched the bird sail way off to the south and left the scene, in case it wanted to return to the same spot. I spent the rest of the day relaying information for 20+ others to get a look at the bird after it was relocated by Allen Gathman and confirmed by Timothy Barksdale just south of Hubbard lake in New Madrid County.
Technical information
- Model
- iPhone 6s
- Lens
- iPhone 6s back camera 4.15mm f/2.2
- ISO
- 25
- Focal length
- 4.2 mm
- Flash
- Flash did not fire, auto
- f-stop
- f/2.2
- Shutter speed
- 1/120 sec
- Dimensions
- 4032 pixels x 3024 pixels
- Original file size
- 1.31 MB