ML646817994

Observation details

Sturdy-looking loons with streamlined spear-like faintly bluish bills with dark culmens; rounded crowns; grayish crowns and aft-necks; white fore-necks with continuous curving borders down the sides of the necks and blackish toward the front of the borders; neat rows of scalloped feathers on the back and scapulars. One with a bold chin-strap; the other with a less-obvious chin strap. Perhaps these two have been at Willard Reservoir all along since McKay O. logged two at the state park pin on Nov 4. And maybe everyone else, including me, has logged one or the other when we saw only one. But I saw double today. I didn't see the first one until I had been sweeping the flock for at least an hour, convinced no "good" birds were present, and then I saw the loon right in the middle of the flock. I'm certain it wasn't there and it sneak-dived its way to the southwest corner of the reservoir. How on earth they creep up on you like that is beyond me. The second one came from far to the north (and I first saw it as a sturdy-looking speck) and joined the first, and eventually, they both elected to hide in the merganser flock.