Date: 03/10/2016

Number: 500

In my 50+ years of eagerly looking for a first Robin, I had never seen a wave until last week. As I drove up the .2 mile gravel driveway at our farm, I saw a dark shadow across the roadway ahead of me about 50' wide. It was moving on the ground. Just as strange, it looked like my neighbor's close-cut alfalfa field off to the right was also moving. It's about two acres in size. I stopped the car to figure out what was happening. Suddenly, the evening the sun broke through the clouds and I realized the entire west-facing slope was covered in birds. We've had unusually warm weather and the ground is soft to about 10 inches. Here and there a bird would hop to a different spot, but the whole wave was tight to the ground. I inches in and was stunned to realize they were Robins. They stayed about a half hour and then flew off into the windbreak in a dense chain of sub-waves. I could not get a picture with my iPhone. It's just etched in my memory forever.

Farmington, MN

Latitude: 44.6 Longitude: -93.1

Observed by: Wendy
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