Alton is across the Mississippi from St. Louis (and a bit north). Since I am having considerable trouble with even the thought of van-camping lately and since there is enough work from Kalispell, I've been staying in motels. I found a Best Western in Alton and headed to the Riverlands Migratory Bird Sanctuary, a partnership between the Army Corps of Engineers and the National Audubon Society. Nice, isn't it? these two entities in partnership...
I was here because I had researched where to find Eurasian Tree Sparrows, a species brought to the US from Europe in 1870. About 20 of these birds were released in the St. Louis area. They competed with House Sparrows (also released in the area about the same time) and the "tougher" House Sparrows were more successful in moving throughout all of the US, perhaps limiting the competing Eurasian Tree Sparrows who remain quite restricted in range, although the species is slowly expanding in Missouri and Illinois
The VC looked over the Mississippi and associated wetlands and the Melvin Price Dam and Locks just downriver. There were four or five Swarovski spotting scopes for public use. I watched and scanned with scope and binoculars and saw a single Eurasian Tree Sparrow within 15 minutes! It was almost surreal. I got a very clear look at the bird which resembles the House Sparrow but has a dark check mark and a white line around the nape. Easy to ID really, especially up close. And then it left as I was scrambling for my camera, and I didn't see it again. It came, I saw it and it left. A perfect birding moment.
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| Canada Geese at Riverlands Migratory Bird Sanctuary - MO |
A few Bald Eagles were on the ice in the distance along with gulls and geese and ducks.
There are USACE publications at these venues near the river, and I learned about potamology. I might have been a potamologist in another life and would then have studies rivers, with an emphasis on the science of river flow. My working world would be hydraulics and sediments and channelization and obstructions, floods, snow pack in distant mountains..... After the 2011, the Mississippi River Geomorphology and Potamology (MRP&P) with bases in New Orleans, Vicksburg, Memphis and St. Louis was formed to watch and measure the river from its confluence with the Missouri to the Gulf of Mexico.
What is it about moving water that fires the imagination?
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