We returned to central Kansas to revisit Cheyenne Bottoms Wildlife Area and Quivira National Wildlife Refuge at what is usually the peak of the shorebird migration. Unfortunately, all the recent rain had flooded the mudflats, sandy areas, and very shallow water preferred by most shorebirds, so the numbers were about the same as two weeks […]
Tag: tallgrass prairie
Flood and Famine
From the Osage Hills in northeast Oklahoma, described in the last post, we headed across southeast Kansas. We’ve only run out of gas twice in the 30 years we’ve been married, but this was an extremely rural area, and when we finally reached a station, the truck’s display indicated only 9 miles to empty. Our […]
From Shorebirds to Bison
Cheyenne Bottoms Wildlife Area and the adjacent land held by The Nature Conservancy (TNC), in central Kansas, comprise a globally critical area for migrating shorebirds (sandpipers, plovers, etc.). In some years, an estimated 40% of the shorebirds breeding in North America pass through the Bottoms during spring migration. The Bottoms is a natural wet area […]
