WEISS WINTERBirding

The busy summer months obviously come to mind when you think of water-based recreation and tourism around Weiss Lake. However, winter fishing is also big for those hearty enough to brave the cold winter winds on the lake. In recent years, an improved environment has brought a new segment of the tourism spectrum to Weiss in growing numbers.

Bird watching is one of the fastest-growing nonconsumptive outdoor recreation trends. The growth in the number of bald eagles on the lake and massive flocks of American White pelicans and Sandhill cranes are bringing nature photographers to the lake in droves.

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Retired Alabama Department of Conservation and Natural Resources Wildlife Biologist Keith Hudson said the bald eagles and pelican numbers have grown exponentially due to the DDT ban.

Winter is breeding season for bald eagles, and that’s the time you’re most likely to see them. You have to remember that an eagle nest is not a home but strictly a maternity ward. After young eaglets leave the nest around 12 weeks of age, there’s no telling where the young, or the adults, will fly off to. Unlike eagles in the extreme northern parts of the country, Weiss Lake eagles don’t necessarily have to migrate anywhere for access to a food supply. There are plenty of crappie, shad, squirrels, and coots around Weiss to keep the eagles well-fed, so it’s not unusual to see eagle activity around the lake year-round, but winter is when they’re the most visible.

The Sandhill cranes are generally observed between October and April. However, weather conditions in their typically Upper Midwest and Canadian Prairies province breeding grounds can directly impact their migration. When they’re in flight, you WILL hear the cranes long before you see them, and you might have a hard time seeing them because they might catch a thermal in the atmosphere and start circling higher and higher.

They love to feast in the remains of cotton and soybean fields, and the river bottoms can frequently be filled with hundreds of cranes. Hudson said the mud bottoms along the lake (think Mud Creek in particular) seem to be where the cranes feast first before moving into the remains of the soybean and cotton fields.

The birds offer a real challenge to photographers because they spook very easily, making it difficult to get close to them without a 300mm lens or longer.

If you are really lucky, there’s a chance you could see endangered Whooping cranes among a cohort of the sandhills. The effort to re-establish an eastern flyway for the whoopers, Operation Migration, has been successful. Occasionally, you might see some of the whoopers who intermingle but do not interbreed with the sandhills on their way from Wisconsin to Florida or reverse.

Many folks are still scratching their heads trying to figure out where the American White pelicans came from close to a decade ago. Like the Sandhill cranes, they’re feasting on shad in the coves of Weiss Lake during the peak of the winter months. They also are believed to migrate from the Upper Plains region to the Southeast for the winter. Like the cranes, it’s more likely than not that you’ll see hundreds of pelicans in one location.

The pelicans are a freshwater species, unlike their brown relatives who love the coast. Hudson said he has no idea where the pelicans came from but pointed out that northeast Alabama “is at the Northern edge of the range of ice-free waters” for the migratory birds.

One takeaway from the proliferation of the cranes, eagles, and pelicans is that it reflects the environmental health of the lake and the surrounding land mass.

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