End of waterfowl season and melting ice (1 Viewer)

[Streesh]

Here in New Jersey (USA) the waterfowl hunting season ended at the end of January. It was succeeded by a very icy spell, which has finally relented, and open water on inland lakes is expanding. I always enjoy watching the lakes fill in with waterfowl and was out yesterday to see good numbers of ruddy ducks, common mergansers, and ring-necked ducks gathering on one of the Central Jersey lakes, along with a couple of less common species, a red-necked grebe from the coast, and a couple of trumpeter swans from the west. The trumpeters have been coming every year for at least 5 years and staying the whole winter. They are the only ones in the state, but their reliability and the ease of viewing them makes them seem less rare than they are.