Now the pressure is off, having finished our Colorado & Kansas Chicken Run, we’ve been taking things a bit easier. Mind you it was perishing cold all day so there was quite a bit of birding from the car. Having had a text exchange with Megan the night before about our lack of waders (shorebirds) we were pleasantly surprised to find a few when we revisited Scott Lake SP first thing. On return to Scott City, and a trip to the local park and water treatment facility, we added more and with the Solitary Sandpiper which Jane managed to see at Put ’em Back Pond our day total for shorebirds finished on 14! This included the biggest surprise of two Piping Plover, which have always been a top target on previous trips. Given that this part of Kansas is approx 1200 miles from the Pacific coast and 1400 from the Atlantic, it’s amazing that any waders come this way at all – and how they find the very limited watery habitats in the vast tracks of prairie is quite a puzzle. Another water bird which caused a stir was a lone Snow Goose at the ‘poo ponds’ in Scott City – I’ll have to check my records but a ‘first’ for the US I think. A few more sites were done on our way to our overnight stop at Hugoton and a late afternoon visit there to the town cemetery produce another welcome addition to the ‘game bird’ list – Northern Bobwhite.