Date: Tue, 1 Feb 2000 13:20:43 -0500 Reply-To: Maryland Birds & Birding Sender: Maryland Birds & Birding From: "Joseph J. Halpin" Subject: Saturday birding along the Potomac-and a strange goose MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit This belated report is to fill in some of the gaps for the outing with Bill Dobbins and Bobby Hughes on Saturday the 29th. We started out at the LBJ Grove-that produced few birds and nothing of note. We moved down to Roaches Run, further south along the GW Parkway; there were good numbers of birds and species. 6 Black Crowned Night Herons, Canvasback, Black and Ruddy Ducks, Coot, Lesser Scaup, Great Blue Heron, Golden-crowned Kinglet, Yellowlegs species and Greater Black Backed Gulls. The list for the Sailing Marina was recently posted; we have nothing to add. We spent some time at the Washington Channel watching the Fire Dept boat break channels through the ice, hoping to see large numbers of gulls and possibly some unusual gulls drawn to the area, but that did not happen. Bill pointed out that at this time of year when the channel freezes, the water oxygen content is decreased and large numbers of fish can die. You could see the dead fish under the ice and it was driving the gulls crazy. This area can be a draw for the gulls and other birds as the ice melts or is broken. Cameron Run by the apartments south of Alexandria-one female Wood Duck, Greater Yellow Legs, Ringed-bill Gulls, lots of Canada Geese and a strange mixed Goose. This goose is bigger that the other geese. The body color is like that of the C. Geese but the neck and head are a mottled white and black with the area around the eyes being dark. The legs are yellow in contrast to the C. Geese. Has anyone else seen this bird and does anyone have an idea what the origination of this hybrid is? Species seen on the Potomac around the Bell Haven area-Hooded and Common Mergansers, Coots, Redhead and Ruddy Ducks, Scaup species, Greater Black Backed Gulls, Buffleheads, 2 Kingfishers, about 100 Green-winged Teal and about 100 Northern Pintail. Joe Halpin Silver Spring, MD halpinj @juno.com ________________________________________________________________ YOU'RE PAYING TOO MUCH FOR THE INTERNET! Juno now offers FREE Internet Access! Try it today - there's no risk! For your FREE software, visit: http://dl.www.juno.com/get/tagj. ========================================================================= To leave the MDOsprey list, send e-mail to listserv@home.ease.lsoft.com with the following message in line 1: signoff mdosprey ========================================================================= ===========================================================================