Date: Sun, 5 Mar 2000 12:39:15 -0500 Reply-To: Maryland Birds & Birding Sender: Maryland Birds & Birding From: Kathie Lambert Subject: The Great Snipe Sneeze - Part Deux Comments: To: Bobby Reichwein , Jean Wheeler , Peter Hanan , Steve Hult , Wafi Raines MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit March 10, a year ago, Larry Zoller & I went to Wooton's Landing Park (Anne Arundel Co.) for a bird watching morning. It was a snow day, and Larry had always wanted to see the park in the snow. While near the tidal pond, I started sneezing. Every time I sneezed, a dozen or so snipe popped up and flew off. The more I sneezed, the more snipe we saw. Larry was cheering on my sneezing fit as he was enjoying all the snipe flying around. All told, he probably saw over 100 snipe; I was too busy sneezing to bother keeping track. Earlier this week, Larry emailed me and said - Hey, let's try for another Great Snipe Sneeze and make it early enough to see some woodcock. At Friday's Anne Arundel Bird Club meeting, Prez Larry invited folks to join us if they could drag their carcasses to the park by 5:30 AM. This morning, Larry was hoping for a repeat sneezing performance. Unfortunately, I didn't have any sneezes in me and we only saw 4 snipe. However, four hardy souls were treated to a fair number of woodcock (I think it was a life bird for one of the folks). It was cold enough that the frogs didn't drown out the woodcock calls. We heard many woodcock - more than I've ever heard at that location. We were treated to them flying around and being able to hear the whistling of their wings. Occasionally, we would see one as it flew back to the ground. It was one of those times when you wished there was a full moon to illuminate them. It all ended shortly before dawn and the woodcock retreated to the cover of the marsh. We could tell that spring is in the chilly air. Bluebirds were singing. Red-winged Blackbirds were squabbling over territory. A Field Sparrow was singing. Large flocks of Canada Geese were heading north. The Wood Ducks are back. A good morning - even if I didn't sneeze. Good birding, Kathie Lambert ======================================================================= To leave the MDOsprey list, send e-mail to listserv@home.ease.lsoft.com with the following message in line 1: signoff mdosprey ======================================================================= =========================================================================