Date: Sun, 7 May 2000 01:21:13 -0400 Reply-To: Maryland Birds & Birding Sender: Maryland Birds & Birding From: Phil Davis Subject: A Railidae Day in Maryland Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"; format=flowed Not a bad day ... 7 species of Railidae ... including 16 rails of five species, a moorhen, and a coot ... Barbara and I started off this afternoon (yes, afternoon ... we're not morning people, remember ...) to search for a few Maryland targets ... SANDY POINT STATE PARK (ANNE ARUNDEL COUNTY). First stop was to take Jim Stasz's advice and look for Nelson's Sharp-tailed Sparrows. Beautiful weather meant lots of people ... no Nelson's, but did hear a SORA calling in the cattail pond between South and East beaches. ST MICHAEL'S, TALBOT COUNTY. Next stop, several places south of Saint Michael's to try to "close out" Prairie Warbler ... no luck, too late in the day, no prior arrangements to get into the Audubon Sanctuary at Bozman. Oh well, lunch at the Crab Claw in St. Michael's was good. Tried several likely habitat plots along Rt 331 for the Prairie Warb ... too much traffic, too noisy ... no luck. EASTON WTP, TALBOT COUNTY. Decided to drop into the Easton WTP Lagoon No Prairie Warb, but lot of good birds, including ... 5 Rudy Ducks 1 Pied-billed Grebe (calling) 22 Wood Ducks (4 adults, 19 young) 1 Green Heron 2 Mute Swans (courtship displays) 3 American Black Ducks 2 Lesser Yellowlegs 1 Common Snipe 2 Least Bitterns (!) 2 Blue-winged Teal, and ... 1 AMERICAN COOT 1 COMMON MOORHEN 2 SORA 2 BLACK RAILS (as we were leaving, they were on the southeast side of the fence. First we heard the distinctive "growl" call and then the ki-ki-keeer. Listened to them repeatedly for about a minute. This was at 7:05pm - still light !!! ELLIOTT ISLAND (DORCHESTER COUNTY). Buoyed by this rail success, we made a spur of the moment decision to head to Elliott Island to try and pick up a state Yellow Rail. No luck on the yellow, but here's what we did get within two hours in the marsh (from 9:30pm to 11:30pm): 2 VIRGINIA RAILS 1 CLAPPER RAIL 1 KING RAIL 7 BLACK RAILS ... they were all calling on their own ... this was without any audio lures. The only luring we were doing was for Yellow Rail. On the marsh, the night temp was in the 72-74 degree range, winds were light to clam. Mosquitoes were not too bad (with appropriate clothes and bug juice). On the way back, heard Chuck-wills-widows calling at Henrys Crossroad (but not Whips!). A good day ... Phil ================================== Phil Davis Davidsonville, Maryland USA mailto:PDavis@ix.netcom.com ================================== ======================================================================= To leave the MDOsprey list, send e-mail to listserv@home.ease.lsoft.com with the following message in line 1: signoff mdosprey ======================================================================= =========================================================================