Date: Wed, 23 Aug 2000 21:13:56 EDT Reply-To: Maryland Birds & Birding Sender: Maryland Birds & Birding From: Matt Hafner Subject: Excellent day in Harford MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit For my last day birding in Harford before I go off to the University of MD Dave Powell and I started off the morning in Bosley Conservancy. It was pretty slow, but we did find Canada and Redstart. Then we went to Harford Glen hoping for better luck. We lucked out with Canada, Black-and-white, Hooded, Chestnut-sided, and 2 Least Flycatchers. Then we went down to some flats at Otter Point Creek and were treated to a juv. Black Tern flying around. At this point Dave went home and I left for Havre de Grace. I stopped by Perryman and found a Hooded Merganser being harassed by a Cooper's hawk in the pond in the field. This bird has been present since June. I finally made it to Tydings to find two Black Terns on the flats with one Common Tern. Then two peeps drew my attention. One was sitting on a rock and the other on the grass mat. The bird on the grass was a semipalmated sandpiper while the one on the rock was a long-winged peep. Having neither Baird's or White-rumped on my county list, I was happy to identify the bird as long-winged peep sp. Then everything on the flats was scared by an eagle and the shorebirds took off. I stayed on the shorebirds and was able to see that the long-winged peep had a dark rump!!!! Baird's!!!!! County Bird!!! I was VERY happy at this point. The peeps then left along with more than half of the Forster's terns and the Blacks. About 15 minutes later, Marshall Iliff showed up very disappointed that he missed the Baird's since he had been at the flats earlier in the day. We did locate another Black Tern and the Common again. Only Leasts and Semis were on the flats along with 1 Greater Yellowlegs. We watched until the flats were gone and took another trip up to Harford Glen. To our list earlier in the day, we added Magnolia, Black-throated Green, and Bay-breasted (another County bird!). Then we took a short trip to Lakeside Ponds to find 5 Glossy Ibis hiding in the grass!!!! To find these birds: As you enter Lakeside, drive until the road bends right. Park and walk over the hill on the left side of the road. The birds were in this "hidden" pond. After that we headed down to Edgewood Arsenal and found more small flocks of birds. We added a Black-and-white to Marshall's county list for a closeout. We also found a Blue-winged Warbler that gave good views. Then to complete the day we went back to Bosley to see if there was any changeover from the morning. It was just as slow with the exception of a good view of a Yellow-bellied Flycatcher!! What a way to end the day! I went home happy with my County list standing at 234 and my County Year list at 205. I think Marshall got 9 county birds to complete his day. Hopefully I will be able to come home from college every so often for some birding. Matt Hafner Bel Air, MD ======================================================================= To leave the MDOsprey list, send e-mail to listserv@home.ease.lsoft.com with the following message in line 1: signoff mdosprey ======================================================================= =========================================================================