Date: Sat, 30 Sep 2000 18:17:03 -0400 Reply-To: Maryland Birds & Birding Sender: Maryland Birds & Birding From: Stan Arnold Subject: Eared Grebes; Snow Goose Migration; Am. Bittern MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Hi Folks, Along with many other birders, I found myself at Assateauge this morning, camping the night, and starting out before daylight. Warblers were dismal for me. Really the only birds of interest were several woodcocks flushed from the roadside during morning twilight, a dozen or so bobwhites, and an AMERICAN BITTERN flying over the road into the Bayside campgrounds. For me, running into birders such as Jim Stasz, Marshall Illiff and Wade Stephens was more interesting than the birds themselves. Early afternoon at Hurlock proved to be much more interesting birdwise than Assateague. Snow Goose migration has begun, and besides the two summer residents, there were an additional 21 Snows among the two-to-three hundred Canadas. There were two EARED GREBEs present, in the far cell, but I didn't see either one of them until I walked completely in back of the cell (quite a hike) and had the sun to my back. Unlike my experience with one a week ago, these birds both stayed on top of the water, and I had excellent looks at them. Four Black-bellied Plovers and a Sanderling were also of interest there. The tally: Pied-billed Grebe 2 Eared Grebe 2 Great Blue Heron 1 Great Egret 1 Snowy Egret 2 Green Heron 1 Snow Goose 23 Canada Goose 250 Am. Wigeon 2 Mallard 5 N. Shoveler 100 Green-winged Teal 1 Ruddy Duck 50 Black-bellied Plover 4 Greater Yellowlegs 1 Sanderling 1 Semipal. Sandpiper 1 peep, sp. 3 Pectoral Sandpiper 3 Laughing Gull 1000 Common? Tern 3 (juvenile terns with dark bills, slight red at base; dark red legs, brown on primaries and tail) Stan Arnold Glen Burnie blackrail@earthlink.net ======================================================================= To leave the MDOsprey list, send e-mail to listserv@home.ease.lsoft.com with the following message in line 1: signoff mdosprey ======================================================================= =========================================================================