Date: Wed, 3 Jan 2001 19:58:04 EST Reply-To: Maryland Birds & Birding Sender: Maryland Birds & Birding From: Paul O'Brien Subject: Northern Shrike MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit I, too, saw the Shrike today (1/3) at about 3 PM. I believe the pinkish hue that Stan Arnold saw at sunset was the result of the low angle of the light which scatters out the blue wave lengths and shifts the remaining light to the red end of the spectrum. I saw the Shrike in full sunlight on one of the sycamores and the breast was clean white with extremely fine gray feather edges, producing a subtle scalloped effect. Also noted was the white rump and the narrow mask, the upper edge of which ran through the eye, while the lower edge ran beneath the eye. The mask did not cross over the upper mandible. I had been there for about 1/2 hour when the three Mockingbirds in the vicinity began to get restless. One of them flew from the nearby hedgerow to the right hand sycamore and landed a few feet below the shrike, which I had not seen arrive because I was looking at the Mockingbirds. Perhaps they are sentinel species. Again, kudos to Dave Czaplak for finding this long-sought county bird and for nailing down the pattern of its habits for us. Paul O'Brien Rockville, Mont. Co., MD pobrien776@aol.com ======================================================================= To leave the MDOsprey list, send e-mail to listserv@home.ease.lsoft.com with the following message in line 1: signoff mdosprey ======================================================================= =========================================================================