Date: Wed, 24 Jan 2001 17:20:53 -0500 Reply-To: Maryland Birds & Birding Sender: Maryland Birds & Birding From: Fran Saunders Subject: Hi from Charlie Muise Comments: cc: Charlie MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit I asked Charlie to update us on his activities and I am sure you will all enjoy reading about his current situation. Sounds like a great place to visit, and we are really glad that Charlie has settled in well! Fran Saunders MOS Web Site Director Silver Spring, MD http://www.MDBirds.org/ webmaster@MDBirds.org ----- Original Message ----- From: "Charlie" To: "Fran Saunders" Sent: Wednesday, January 24, 2001 3:53 PM Subject: Hi | Hi Fran (and Norm) | | I'm sorry to say that I've not been able to keep up with Maryland | happenings. I set Osprey to nomail a couple months ago, when I just | couldn't keep up with all my mail. I haven't unsubscribed because I | do hope to start getting mail again. I do miss the birding community | up there. | | Birding here tends to be in amazingly beautiful locations, but | doesn't hold the treasure trove of birds that Maryland does. And the | lack of birders here means that it's a lot harder to determine what | sightings are important. For instance I was birding with a local | expert, and I casually mentioned an eagle in the distance, and was | surprised when he got excited. Though eagles are common in TN, they | are unusual where we were, but I never would have known that, and | wouldn't have bothered reporting it. | | The sparrow field I found this fall, which caused a big stir (10 or | 11 species of sparrow in a month's time, in just 20 acres!) has sadly | been bulldozed. There are still some birds there, but only a few | SOSP and SAVS are left. | | My year list is an embarrasingly small 64 species (a number I usually | had by Jan 2 in MD!) and my state list, including fall migration is | only about 115. I plan to remedy some of this with a trip to the | South Carolina coast next week, and a trip to Florida 2 weeks after | that. And if that Smew hangs around in St. Louis... | | I did go to see the Mango in NC, and was happy to meet up with some | MD birders and see lots of familiar names in the guest log. | | This year I did 3 CBC's; 2 here, and I did get up for Ocean City. I | was fortunate enough to have a Northern Saw-whet Owl for the Cades | Cove CBC, which I am told is only the 3rd ever in a TN CBC. Others | have since heard and seen the bird. | | I non-birding news, I am having a blast learning a lot about plants, | moths and herps. This is an amazingly diverse place. My job has me | outside hiking a lot, and during my time off I have hiked about 140 | of the park's 900 miles of trail. I have seen plenty of bears, with | a few sightings of otter and bobcat. I have seen Jordan's | Red-cheeked Salamander, which is endemic to the park. I've been | helping out a bit with the All Taxa Biodiverstiy Inventory (ATBI) | which is a tremendous undertaking to count ALL organisms in the park | - from myxomycetes, to blood-borne bird parasites, to moths. One man | I am assisting sets up a moth trap every week in warm weather. So | far his trap has caught 200 species new to the park, and 2 apparently | new to science. Very exciting stuff, to say the least. | | Well I think that's enough update! | | I hope all is well with you and yours. If you think folks would be | interested, feel free to forward this to Osprey. And if you know of | anyone who's planning a trip to the Smokies and needs a comfy sofa to | crash on, my email hasn't changed. | | ************************************************** | Charlie Muise, Senior Naturalist | Great Smoky Mountains Institute at Tremont | Townsend, TN lat 35 degrees, 38'23" long 83 degrees, 41'22" | ======================================================================= To leave the MDOsprey list, send e-mail to listserv@home.ease.lsoft.com with the following message in line 1: signoff mdosprey ======================================================================= =========================================================================