Date: Wed, 16 May 2001 13:47:39 EDT Reply-To: Maryland Birds & Birding Sender: Maryland Birds & Birding From: Marshall Iliff Subject: PACIFIC LOON at Ocean City, Wilson's Phal, other good Eastern Shore birds Comments: cc: voice@capaccess.org MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Hi all, Today 15 May 2001 George Armistead and I had a great day afield in coastal Maryland. We were, at least in part, scouting for a couple runs at the Maryland Big Day record this week Highlight of the day was an alternate-plumaged adult PACIFIC LOON at Ocean City Inlet. We found it at 6:00 p.m. and had brief, distantr looks in poor light until 6:15. On George's cell phone we reached Mark Hoffman who spread the word to Salisbury birders (Sam Dyke, Eric Decker, Don Broderick) who were on the scene by 7:15 p.m., when we refound it after it had been out of view for a period. The bird was more cooperative this time and gave us 45 minutes of good views. At all times the bird was on the far side of the south jetty, and spent much of its time very close to the jetty and this difficult to see over the large rocks. It also periodically strayed very close to the Assateague shore along the jetty and was thus entirely invisible from the Inlet Parking lot. This bird is in nearly complete alternate plumage. It generally appears dark-headed and white chested, with a dark back with two broad rows of white rectangles on the scapular area. The nape is very pale gray and contrasts with a darker mask, and the head profile is distinctove with its "s" shaped head and small bill. The gray nape has some pale streaks, perhaps implying that molt to alternate is not complete. The obscure white streak bordering the dark throat patch was pbarely visible, and we were unable to see the chin band. This, in addition to the fact that the bird showed no white along thwe waterline, led us to believe that Arctic Loon was not a consideration. We did not see a vent strap and could not discern throat color. Although it has been reported in Maryland at least 7 times, Pacific Loon only has one accepted record from the state (Nov 1999 - Conowingo Lake). One previous report fro Worcester 5 Dec 1991 was not documented. We had other nice birds today, including * Adult female WILSON'S PHALAROPE with other shorebirds (1 Lesser Yellowlegs, 2 Greater Yellowlegs, 4 Solitary Sandpipers, 30 Semipalmated Plovers, 25 Semipalmated Sandpiper, 50 Least Sandpiper) in a NEW pond (will be permanent!) off Cedartown Rd., 1.5 mi east of Rte. 113 and just NE of Snow Hill, Worcester County. This pond has been reliable for shorebirds and ibis, though today there was but one Glossy Ibis there. * An incredible concentration of 1060 (!) Black-bellied Plovers, 2 Killdeer, 10 Short-billed Dowitchers, 5 Ruddy Turnstones, 800 Laughing and 100 Ring-billed Gulls, and 5 Cattle Egrets behind a tractor plowing a field at Ironshire Station Rd. and Evans Rd. * Canada Warbler at Furnacetown and Blackburnian Warbler just south of there, the only migrant warblers of the day. * 10 Glossy Ibis, 15 Snowy Egrets, 10 Greater Yellowlegs, 30 Least and 15 Semipalmated Sandpipers at Truitt's Landing Rd. * 1 Bank Swallow, 10 Glossy Ibis, 1 Lesser Yellowlegs, 4 Greater Yellowlegs, and several Northern Bobwhites at north E.A. Vaughn WMA. * 5 Snow Geese at Goody Hill Rd. Pond, 1 Snow Goose, 1 Ruddy Duck, and one male Green-winged Teal at Pocomoke Sewage Plant. * One 1st-w Lesser Black-backed Gull, 2 Ruddy Ducks, 300 peep (65% Least) at Berlin Sewage Plant (sludge on the ponds supports feedign peep). * One Surf Scoter, 25+ Purple Sandpipers, 10 Northern Gannets, 8 Red Knots, three Red-throated and one Common Loon at Ocean City Inlet, along with the guest of honor. * 1 subadult Great Cormorant, Black Skimmers, Royal Terns, Common Terns, and 3 1st-winter Lesser Black-backed Gulls among 2000 1st-w Herring Gulls on Skimmer Island, all seen at about 8:20 p.m. as light was fading. Better birds were surely hidden among those throngs. Best, Marshall Iliff *********************** Marshall Iliff miliff@aol.com Annapolis, MD ************************ ======================================================================= To leave the MDOsprey list, send e-mail to listserv@home.ease.lsoft.com with the following message in line 1: signoff mdosprey ======================================================================= =========================================================================