Date: Sun, 1 Jul 2001 12:26:39 EDT Reply-To: Maryland Birds & Birding Sender: Maryland Birds & Birding From: Rick Sussman Subject: Kinder Farm Park Comments: To: voice@capaccess.org MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Hello, A friend and I visited Kinder Farm Park this morning (Sunday, July1), arriving fairly early to beat the heat (just before 8 AM). We got to the area around box #9 after lingering over some good finds along the paved hiker-biker trail (Yellow-breasted Chats, and a Yellow-billed Cuckoo right beside the trail). Very soon we began to hear the Clay-colored Sparrow singing, but could not locate it. I walked down the trail a bit and spished and out flew two birds, on and over into a small shrubby tree. One was a Field Sparrow and the other was the Clay-colored. They flew again before my friend could spot them (a lifer for him), away into heavy cover. Shortly he heard the song coming from its original location, and we both soon found the bird perched in the top of a small tree, singing its heart out. From then on it was a game of chase, as we saw it fly from one area to another, stop and sing, then fly back to near its original location. We were able to get it in his Nikon fieldmaster scope long enough for him to get some really fine looks before we abandoned it to find what other goodies we could. Right now this area of the park is alive with Indigo Buntings, Blue Grosbeaks (a male of each were perched in the top of the same small tree right next to each other, briefly, but long enough for scope views), as well as many Yellow-breasted Chats and Common Yellowthroats. Lots of butterflys around too, along with swallows, bluebirds, Cedar Waxwings, all three Mimidae, and Baltimore Orioles. This was only my second visit to this park, but I have found it to be very nice; great habitat, nicely laid out, very user friendly and easy to get to. I would like to re-visit some time during migration to see what is about. Since the heat/humidity got bad early, we left by 10:15 or so, and got home by about 11, but still had a very rewarding morning of summer birding! Rick Sussman Ashton, Montgomery County, MD warblerick@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 ======================================================================= =========================================================================