Date: Mon, 27 Aug 2001 17:07:26 -0400 Reply-To: Maryland Birds & Birding Sender: Maryland Birds & Birding From: Stan Arnold Subject: Assateague Island, Sat., 8/25 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Hi Folks, On Saturday, 25 Aug, Joan DeCarli and I spent some time birding Assateague Island, mostly in the Off-Road-Vehicle (ORV) zone. There were no surprises for the outing, except for the fortuitous encounter with Iliff, Haffner, et al, amidst their first August big day run. They had fresh intel of Mark Hoffman's Lark Sparrow sighting, so Joan and I were able to captialize on that bird, once it was located by the four-man swat team spreading out and scouring the area immediately north of the state park parking area. The only big differences between this outing and my Assateague visit with Mark Hoffman ten days earlier was that we found no migrant passerines today (but then again we didn't even look following the poor findings of the big-dayers), and the fact that Sandwich Terns were present in good numbers, whereas Mark and I couldn't buy a Sandwich Tern ten days ago. A summary of the birds, excluding gulls and common residents (catbird, C. Wren, etc.): Bayside: Green Heron 1 (only one of day) Glossy Ibis 1 Semi Sandpiper 2 Least Sandpiper 7 Brown Thrasher 1 State Park Lark Sparrow, imm Beach in ORV zone: Brown Pelican 14 DC Cormorant 2 BB Plover 8 Am. Oystercatcher 2 Willet 37 Whimbrel 8 Ruddy Turnstone 7 Sanderling 1000+ Royal Tern 165 Sandwich Tern 26 Common Tern 90 Forster's Tern 5 Fox Hills Level (access using crossover #10) Great Egret 1 Snowy Egret 1 BB Plover 35 Semi Plover 20 Spotted Sandpiper 2 Ruddy Turnstone 1 Sanderling 3 Semi Sandpiper 2 Least Sandpiper 40 Pectoral Sandpiper 1 SB Dowitcher 1 Royal Tern 150 Sandwich Tern 2 Common Tern 15 Forster's Tern 20 Hungerford Flats (access using crossover #4) Great Egret 15 Snowy Egret 25 Little Blue Heron 14 (various stages of moult) Tricolored Heron 28 Glossy Ibis 19 Am. Black Duck 3 Osprey 1 N. Harrier 1 BB Plover 8 Greater Yellowlegs 6 Lesser Yellowlegs 1 Semi Sandpiper 1 Least Sandpiper 94 SB Dowitcher 2 Caspian Tern 11 Royal Tern 6 Sandwich Tern 2 Forster's Tern 34 Not too much exciting out there, but it was a beautiful day to be on the island, with enough breeze to keep the mosquitoes off for a while. 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 ======================================================================= =========================================================================