Date: Fri, 1 Nov 2002 15:34:20 -0500 Reply-To: Maryland Birds & Birding Sender: Maryland Birds & Birding From: "Paul P." Subject: Misc DC sightings Comments: To: "Hilton, Rob" , Janni Ottavio , Jason Berry , John Hubbell MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Yesterday (Thurs, 10/31) I went to the Mary Ripley garden to look for the Ovenbird that Jim Felley reported. I didn't find it, but did see 1 female COMMON YELLOWTHROAT, 2 HERMIT THRUSH, and 1 GRAY CATBIRD. Today (Fri, 11/1) I hit a couple of spots in DC (Hains Pt, West Potomac Park, Anacostia River Park (ARP), and Kenilworth Park(KP)), and found it to be incredibly birdy. I found 64 species over a few hours, without really trying. Here are the highlights: 1 imm. male NORTHERN HARRIER (ARP) all 3 falcons - PEREGRINE on the RR bridge (finally back after being gone since the end of June), MERLIN at Hains, & AM. KESTREL at KP plus B. Eagle, 2 accipters and 2 buteos made for a relatively large raptor count 1 1st winter BONAPARTE'S GULL ( KP) 3000+ LAUGHING GULL (ARP) - huge numbers, alas no Franklin's 3 N. ROUGH-WINGED SWALLOWS (ARP) 27 AMERICAN PIPITS (KP) - I think this was my highest count ever for DC 1 GRASSHOPPER SPARROW (at KAG, seen from KP) 1 imm WHITE-CROWNED SPARROW (Hains) 1 EASTERN MEADOWLARK (KP) The Grasshopper Sparrow threw me for a loop. It was in small tree at the edge of the marsh, and was very brightly colored (lots of buff below and in the face), with smudgy streaks across the breast and more well defined streaks down the flanks. Still, the strong eye ring, lack of gray auriculars, and white central crown stripe pointed to Grasshopper as much as I tried to turn it into something rarer. I'm sure I missed some other good birds. Oh well, Rob H. will probably find them while I'm away this weekend. Good birding, Paul P. Arlington, VA cheep@erols.com ======================================================================= To leave the MDOsprey list, send e-mail to listserv@home.ease.lsoft.com with the following message in line 1: signoff mdosprey ======================================================================= =========================================================================