Date: Fri, 28 Mar 2003 05:54:47 -0500 Reply-To: Maryland Birds & Birding Sender: Maryland Birds & Birding From: Stan Arnold Subject: Halethorpe Ponds on thur., 3/27 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Hi Folks, I visited eight of the 14 "Halethorpe Ponds" yesterday afternoon, most of them for the first time ever. Not a lot of variety, but a few Spring arrivals. Most of the ponds are sterile (of life, not trash), but a couple are wild and interesting. They mostly lie along the south side of the Patapsco River in northern Anne Arundel Co but a few, including the biggest, are in Baltimore Co. I met Charlie Kucera at the latter, to view woodcocks. The tally, by county: Anne Arundel Co.: DC Cormorant--2 (pond #10) Great Egret--2 (pond #10) Wood Duck--1 male (pond #10) Gadwall--15 (pond #10) Mallard--most ponds N. Shoveler--(2 pair in pond #9, one pair in pond #10) Tree Swallow--5 (pond #14) Baltimore Co., all at ponds 4&5 which are adjacent to each other, and I collectively call the "Big Halethorpe Pond": Pied-billed Grebe--1 Gadwall--14 Mallard Am. Woodcock--at least five males peenting and displaying. Three or four good flight displays were seen, many others were heard. The woodcocks roost in the thickets along the fence separating (Patapsco Valley) park property from I-895, adjacent to the powerlines. They can be seen/heard almost anywhere along the nice gravel road that follows underneath the powerlines. First peent came at about 6:50 this evening, and continued for at least 20 minutes. This area can be accessed by taking Alt US 1 (Washington St.), and turning south onto Halethorpe Farms Rd., to its end. Park along the curb here, and walk through the gate, and along the path under I-895, to the ponds and powerlines. Pond #9 is north of the Oregon Business Park in N. AA Co., and can be viewed from there (this time of year), but is not accessible from there. Perhaps it can be reached from Snyder's Restaurant on Hammonds Ferry Rd., next to the beltway. Pond #10 is accessible from the Patapsco Business Park, and is on the west side of the BW Parkway. Stan Arnold Glen Burnie dy.dx@verizon.net ======================================================================= To leave the MDOsprey list, send e-mail to listserv@home.ease.lsoft.com with the following message in line 1: signoff mdosprey ======================================================================= =========================================================================