Date: Thu, 10 Apr 2003 22:37:26 -0400 Reply-To: Maryland Birds & Birding Sender: Maryland Birds & Birding From: Henry Armistead <74077.3176@COMPUSERVE.COM> Subject: Blackwater & Ferry Neck April 10 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Disposition: inline April 10, 2003, Thursday. Overcast to fair to overcast, 40 - 52 - 44 degrees F., winds NE 20-40 m.p.h. Ever notice how March winds go from mid-February until mid-April? Mostly tended my boat today, oversaw installation of power winch and wiring, got permits, chatted with the folks at Gootees Marine. Napped through the war news at Bob Smith's GM dealership in Easton. Not much time for birding and the gale winds didn't help. Blackwater N.W.R. 7:30-8:00 A.M. only. Green-winged Teal 285. Gadwall 23 (actually, a good count for here). Ring-necked Duck 5 (Pool 1). Common Merganser 3 (on Blackwater River, as usual). Bald Eagle 7. Greater Yellowlegs 20. Caspian Tern 8. "Rigby's Folly", Armistead property on Ferry Neck, Talbot County, MD, near Bellevue. 2:30 - 6:15 P.M. Common Loon 4 (2 of them chowing down on ... you guessed it ... Hogchokers). Horned Grebe 10. gannet 0. All of 4 Canada Geese. Wood Duck 4 (1 pair swimming in our driveway ditch, which I've never seen previously, to give you some idea of how much surface water there is). Green-winged Teal 2 drakes. Surf Scoter 145 (most in Irish Creek, unusual but they must have been looking for a protected lee area; mostly drakes, including one in our cove, where I have never seen them before). Bufflehead 40. Bald Eagle 3 (a bird that can handle today's high winds). Herring Gull 185. An Osprey dive-bombed an adult eagle several times. Also: 9 deer (does). 2 Eastern Cottontail bunny wabbits (Peter Cottontail and Thumper, doing their Easter warm-ups). Gray Squirrel 1 (Squirrel Nutkin, not to be outdone ... can scamper with the best of them). Hawthorns are bloomin' all over the place. Lots of white blossoms in the scrubby areas. Lawn has been cut for the first time. Sat in the old chair at Lucy Point in the sun and out of the wind overlooking the Choptank River for a couple of hours, dozed off several times. Scoters in close. Driving home along Route 301 to Delaware at dusk is little Serengeti with numerous groups of deer (but no mega-predators, alas) easing cautiously out of the woods to feed in the fields ("And the little things creep out to patch themselves hovels in the marred shadow of your gift" - T. E. Lawrence) Best to all.-Harry Armistead (soon to be reincarnated with special birding hearing aids; Grasshopper Sparrows, here I come!), 523 E. Durham St., Philadelphia, PA 19119-1225. 215-248-4120. Please, any off-list replies to: harryarmistead@hotmail.com ======================================================================= To leave the MDOsprey list, send e-mail to listserv@home.ease.lsoft.com with the following message in line 1: signoff mdosprey ======================================================================= =========================================================================