Date: Thu, 3 Jul 2003 09:39:53 -0400 Reply-To: Maryland Birds & Birding Sender: Maryland Birds & Birding From: Stan Arnold Subject: Willow Flycatcher at UMBC, etc. Comments: cc: Charles Kucera , Karin Readel , Sandy Parker , Kevin Omland , Mark Hollis , Bryan MacKay MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Hi Folks, Having been washed out of doing any atlasing last evening with the sometimes heavy rain, I was out before dawn this morning making up for lost time. The pre-dawn visit to UMBC's Conservation and Environmental Research Area (CERA) was productive as I heard, then saw (about 5:45 a.m.) a WILLOW FLYCATCHER, continuously singing its "Fitz-bew." It was first perched near the northern Storm Water Pond (in the Relay NW atlas block), then flew north through some small trees and tall grass (into the Balt. West SW block). This is a new bird for the UMBC Bird List. The bird was found near the loop at the end of Research Park Drive, off of UMBC drive, off of I-195. At the end of this loop is a rise with many small trees and lots of tall grass, where the Willow was singing. Other sightings on campus included a WOODCOCK, that flew over my head, and BLUE GROSBEAK singing south of the Research building near the edge of the woods. About ten days ago Charlie Kucera and I watched a pair of GREEN HERONs building a nest in one of the storm water ponds, and one of them was seen this morning perched on the outflow structure. At Pig Pen Pond, a hen WOOD DUCK was in the company of two ducklings, now almost the size of the mother. Yesterday, at Halethorpe Pond #3, south of the Patapsco River in AA Co., I checked the PROTHONOTARY WARBLER nest box that Charlie and I put at the pond's edge last year. For the second year in a row, the box had Prothonotary eggs, but for the second year in a row, they will not hatch. Last year I think the female disappeared, perhaps by predation. This year, the box was inundated by the excessive flooding of the Patapsco River two or so weeks ago, and when I checked, the eggs were obviously lifeless, and covered with silt. The CERA at UMBC continues to be alive with bird activity, and a great source of atlas discoveries. 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 ======================================================================= =========================================================================