Date: Sun, 4 Jan 2004 17:07:46 EST Reply-To: Maryland Birds & Birding Sender: Maryland Birds & Birding From: Rick Sussman Subject: Sugarloaf CBC, Area 1 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Hi all, My small sector of the Sugarloaf CBC is along the C&O Canal from Dickerson Conservation area up to the mouth of the Monocacy river area. The walk along the canal is really quite nice, (except for that darned power plant in view for much of the time). Lots of woodpeckers (except Red-headed), good numbers of bluebirds and yellow-rumps, and all the regular winter woodland birds but Winter Wren. Raptors were unusually scarce though, as were vultures until late morning. My best birds were my first ever COMMON RAVEN for Montgomery County, flying alone over a field heading basically towards the power plant area in early afternoon, an adult Bald Eagle flying across the powerline cut before the conservation area with a pair of Turkey Vultures, and a very last minute American Kestrel conjured up right as I was getting ready to quit, right at the edge of my territory. I was being chauffered around by my wife, and hopping in and out of the car trying to reach 45 species for the day, when I complained that I just wanted 5 more minutes, and maybe a kestrel would show up (we were in very appropriate habitat). Suddenly my eyes caught sight of a falcon flying into my territory from beyond, and on my side of the car. I quickly jumped out, walking up the road as I followed the flying bird into countable territory while my wife turned the car around. Must've been karma! I finished the day with a big grin on my face... Rick Sussman Ashton,MD warblerick@aol.com ======================================================================= To leave the MDOsprey list, send e-mail to listserv@home.ease.lsoft.com with the following message in line 1: signoff mdosprey ======================================================================= =========================================================================