Carroll County Crossbill Report: 12/21

Phil Davis (pdavis@ix.netcom.com)
Sun, 21 Dec 1997 19:38:03 -0500 

No White-wings ... if that's all you're interested in, you can "delete" now
<grin>.

I arrived at the Baltimore City Watershed Office location on Oakland Road
around noon today, Sunday, December 21.  Steve Stanford was just leaving.
He had a flock of 6-7 crossbills just south of here at the boat launch area
earlier in the morning.  At least one of his birds was a Red Crossbill.
(Steve returned several times during the afternoon).

I checked out the area for about an hour.  Plenty of Red-breasted
Nuthatches, a few Yellow-rumped Warblers, and plenty of Paridae ... oppps,
I mean Poecilea and Baeolophus(es?).

Mark Hoffman arrived at 1 pm and about 1:30 we had our first flock of Red
Crossbills.  Did not hear them arrive, just found them in the white pines
between the Watershed office and the house (all within the chain link
compound) on the south side of the road).  There were 2 m, 2 f/imm, and 2
?.  T hey stayed for about 10 minutes.

About 10 minutes later (around 1:50) we picked up a small flock of three
birds: 1 m, 2 f/imm.  They left about 2:05.

Around 2:20, we had four more (2 m, 2 f/imm).  They stayed for about 5
minutes.

Around 2:50, a flock of about 9 birds flew down the road (from the west).
A few stayed in view, feeding, for about 10 minutes.  The rest went
somewhere else (?)

At 3:15, a flock of 6 flew by, coming out of the east.

Finally, at 3:55, a flock of about 6-8 appeared flying overhead, they
circled the area several times, increasing in numbers with each circle.
brought the total up to about 18, and on the the final circle, I counted
22-24 birds.  They finally flew out of view to the north.

At no time did we hear or see anything that appeared to be a white-winged.

We left at 4:15.

Hope this helps!

Phil



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Phil Davis

home:	PDavis@ix.netcom.com	Davidsonville, Maryland, USA
work:	PDavis@OAO.com		Greenbelt,     Maryland, USA
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