Hello and thanks to Modospreyers and esp. Norm Saunders who have made this possible. Sunday I actually got to taste the fruits of subscribing to modosprey. After hearing about the good stuff at Ocean City, esp. the harlequin ducks, we finally made it to the Jetty where we saw a guy with a scope to whom we immediately gravitated, along with another birder. Turns out the other birders were modospreyers! -- Elliott and Nancy Kirshbaum and Bill Schreitz -- who helped me find four life birds within a half an hour: 3 white-winged scoters, 5 red-throated loons, gobs of purple sandpipers, and, yes, a gorgeous flock (dozen) of harlequin ducks! That, together with the surf scoter I saw on the Choptank the day before brought the life count to five, not bad for someone who's been birding for 12 years already. An interesting aside: While I was birding the West O.C. Pond, I talked with a Dutchman who is a volunteer at Blackwater NWR. As I told him I had been looking for the smew in Cambridge the day before, he said he very seriously doubted that it was a smew that had been spotted. He said that he had seen smews in Europe and that they were much smaller and more delicate than anything that had been described on the Choptank. He thinks it's probably an oldsquaw with a tail missing or something. Any ideas? I did see an oldsquaw-looking duck with not much tail there through the rain and wind Sat. (and I do this for FUN?) Cheers, Edna Aaron Alexandria, VA (703) 768-5562 _____________________________________________________________________ You don't need to buy Internet access to use free Internet e-mail. Get completely free e-mail from Juno at http://www.juno.com Or call Juno at (800) 654-JUNO [654-5866]