I know this is not about Maryland birds, but I was at Bombay Hook today
(where the renovated women's room is really nice!) and saw a note on the
sighting list that snow buntings were in the Shearness parking lot at 9:00 a.m.
I didn't get to Shearness until 1:00, and when I saw four cars in the
little pull-off lot
I figured I was too late as usual, but there were two people lying on the
ground with
huge scopes and telephoto lenses, and I'll be darned, they were
photographing two
snow buntings, scrounging in the gravel. I got out of the car to take some
photos (very old film, so I am not optimistic about that), other people got out
to take photos, cars drove by, and the little birds just kept searching for
food.
They were still there a half hour later when I left the refuge, surrounded by
paparazzi.

Is this normal for snow buntings? Are they always so tame or at least uncaring
about how close people get to them? They seemed almost completely
oblivious about the close observers. We were within ten feet of them. They
never
flew--just stretched their wings periodically.

They're life birds for me!

FYI, other birds included Canada and snow geese as you would expect,
northern shovelers,
pintails, at least one pied-billed grebe, green-winged teal, lots of
harriers, and
what I am pretty sure were savannah sparrows (lots of streaks, pink legs,
greeny-yellow line above the eye). There were two small diving ducks
in Raymond pool that I think were goldeneyes but they were really far away.
Also shorebirds, don't ask what kind because they all look alike to me,
herons, as usual. Supposedly there's a Lapland longspur out there, too, but
I didn't see it.



--Pat

Pat Valdata, Elkton, MD | 
"The natural function of the wing is to soar upwards
and carry that which is heavy up to the place where dwells the race of gods.
More than any other thing that pertains to the body
it partakes of the nature of the divine." --Plato