"Rigby's Folly", Armistead property on Ferry Neck, Talbot County, MD, near
Bellevue.  January 15-17, 2005, Sat.-Mon.  3 days of sleeping in, afternoon
naps, and moderate activity.

Fri., Jan. 14.  An Opossum feeding on something in the driveway at 10:15
P.M.

Sat., Jan. 15.  Mostly overcast and with high haze, temps. 32-41, winds
NW-NE-NW 15 m.p.h. to calm at dusk.  35 species.  Some daffodils up 7-8
inches.  Barest traces of some ice.  Dinner with Michael & Nancy Lytell. 
Tremendous amount of surface water with currents in the drainage ditches.  

1 Horned Grebe.  1 Great Blue Heron.  55 Tundra Swans.  2 black ducks.  810
Surf Scoters.  120 Ruddy Ducks.  3 Bald Eagles.  1 Sharp-shinned  & 1
Cooper's Hawk.  465 Ring-billed Gulls (in a single group roosting in the
cove).  1 Hairy  Woodpecker.  6 bluebirds.  20 robins (in hollies in the
woods).  

BALD EAGLE NESTS:  Nancy Lytell put me onto a new nest in a Loblolly Pine
only 6 feet from the gravel on the driveway on the SE side of Field 6 (F6).
 It is quite inconspicuous, c. 15 feet below the tree's crown.  Some of the
dead limbs in the nest look to be c. 2 inches in diameter.  After
determining no birds were around, I examined the area below the nest and
found no remnants of prey items, eagle feathers, or whitewash.  By way of
contrast another eagle nest in our Woods 2 (W2) that was active 2000-2003
still has some Diamondback Terrapin carapaces underneath it including one
lodged in a sapling about 7 feet off the forest floor ... even though there
is no sign of the nest now.  It remains to be seen if this new nest is
going to be truly active one this year.  The pine it is in is c. 8 feet in
circumference at chest heighth.  An additional nest is in an isolated
loblolly on the east side of Frog Hollow quite easily visible to the south
from Ferry Neck Road.     

Sun., Jan. 16.  Overcast becoming mostly clear, temps. 30-40-35 at dusk,
winds NE-NW 10-15 m.p.h.  37 species.

4,000 Canada Geese (1,300 in the Big Field actively feeding ... on onion
grass?).  8 black ducks.  2 Bald Eagles.  20 Mourning Doves.  4 flickers. 
145 starlings.  40 juncos (not present yesterday).  Also:  8 deer and 3
Gray Squirrels.

Delicious lunch of oyster stew with country ham and pumpkin jam sandwiches.
 In a bureau in the garage I found an active mouse nest composed of
shredded rags and string.  At least 4 mice were in it, furry and appealing,
and pretty well-grown.  I closed the drawer and went to get a bucket to put
them in.  By the time I returned they had disappeared.  

JUMPY BAY DUCKS.  A very fine flight of restless diving ducks (10 species),
mostly at dusk, including:  60 Canvasbacks.  4 Redheads.  1 Greater Scaup
(a cripple).  45 Lesser Scaup.  30 Long-tailed Ducks.  1,160 Surf Scoters
(new high count for here in winter).  165 Common Goldeneye.  110
Buffleheads.  1 Red-breasted Merganser.  25 Ruddy Ducks.  The goldeneye
were flying north up Irish Creek.  The scoters were far out in the Choptank
River mouth, also flying north.  Stayed out until 6 P.M. watching the
waterfowl into the last light.

"The tangled bine stems scored the sky
Like strings of broken lyres.
And all mankind that haunted nigh
Had sought their household fires."-
Thomas Hardy, 'The Darkling Thrush.

I was glad to seek mine at 6 P.M., a nice blaze of small Red Cedar, Black
Locust, Black Walnut, and American Hackberry logs.  I love this poem,
although it is almost comically morbid and overstated at times.  But
Hardy's powerful image of a lyre with busted strings is a great foil for
the end of his poem in which his thrush, contrastingly, IS able to make
music and sing in the face of a grim winter dusk and "fling his soul
against the growing gloom.":

"That I could think there trembled through 
His happy goodnight air 
Some blessed hope whereof he knew 
And I was unaware." 

Getting into the spirit of things, it was nice to hear a couple of Carolina
Wrens singing in the very cold, very windy morning on Monday.  I have the
advanced proof sheets of a fine new book on bird songs by Donald Kroodsma:
"The singing life of birds: the art and science of listening to bird song"
(Houghton Mifflin, April 4, 1005, to be 496 pages, includes an extensive
CD, $28.00).  In this he has a chapter entitled "She also sings" in which
he discusses Carolina Wren, Northern Cardinal, and Barred Owl, whose
females vocalize as well as the males.  It is heartening to hear the
Carolinas singing in mid-winter.         

Mon., Jan. 17.  Fair, windy, winds NW 20-25 m.p.h., temps. 25-31 degrees F.
 Very cold.  Much ice in the fields and ditches.

Didn't do much birding today.  Cleaned out the Pump House.  3 Bald Eagles
including 1 that has a dark terminal band on the tail plus several dark
central retrices but otherwise seems to be in full adult plumage.  I saw
what must be the same bird yesterday also.  The Ring-billed Gull flock that
has been resting in the cove, c. 440 yesterday, is down to  310 today.  Why
these birds rest on the very choppy waters of the cove exposed to the full
blast of the NW near-gale winds is curious.  9 deer including 6 does and 3
small, spikey bucks with 2, 2 and 3 points.     

Not one Myrtle Warbler the whole time.  The lush growths of turnips on one
of the manure piles still look like edible plants.  Jared Sparks cooked
some last fall.  Liz did some in December.  The Olszewskis planted them for
the deer, which seem to have ignored them.
 
Best to all.-Harry Armistead, 523 E. Durham St., Philadelphia, PA
19119-1225.  215-248-4120.  Please, any off-list replies to: