Hi All,

A group of eight Kent Countians toured the Chesapeake Farms area Saturday morning, 19 March. Walter had gotten permission from farm manager Mark Conner to tour the currently-closed auto tour, affording access to woods and ponds usually off-limits at this time of year. The main viewing pond near Chesapeake Farms headquarters off Ricauds Branch Rd had the best waterfowl diversity of the day, with satisfying looks at Northern Shoveler, Northern Pintail, Gadwall, Mallard, and more distant American Wigeon, Ring-necked and Ruddy Ducks. The ponds along the auto tour hosted mostly Mallards, with a few Wood Ducks and a pair of Hooded Mergansers on the large water-willow-filled impoundment and good numbers of rather flighty Green-winged Teal scattered around. A welcome sight over several ponds were our first Tree Swallows of the year, skimming about in the bright sunshine. A walk in the woods bordering Route 445 was fairly quiet, aside from a Red-shouldered Hawk and a pair of Barred Owls responding vigorously to Walter's hooting. The best passerines of the day were about a dozen White-crowned Sparrows in hedgerows along the auto tour. We ended the trip with a quick visit to Shipyard Landing, where distant scaup were visible beyond the recently re-occupied Osprey nest. The Common Mergansers that had been present have apparently taken advantage of the same conditions that have seen many geese head north the past few days. A quick check of the pond near Edesville that others had found an Eurasian Wigeon on last weekend yielded only a dozen or so American Wigeon. The outing finished with 53 species for the day.

Good Birding,

Nancy Martin & Walter Ellison

23460 Clarissa Road
Chestertown, MD 21620
phone: 410-778-9568
e-mail: 

"A person who is looking for something doesn't travel very fast" - E. B. White (in "Stuart Little")

"Are there *ever* enough birds?" - Connie Hagar as quoted by Edwin Way Teale in "Wandering through Winter"