Hi folks,

Elaine and I set out to look for woodcocks on Thur., Friday, and Sat. evenings, and found them in three different counties.  We also birded mostly Caroline Co. on Sat., where we saw our first Ospreys of the season.

On thursday evening, 2 march, we visited a little wooded area along Cabin Branch Creek, next to Burwood Plaza in Ferndale, AA Co., and there we had 6 woodcocks fly by us, but only one was heard vocalizing, and none was displaying.

On Friday evening, we visited Southwest Area Park (Balt. Co.) with Charlie Kucera, and despite the horribly wicked wind, we still manged to see two woodcocks flying from point A to point B, but that was the extent of the show.

On. Sat., we enjoyed driving around Caroline Co., where we saw an Osprey flying over Rte 404 at the Choptank River bridge, just west of Denton, and another Osprey at Martinak State Park.  Out in the water from there were about a dozen Common Mergs.  The Denton Sewerage Ponds had Ring-necked Ducks, Buffleheads and Ruddy Ducks, pretty much as Danny Poet described.  Our nicest collection of ducks was along Skelton _______ Rd., south of Tanyard, where a rill running under the road was flooded, creating a pond that had about a dozen Am. Wigeons and at least as many Green-winged Teal.  At dusk, we drove along Cherry Lane on the eastern edge of Tuckahoe State Park, and heard peents from three different woodcocks.  We then raced over to QA county to see if we could get some there, but we heard or saw none.  Our compensation was a nice Great horned Owl flying across the road, about a quarter mile south of the Tuckahoe Equestrian Center on Rte 481.

Stan Arnold
Glen Burnie