Three of us went birding on Sunday and were lucky enough to find/see our 
target birds, the Common Raven (2 adults bring food to the nest and 
movement in the nest while the adults were gone) in Frederick County, and 
Wilson's Snipe at Lilypons and at Hughes Hollow in Montgomery County. It 
was interesting to me that outside of the usual large numbers of the 
various black birds, the largest numbers of birds we saw at both Lilypons 
and Hughes Hollow were Wood Ducks and Wilson's Snipe. As reported earlier 
by Jim Stasz, we saw about 30 Wilson's Snipe at Lilypons. At Hughes Hollow, 
we saw about 20. At Lilypons, we estimated about 30 Wood Ducks and at 
Hughes Hollow about 50.

When leaving Sycamore Landing Road we stopped near the one-lane bridge 
which turned out to be very birdy and from a distance we heard a Barred 
Owl. Then at Hughes Hollow there was a second Barred Owl (from a different 
direction than the first). At the end of the day at Hughes Hollow, we had 
our first Blue-Gray Gnatcatcher.

There were signs posted stating that Wild Turkey Season opens on April 15 
through May 23.

Marcy Stutzman
Russett, MD