Hi Folks,

Following many weeks of daily observation, Brian Sykes has released several of his photos of the complete nesting cycle of the Brown Creepers, whose nest was discovered along the Patapsco River near the Halethorpe Farms Pond in late March.  Three young were seen fledging on the day of the May Count, Sat., 13 May 2006.  There had been a total of seven eggs seen in the nest.

According to the "Atlas of the Breeding Birds of Maryland..." (the compilation of the results from the 1980s atlas project) the contents of a Brown Creeper nest had never been documented in Maryland.  This is certainly a momentous occasion for the breeding bird atlas project, particularly in light of the scarcity of confirmations for this species during the current atlas.

Charlie Kucera has been kind enough to scan Sykes' photos, and place them on the website that he created to document birds and nesting, particularly at UMBC and other parts of the Relay NW and NE atlas blocks.  To view some selected photos of the creeper nesting, go to

http://home.us.net/ckucera/browncreeper.htm

 

and then click on the "rest of the story" for the remaining photos.



Stan Arnold

Glen Burnie