During my lunchtime walk around Schoolhouse Pond, I flushed out an adult 
Yellow-crowned Night Heron from the trees at the water's edge on the back 
side of the pond.  The bird was located in a tree on the right hand side 
of the boardwalk that leads to the observation platform at the rear of the 
pond.  Apparently, as soon as I set foot on the boardwalk, the bird 
flushed out of the tree and I saw it in flight as it passed over the 
backside of the pond and than off in the general direction of Brown 
Station Road (to the northwest).  The bird called repeatedly as it took 
off, a higher pitched squawk than the Black-crowned Night Herons that are 
sometimes along the water's edge here.  

Fred Shaffer
Patuxent MOS