Ferry Neck & Blackwater NWR, MD, Nov. 24-26, Liz & Harry Armistead.

FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 24, 2006.   

330 Tundra Swans feeding and calling in a big field to the west 3.4 mi. N
of Routes 481 X 309.  325 Ring-billed Gulls in the field S of Rt. 33 at
North Bend Road.   

Rigby's Folly, Armistead property on Ferry Neck, Talbot County, MD, 25124
West Ferry Neck Road near Royal Oak but nearer still to Bellevue. 
2:45-5:30 P.M. only.  Clear, warmish, nearly windless.  A Northern Gannet,
an earliest ever fall date, seen plunge-diving 3 times.  1 ad. Snow Goose. 
1,370 Canada Geese.  4 Gray Squirrels.  3 does and a buck seen over at
Holland Point.  The Olszewski family is hunting deer today, gave us a big
box full of 50 apples.  

SATURDAY, NOV. 25.  55 species.  clear, 46-61, WNW-W-SW 5 but mostly calm,
tide sequence high-low-high.  A red letter day with the following listed
from most unusual to least so:

Brown Pelican 5.  Only the 2nd property record, flying up the Choptank
River.  Only other record was an imm. on Sept. 7, 1996, in the aftermath of
Hurricane Fran.  The many hundreds of times I've looked for them with
several thousand present in the warm months south of here in the central
Chesapeake and this is all there is to show for it.   

Gadwall 2, in the cove all day, a pair, 4th property record.

Golden Eagle, a classic juvenile seen soaring at the head of the cove,
watched, often through the scope, for 15 minutes, nice, distinct white
panels at the base of the primaries and tail, small head, definite
dihedral, and broad-at-the-end, palmate wing tips, a beauty.  Great views. 
7th property record.

Osprey 1.  Latest ever save for singles Dec. 1, 2002, and Dec. 2, 1999.

American Black Duck X Mallard hybrid, 1 male.  No doubt others have been
present but this seems to be the first noted here.

Ruddy Duck 415.  6th  highest count.  Tight group in Irish Creek.

Nothern Gannet 3 adults incl. a first - a bird plunge-diving after sunset -
perhaps an indication they're having no more luck with fish than people are
locally.

Snow Goose 1 adult present all day.

More indications the mouth of the Choptank River may be something of a DEAD
ZONE (???), low numbers or complete misses today:  10 Common Loons, 4
Horned Grebes, 0 Double-crested Cormorants, 2 Tundra Swans, 10 Long-tailed
Ducks, 95 Surf Scoters, 12 Common Goldeneyes, 0 Forster's Terns, 35 Herring
& 1 Laughing gull.  These totals the best that could be done in spite of
the glassy, calm waters and 3 hours spent carefully scopeing the mouth of
the 'Tank.  Sport fishing boats are all out at the mouth of the Choptank
where it meets Chesapeake Bay. 

Also:  16 waterfowl species, 10 of them divers, incl. 4 Greater, 6 Lesser &
20 unID'd scaup, 2 White-winged Scoters, 225 Buffleheads, 1 male Canvasback
(in the cove all day) and 10 Red-breasted Mergansers.  

8 raptors incl. 1 imm. male Northern Harrier and 2 imm. Bald Eagles.

11 Mourning Doves.  1 Great Horned Owl heard from our bed at 5:45 A.M.
right through the storm windows.  All of 1 Cedar Waxwing & 2 Red-winged
Blackbirds.  20 Song, 4 Field & 3 Savannah sparrows.  Field Sparrows have
such a gentle, sweet expression reminding me of redpolls, which are even
more so.

Other critters:  1 Gray Squirrel, 4 does.  BUTTERFLIES:  2 Buckeyes, a
Monarch headed across the Choptank, and 1 Orange Sulphur.  

SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 26.  Blackwater N.W.R. 18 of us on the birdwalk:  Levin
Willey, Linda Schwartz, Gordon Jennings, Paul & Priscilla Thut, Kate
Murphy, Arnold Simon et al.  7:30 A.M. until Noon.  Water in the
impoundments is high.  Another clear, warmish, nearly windless day.  56
species incl.:

8 Double-crested Cormorants still hanging around.  1 late Cattle Egret.  5
imm. Black-crowned Night Herons in the willows of Pool 3C.  1 Great Egret. 
1 adult Ross's Goose.  c. 850 Snow & 275 Blue geese.  30 shovelers.  375
pintails.  3 male Ring-necked Ducks in Pool 1.  1 female Common Merganser
out on the Blackwater River.  20 Bald Eagles.  1 imm. male Cooper's Hawk. 
12 coots.  only 1 Forster's Tern.  70 Mourning Doves.  30 Tree Swallows.  6
meadowlarks.  7 Savannah Sparrows.  

Also:  1 Fox Squirrel.  1 Red-bellied Slider in Pool 5B.      

He's too modest to say so here but I'm not:  Levin Willey's Blackwater
refuge list for 2006 is 194 species.

Malkus Bridge at Cambridge, a Red-throated Loon "upstream".  3 adult Bald
Eagles engage in a chase low and right over Rt. 50 1.5 mi. N of Trappe,
unimpressed with the weekend traffic of a beautiful Sunday afternoon.

Rigby's Folly, 1-4:45 P.M. only.  Species missed yesterday: 1 Eastern
Towhee, 1 House Finch.  1,120 Canada Geese in the cove.  1 imm. Bald Eagle
perched in an oak on the SE corner of Field 4, perhaps attracted by the 2
fresh gut piles nearby where the turnoff goes into Field 6.  1 Eastern
Cottontail, 1 Gray Squirrel.  1 Southern Leopard Frog in the water by the
culvert on the lawn edge.  Yesterday's single male Canvasback joined by 3
females today.  

The section of Field 1 tidied up for Mary's wedding on June 25, when 133
guests assisted by a "support staff" of 21 danced, dined, laughed, and
raised their glasses to toasts under a big, white tent is now, 5 months
later, overgrown with still-flowering asters and Panicum grass, some of it
7 feet high and burdened with seed heads patronized by many hungry Song
Sparrows. 

HEADIN' HOME.  A Gray Squirrel up late, at 5:03 P.M., standing on the edge
of the paved road shoulder section, facing traffic, on Rt. 309 N of Easton,
rsiking being nailed by a Great Horned Owl.  On the same car: "Don't blame
me, I voted for Willie Nelson" and "DOG is my co-pilot."  Wonderful folk
music on Nick Spitzer's NPR program helps melt the miles away.    

Thanks to Ed Kilduff for his information that the many boats I saw 2 weeks
ago scraping were after oysters rather than crabs.

MONDAY, NOVEMBER 27.  9 Gray Squirrels in our backyard here around the
feeders, close to the record.

Best to all.-Henry ("Harry") T. Armistead, 523 E. Durham St., Philadelphia,
PA 19119-1225.  215-248-4120.  Please, any off-list replies to: 
harryarmistead at hotmail dot com  (never, please, to 74077.3176 ....)


"The light, sunny room with its white painted walls was filled with the
creamy light of the golden autumn days that follow the Feast of the
Assumption, when the mornings begin to be frosty and titmice and magpies
dart into the bright-leaved, thinning woods.  On such days the sky is
incredibly high, and through the transparent pillar of air between it and
the earth there moves an icy, dark-blue radiance coming from the north. 
Everything in the world becomes more visible and more audible.  Distant
sounds reach us in a state of frozen resonance, separately and clearly. 
The horizons open, as if to show the whole of life for years ahead.  This
rarified light would be unbearable if it were not so short-lived, coming at
the end of the brief autumn day just before the early dusk."  'Dr. Zhivago'
by Boris Pasternak.