Hi All,

We had bookshop duty at Eastern Neck NWR yesterday. So we birded our way 
home after we closed up shop (still on winter hours for now: 11 to 3). 
The waterfowl are on the move, it's pretty clear that the goose flocks 
have been getting slimmer on a steady diet of departures for the north, 
and numbers are in flux for most of the other species. Nonetheless we 
had 23 waterfowl species. Highlights were our first BLUE-WINGED TEAL of 
the year on the shallow pond at the bend in MD-445 about a mile north of 
the refuge on Eastern Neck; 450 Canvasback on the refuge split between 
Bogle's Wharf and Calfpasture Cove; 280 Tundra Swans still on the 
refuge; 75 pintail, 20 wigeon and a gadwall with the Blue-winged Teal; 
150 pintail and 8 shovelers at the main pond at Chesapeake Farms; and 80 
Common Mergansers and 2 Hooded Mergansers on the hatchery pond on Fish 
Hatchery Road. Other good birds were a coot with the wigeon on Eastern 
Neck; two more coots on Shipyard Creek at Edesville (on MD-20); and a 
MERLIN just east of Edesville on MD-20. It's nice that it feels more 
springlike outdoors again.

Good Birding,

Walter Ellison

23460 Clarissa Rd
Chestertown, MD 21620

phone: 410-778-9568

"Nothing is as easy as you would like it to be, and nothing is as hard 
as you might fear"