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Subject:

Jug Bay waterfowl and swallows this morning

From:

Jeff Shenot

Reply-To:

Jeff Shenot

Date:

Sat, 27 Oct 2007 13:26:23 -0400

It's so green today!  At Jug Bay this morning, a good waterfowl variety (10am-
11:30), plus:

P-billed Grebe 1
Red-necked Grebe 1
Great B Heron 4
Great Egret 1
Double-crested Cormorant 82
Canada Goose 42
Mallard 78
A. Black Duck 28
N. Pintail 2
Green-winged Teal 1
Wood Duck 3
Ring-necked Duck 10
Ruddy Duck 7
Bufflehead 1

A few raptors-
Osprey 1
B Eagle 3
N Harrier 4
S-shinned Hawk 1
Coopers Hawk 1

Forster's Tern 2
R-billed Gull ~45
Laughing Gull ~ 75

And swallows!:
Tree ~18-22
Purple Martin 3 ?*

*From about 1500-2000 feet away, I scoped a swallow flock hawking over the 
flooded spadderdock, and saw 3 swallows that were not Trees.  They were 
larger than the tree swallows, had dark gray bellies, and two of them tended 
to keep together while hunting while the third stayed nearby.  They were 
generically dark overall, with the blackish back darker than the drab grey belly. 
The wings were "angular" in appearance of their silhouette, that to me 
resembles a classic falcon's wing.  I checked the yellow book and it has Oct 
23 as a late datefor Martin (I don't know if my version is old), which makes me 
less confident about my distant identification.  I assumed they got blown in by 
the storm this week, but how odd would it be to see Purple Martins now?

Cheers-
Jeff Shenot
Croom Md