Hi Folks,

Just getting around to this belated post.  Elaine and I spent Saturday 
morning (2/16) at Smoky Rd. in Calvert Co., just southeast of Lower 
Marlboro.  This has become one of my favorite birding places in Maryland. 
Living a couple hundred yards from an interstate, and little more than a 
mile from a major international airport, we are immersed in noise, and Smoky 
Rd. offers the exceptionally rare alternative.  I don't think I've ever 
heard a vechicle or an airplane while hiking there; maybe a distant 
four-wheeler, but that's about it.  Planes do fly high overhead, but I don't 
hear them.  The copasetic ambiance is unmatchable anywhere else in my 
experience.

Elaine and I made the four-hour round trip hike from the parking area to the 
Patuxent River.  I was looking for something as simple as a Fox Sparrow. 
Never found one, but we did have a couple other interesting sightings.  When 
we came upon the big open fields towards the end of the road, we saw a few 
small flocks of birds flying about.  When they finally settled down, we saw 
that they were AMERICAN PIPITS.  After picking out a few in the difficult 
terrain, they all got up and flew at once.  I estimated that there were 115 
of them.  Our most notable sighting, however, was down at the river.  When 
we arrived there was not a bird on the water; just a few Herring Gulls 
circling overhead.  As we rested, I picked up a dark bird way downstream 
flying towards us.  Cormorant, I thought.  Then I put the binoculars on it. 
Yup, cormorant, or was it?  It had a slower wing beat, or otherwise struck 
me as not being a typical cormorant.  As it got closer, I could see why.  It 
was a robust bird, heavier than a Double-crested, shorter-tailed, very dark 
plumage, and after a fashion, I could see a pale throat.  "GREAT CORMORANT" 
I called to Elaine, sitting nearby.  It lacked the white flank patch, and 
sadly had no nearby Double-cresteds for size comparison, but I'm 98% sure of 
the ID.  This is my first inland sighting of Great Cormorant, and since its 
path took it from one side of the river to the other, it was seen in both PG 
and Calvert Counties.

What I found additionally interesting about the sighting is Bill Hubick's 
report of both White-winged Scoter and Red-throated Loon on the river at 
about the same time.  These are all birds that are much more associated with 
the bay and ocean than with rivers, but perhaps migration or other reasons 
have brought them inland.

Here's our morning tally from the length of Smoky Rd. (0730-1130 a.m.):

Canada Goose--86
Wood Duck--18
Am. Black Duck--14
Mallard--40
Common Merganser--4
Great Cormorant--1
Turkey Vulture--8
Bald Eagle--2 (1 adult, 1 imm)
Ring-billed Gull--3
Herring Gull--3
Mourning Dove--2
Red-bellied Woodpecker--6
Yellow-bellied Sapsucker--1
Downy Woodpecker--2
Hairy Woodpecker--2
N. Flicker--3
Pileated Woodpecker--3
Blue Jay--10
Am. Crow--7
Fish Crow--1
Am. Pipit--115
Carolina Chickadee--8
Tufted Titmouse--10
White-breasted Nuthatch--1
Brown Creeper--2
Carolina Wren--3
Golden-crowned Kinglet--8
Ruby-crowned Kinglet--2
E. Bluebird--30
Hermit Thrush--2
Am. Robin--22
N. Mockingbird--4
Brown Thrasher--3
Eur. STarling--18
Yellow-rumped Warbler--1
E. Towhee--8
Song Sparrow--5
White-throated Sparrow--38
Dark-eyed Junco--33
N. Cardinal--11
Red-winged Blackbird--4
Common Grackle--30
Brown-headed Cowbird--2
House Finch--2
House Sparrow--3

    On our way home we stopped at Chesapeake Beach, where we found two drake 
REDHEADs with a few scaup, and then drove along the boardwalk at North Beach 
where we found a drake NORTHERN SHOVELER paddling along shoreline with some 
Mallards.  Bill Hubick told me that this bird is an annual winter resident, 
though this is the first time I've seen it, and I've made many visits here 
at all seasons.

    On Sunday, 2/17 Elaine and I made a trip to Cromwell Valley Park where 
we dipped on the N. Shrike.  We had a better day in our yard in Ferndale, 
Anne Arundel Co., however.  In fact, we tallied 31 species in (or from) the 
yard, which is our February high.  Another highlight was having five species 
of woodpecker in one day (all but Pileated and Red-headed) for the first 
time ever.  Our best sighting, though, was viewing (and filming) a MERLIN 
from the end of our driveway, as it sat eating its prey atop a the same 
utility pole where we saw a Merlin eating a junco 12 days earlier.  This is 
highly suggestive that we have a neighborhood Merlin, and that it has a 
favorite place to eat its meals.

    Hope everyone has a warm place for the next few days; I bet wind chills 
are already in the teens as I write this.  Yesterday's 70+ temp was quite a 
tease.

Stan Arnold
Ferndale (Glen Burnie)