I spent a reasonably productive morning at the Kenilworth Aquatic Gardens in D.C. this morning.  The tide was out which may have reduced the water fowl, and its was fairly breezy most of the morning which seemed to keep the landbirds down.

Highlights included 5 Rusty Blackbirds, 8 Wood Ducks, and 2 Common Mergansers.  I flushed what I thought must have been a bittern, but did not get much of a look before it dropped into tall marsh vegetation.

As I was returning from the River trail, I saw a Red-shouldered Hawk perched in a tree above a marshy area.  As I started to position myself to see if I could get a nice picture, it flew down to the ground in the marsh and stayed there for about a minute.  It clearly had pounced on something.  When it eventually flew up and over my head, I saw that it was carrying a good sized frog which it then proceeded to eat in a nearby tree (after calling quite a bit).

A complete list for the morning from my eBird report appears below (note that eBird calls this spot "Kenelworth Water Gardens" -- I hoping to get that fixed).

Jim Nelson
Bethesda, MD

Location:     Kenelworth Water Gardens
Observation date:     3/15/08
Notes:     Day was fairly breezy which kept landbirds down.  Low tide.
Number of species:     34

Canada Goose     45
Wood Duck     8
Mallard     9
Common Merganser     2
Great Blue Heron     1
Turkey Vulture     1
Red-shouldered Hawk     2
Killdeer     1
Ring-billed Gull     10
Mourning Dove     2
Belted Kingfisher     1
Red-bellied Woodpecker     4
Downy Woodpecker     8
Hairy Woodpecker     1
Northern Flicker     4
Eastern Phoebe     4
Blue Jay     10
American Crow     18
Fish Crow     7
Carolina Chickadee     9
Tufted Titmouse     1
Carolina Wren     7
Ruby-crowned Kinglet     2
Eastern Bluebird     1
American Robin     10
Northern Mockingbird     4
European Starling     17
Eastern Towhee     1
Song Sparrow     17
White-throated Sparrow     13
Northern Cardinal     10
Red-winged Blackbird     36
Rusty Blackbird     5
American Goldfinch     3