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Subject:

AA and PG Counties this weekend

From:

Stan Arnold

Reply-To:

Stan Arnold

Date:

Sun, 1 Feb 2009 18:22:25 -0800

Hi Folks,

Leo Weigant and I spent some time making the rounds in Anne Arundel County 
yesterday (Sat., 1/31), but the land birding was very slow.  Our best finds 
for the day were 16 GREEN-WINGED TEAL at Patapsco Pond #11 on Nursery Rd., 2 
drake REDHEADs at Fort Armistead (actually in Baltimore City waters), and 4 
GREAT CORMORANTs on the Thomas Point Light House, with a couple dozen 
Double-cresteds (seeing conditions were fairly good to make these 
observations).

Today, I decided to head out solo to Prince Georges Co.  Neither Schoolhouse 
Pond nor either of the two Depot ponds offered anything enticing, so I 
headed over to Patuxent River Park at Jug Bay.  Here I found a couple 
hundred Herring Gulls standing on the ice, and a noticeably paler brown gull 
among them.  After watching this bird for a while, it obligingly lifted it's 
wings, and I could see the overall palor of the wings and the dark outer 
webs of a THAYER'S GULL.  Perhaps this is the same bird that was at 
Schoolhouse the day before.  The next stop was at Selby's Landing where 
there were 14 COMMON MERGANSERs visible from the boat launch.  Here I picked 
up the Critical Area Driving Tour, and drove to Merkle across the Mataponi. 
With the buildings of Merkle in sight, I took the loop that skirts the 
river, and here I found a flotilla of a couple thousand Canada Geese in the 
river.  I scanned and found three blue-phased SNOW GEESE (1 adult and 2 
imm), certainly the same birds that were seen at Merkle last fall, and I was 
also able to pick out a single CACKLING GOOSE.  While I was observing, the 
birds flushed out to the middle of the river.  As I passed the fields 
driving from the river to the Visitor Center, I heard a HORNED LARK, and 
then saw this very pale bird land (only my second ever Horned Lark in PG). 
About the same time a flock of about a dozen AM. PIPITs flew across the 
road.

I checked out Milltown Landing road, where the most interesting birds were 
two FOX SPARROWs at the corner with Croom Rd., and then in the primary 
hedgerow and adjacent field across from the first barn were four SAVANNAH 
SPARROWs and four WHITE-CROWNED SPARROWs (1 adult and 3 imm).

From there, I decided to retrace my steps in the hopes of chancing upon the 
Golden Eagle that has been cruising the area.  No luck.  I ended up back at 
Schoolhouse Pond, and here I briefly chatted with Diane Ford, and then 
walked around the boardwalk where Mikey Lutmerding was scoping and 
photographing an interesting Herring Gull.  Mikey pointed out to me the 
first cycle GLAUCOUS GULL in the middle of the flock of several hundred 
gulls resting on the ice.  After the gull flew out into the open at the far 
end of the pond we both went over to get a lot of photos of this bird.  I 
also came across the third cycle LESSER BLACK-BACKED GULL that Mikey had 
found earlier, but he also found a first cycle bird that I did not see.

Wow, there are so many interesting birds around this winter.

Stan Arnold
Ferndale (AA Co.)