Pete Webb and I went up to check for crossbills and such on Kevin Graff's 
"Gunpowder Loop" at Hoffmanville in far northern Baltimore County where 
Kevin leads trips on alternate Tuesdays. About a quarter of a mile up the 
trail (starting about 50 yards north of Hoffmanville Cemetery on the west 
side of Gunpowder Road) we found the row of larches on the north side of the 
first large field. They were indeed some form of larch with no needles and 
very dense with cones looking very much alive.

After about a half hour there, around 11:00 Pete spotted an adult male 
White-winged Crossbill at the top of one of the larches. By the time I was 
about to focus, crossbills started calling and flew out to the west. There 
were 8 of them, about 50% male. We're pretty sure they were Red Crossbills. 
The larches were very active with Chickadees and Titmice, and the whole area 
had lots of Flickers, Hairy and Downy Woodpeckers, and two Pileated 
Woodpeckers.

From about 2:00 to 2:30 we stopped at Druid Ridge Cemetery and were pretty 
confident we heard one or two WW Crossbills, but didn't see them. Someone 
else at the west end of the long row of hemlocks said he saw 3 while we were 
by the east end.

Steve Sanford
Randallstown MD
scartan^at^verizon^dot^net