Had a couple of surprises today. First thing this morning, on Tuesdays, I climb our 120 foot tall meteorological tower to change out collection glassware for our rainfall mercury collector. I usually bring binoculars unless the weather is so heinous that I want to get the job done and be back on the ground. Today was marginal as it was quite windy up there. One gust almost knocked me over. Our Bald Eagle nest now has two eaglets. I could only see one of them today but you really need a scope. Turkey Vultures were soaring overhead headed north. Several Red-shoulders also moving north. Best bird was a Broad-winged Hawk that flew about 50 feet overhead. I could clearly see the black outlined wings.
My second surprise was down at the dock at our education center. I had gone down to look for Bonaparte's Gulls which would be a SERC bird for me. Instead, I found two Northern Gannets flying back and forth on the Rhode River between Big Island (part of SERC property) and Camp Letts. I know there are tons of them on the Bay but that bird wasn't really on my radar to show up on the Rhode River!
Anyway, the full eBird list is below.
Tyler Bell
California, Maryland
Location: Smithsonian Environmental Research Center
Observation date: 4/7/09
Notes: tower climb at 0900, stream sampling until 1300
Number of species: 42
Canada Goose 5
Wood Duck 8
Gadwall 6
Mallard 2
Northern Gannet 2
Double-crested Cormorant 25
Great Blue Heron 2
Black Vulture 4
Turkey Vulture 15
Osprey 9
Bald Eagle 3
Red-shouldered Hawk 7
Broad-winged Hawk 1
Red-tailed Hawk 1
Herring Gull 5
Great Black-backed Gull 1
Forster's Tern 9
Red-bellied Woodpecker 3
Northern Flicker (Yellow-shafted) 1
Pileated Woodpecker 1
Eastern Phoebe 1
Blue Jay 3
American Crow 2
Fish Crow 1
Northern Rough-winged Swallow 3
Carolina Chickadee 3
Tufted Titmouse 4
White-breasted Nuthatch 4
Eastern Bluebird 2
American Robin 2
Northern Mockingbird 1
European Starling 5
Pine Warbler 2
Chipping Sparrow 1
Swamp Sparrow 2
White-throated Sparrow 6
Dark-eyed Junco (Slate-colored) 2
Northern Cardinal 4
Red-winged Blackbird 12
Brown-headed Cowbird 2
House Finch 7
American Goldfinch 12
This report was generated automatically by eBird v2(http://ebird.org)
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