Last night, Maren Gimpel and I decided to try for Black Rails for the second time this year on Elliot Island Road. We birded Blackwater NWR for a few hours in the afternoon and found 2 Red-headed Woodpeckers along the closed auto tour road between the Woods trail and the Marsh trail. We ran into many Brown-headed nuthatches and the number of singing Pine Warblers was really impressive. 

We then headed over to Elliot Island Road and got there around 1930, we cruised along the road slowly hoping to hear a Saltmarsh-Sharptail and stopped at the end of the "good" Black Rail area and had dinner. We had no luck hearing a Saltmarsh then, but did hear one in the dark later. We were both blown away by the number of Seaside Sparrows, Marsh Wrens and Meadowlarks singing along the road, there was also a Black-necked Stilt parent and chick walking along the road. While watching the sunset from the end we had one Tri-colored Heron flyover, we then drove back east and parked at the boat ramp and and scanned the sky until dark. From here we had 5 Am. Bitterns, 5 Harriers and at least three Short-ears hunting to the west against a pink sky. 

We drove the road twice once it was dark, we heard 7 or so of Virginia's and Clappers on the drive west, but on the return trip east later in the night the numbers were significantly higher. We never heard any keekeekrees from the Black Rails, but did have have two making growling calls close to the road a couple hundred meters west of the building with the light at about 1130ish.

It was great to get out of Queen Annes Co and do some marsh birding.

Dan Small
Chestertown, MD