Hello all,
Spent the day birding between the Ocean City Inlet, MD and the Indian River Inlet, DE yesterday on my own and then with one of the DE bird clubs. I'll focus on the MD stuff here, most of which has already been reported with a couple of differences.
Started at the Bayside Development Pond based on the suggestions of others and found a great assortment of dabbling and diving ducks between 7:30 - 8:00 am includng ~ 15 Redhead, ~ 12 Ring-necked Ducks, 10 Lesser Scaup, 15 Am. Wigeon, 6 Hooded Mergansers, 6 Bufflehead, 1 Green-wing Teal, a few Mallards and ~ 30 Canada Geese. The Eu. Wigeon was not present at this time.
Then I headed to the "West OC Pond" aka Elliotts Pond, on Golf Course Road (8:10 - 8:25 am). There was a flock of Canvasback numbering approx. 40 - 50 individuals. There was one Redhead here among them, a few more GW Teal, ~ 12 N. Shovelers, 1 drake N. Pintail, a few Ruddy Ducks, 2 Tundra Swans, and 1 female Common Merganser. Also present was a ~ 100 - 150 Ring-billed Gulls (rough est., didn't count these) and a few Herring Gulls. Also 1 Yellow-rumped Warbler, 2 Greater Yellowlegs (fly-over and calling), and 1 Cooper's Hawk. One of the Ring-billeds was wing-tagged but I couldn't read the tag due to the distance.
Then to the OC Inlet where I met up with approx. 12 birders on a field trip from DE (8:30 - 9:30 am). Here we saw 26 Common Eiders, close, between the end of the jetty and the beach (mostly female and 1st year males, with a couple adult males). We also saw ~ 12 Red-throated Loons, 4 Common Loons, ~ 10 Long-tailed Ducks, ~ 12 Black Scoters, ~ 15 Surf Scoters, a few Bufflehead, ~ 12 Brant, ~ 6 Am. Black Ducks, ~ 50 Purple Sandpipers, at least as many Ruddy Turnstones, 1 Sanderling, and 1 Boat-tailed Grackle. The Harlequins were not in sight at this time. There were 2 Harbor Seals hauled out on the end of the south jetty, which was very cool.
The birds of note found in Delaware but not in MD were 5 Great Cormorants, ~ 50 Dunlin, 1 Bonaparte's Gull, and ~ 100 Snow Geese (fly-over) at the Indian River Inlet, 8 Horned Grebes and 2 Pied-billed Grebes at the Indian River Marina along with ~ 6 Red-breasted Mergansers, 4 Common Goldeneye, and 1 Am. Pipit, and a pair of Black-crowned Night Herons at Savages Ditch along with 2 Savannah Sparrows.
I then headed back to OC to try again for the Wigeon and Harlequins without success. The only new species I turned up at the Bayside pond was 1 Wilson's Snipe, 1 male N. Harrier, and 1 Killdeer. This was my third attempt at the Wigeon for the day (7:30 and 10:30 am and ~ 3:30 pm). I headed back to the Inlet (also for the third time (8:30 am, 3:00 and 4:00 pm) and stayed until about 5:00 pm. Most of the birds had cleared out and there were only few Common Loons, ~ 8 L.T. Ducks, some Brant, 2 Surf Scoters and 1 Black. ! hen Common Eider was actively diving just south of the red channel marker. No Harlequins were detected. At this point though, the light to the south was making it very difficult to see in the direction of the south jetty so they may have been there and I just couldn;t see them in the glare. There were a number of birds flying in off the water and landing on the south side of the south jetty out of view, but the only ones I could ID were Brant and L.T. Ducks.
I did, however, get mind-blowing looks at Surf and Black Scoter (which were 10 - 12 feet from the end of the jetty where I was standing) as well as Purple Sandpipers, Sanderlings (the only species to increase in number since the am) and Ruddy Turnstones (which were feeding within 8 - 10 feet of me). Very cool . That and the excellent views of Redhead and all the ducks at Bayside, etc. were quite memorable. Total of 28 species of waterfowl for the day.
Good birding,
Frank Marenghi
Annapolis, MD
P.S. Had my first Am. Tree Sparrow at my feeders this morning in Eastport, along with the more usual species. Didn't see the Field Sparrows yet today but had them on Friday.
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