Hi all,
I spent the morning at Point Lookout State Park, the definite highlight was
flushing an unknown sparrow from near the point. I originally flushed the
bird from the Bay side (as opposed to the river side) of the island of trees
before the lighthouse. I slowly worked around towards it and flushed it
into the grassy center of the loop road where it ran around under the
boulders occasionally perching on them. I initially felt that it was a
sparrow that I had not seen before, but unfortunately, talked myself into a
strange plumage of a young Vesper that I was not familiar with. Some things
bothered me about this, and I uploaded photos and solicited opinions. Matt
Hafner and I talked about the bird and about what my initial feeling for the
birds ID was. He and Marshall Iliff agreed that an Aimophilla sp. is
involved. I managed to take many shots from a distance (which I have
posted below) and feel that there are at least 2 shots that strongly argue
for CASSIN'S SPARROW as opposed to Bachman's or Botteri's. The outer tail
as viewed from underneath had a distinctive white border (see photo 5-
Bachman's and Botteri's have an indistinct border) and the central tail
feathers were barred (hard to see but evident in shot 10, I believe
Bachman's and Botteri's tail is plain) which is something that jumped out at
me in the field. Unfortunately the whole incident lasted a few minutes and
the bird disappeared into the fenced off area around the lighthouse. I
spent the next hour and a half walking the grassy area hoping it would
return with no luck. I truly hope the bird sticks around!
Photos of the bird can be seen at-
http://www.flickr.com/photos/mikeycerw/
Comments welcomed
Point lookout was also hopping with the more expected migrants, the winds
were out of the NE and with the front coming in from the west , the birds
seemed to be concentrated at the point, many warblers were seen coming in
off the bay well after sunrise.
Location: Point Lookout State Park
Observation date: 9/26/10
Number of species: 72
Canada Goose 5
American Black Duck 2
Mallard 3
Brown Pelican 30
Double-crested Cormorant 25
Great Blue Heron 5
Black Vulture 3
Turkey Vulture 4
Osprey 3
Bald Eagle 4
Merlin 1
Laughing Gull 130
Ring-billed Gull 25
Herring Gull 15
Great Black-backed Gull 10
Common Tern 30
Forster's Tern 75
Royal Tern 4
Rock Pigeon 2
Mourning Dove 3
Eastern Screech-Owl 1
Chimney Swift 1
Ruby-throated Hummingbird 1
Belted Kingfisher 1
Red-bellied Woodpecker 2
Downy Woodpecker 2
Northern Flicker (Yellow-shafted) 11
Pileated Woodpecker 1
Eastern Wood-Pewee 1
Eastern Phoebe 4
Great Crested Flycatcher 1
White-eyed Vireo 3
Red-eyed Vireo 4
Blue Jay 13
American Crow 2
Fish Crow 1
crow sp. 7
Carolina Chickadee 7
Tufted Titmouse 5
Brown-headed Nuthatch 5
Carolina Wren 3
House Wren 6
Marsh Wren 2
Ruby-crowned Kinglet 2
Eastern Bluebird 5
Swainson's Thrush 2
Gray Catbird 6
Northern Mockingbird 4
Brown Thrasher 3
European Starling 30
Northern Parula 3
Yellow Warbler 3
Magnolia Warbler 2
Black-throated Blue Warbler 2
Yellow-rumped Warbler (Myrtle) 5
Pine Warbler 6
Palm Warbler 15
Palm Warbler (Western) 20
Palm Warbler (Yellow) 3
Bay-breasted Warbler 1
Blackpoll Warbler 1
Black-and-white Warbler 5
American Redstart 4
Ovenbird 1
Northern Waterthrush 2
Common Yellowthroat 5
Eastern Towhee 1
Chipping Sparrow 1
CASSIN'S SPARROW 1
Rose-breasted Grosbeak 2
Indigo Bunting 3
Red-winged Blackbird 5
House Finch 2
American Goldfinch 1
This report was generated automatically by eBird v2(http://ebird.org)
Good Birding!
Mikey Lutmerding
Croom, MD
http://www.flickr.com/photos/mikeycerw/ |