8:35 Cassins near lighthouse
Mikey Lutmerding <> wrote:
>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/
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