Lisa and I headed to the Eastern Shore for our annual January beach and bird getaway early Saturday morning. Highlights were CLAY-COLORED SPARROW south of Berlin, RED KNOT on Skimmer Island and GREAT CORMORANTS at both Sandy Point lighthouse and the Ocean City inlet.

Things started off slowly, as we dipped on both the Snow Bunting at Sandy Point and the Shrike at Pickering Creek, although we were compensated both times: 3 FoY Great Cormorants atop the Sandy Point lighthouse and 20 FoY American Pipits alighting in a field outside Pickering Creek Audubon Center.

Not surprisingly, our luck changed after we met up with Peter and Kimberly Kaestner near Cambridge (after stopping at Oakley Street to tick off American Wigeon and enjoy the many Canvasbacks). We headed down to the intersection of Route 113 and Mason Road south of Berlin, where the Clay-Colored Sparrow was quickly found, sunlit, in a tree. Next stop was Assateague, where we had a Northern Saw-Whet Owl (lifer for Lisa - thanks Jim Stasz!), as well as Red-Breasted Nuthatch and some Purple Sandpipers on the wing. Peter had a Northern Gannet far out at sea. We ended the birding day at Bayside Development, where we found Gadwall and a pair of Redheads among the ducks in the pond and Lesser Yellowlegs in the marsh, but no Orange-Crowned Warblers.

Sunday morning found us at a very cold Ocean City inlet, which yielded all 3 Scoter species; a half-dozen Bonaparte's Gulls; a single Great Cormorant and two American Oystercatchers on the south jetty; a male and female pair of Harlequin Ducks beyond the south jetty; and numerous Common Eiders. 

After we parted ways with the Kaestners, Lisa and I checked out Skimmer Island from Hooper's parking lot, and pulled up (on the smaller island/sandbar to the left of the main one) a Red Knot behind a row of gulls. (This may be the same bird that was at the inlet in late December). A return to Assateague yielded a surprising Eastern Meadowlark in the very narrow grass strip (to the south) between road and water just past the eastern end of the bridge from the mainland. The campgrounds near the Life of the Marsh trail, and the trail itself, were teeming with sparrows, and we netted seven: Song, Savannah, Swamp, Fox, Field, White-Throated and Eastern Towhee. Just off the road as we left the parking lot was a very slow-moving, and we suspect, injured American Woodcock.

Wending our way home, we found little at frozen-over Truitt's Landing and no Glaucous Gull (or any other) around Salisbury landfill late in the afternoon. Final, and 87th, species of the trip were two Mute Swans at the eastern end of the Bay Bridge just before dark.

Apologies for the long post. Good birding all!

Warren and Lisa Strobel
Annapolis, MD
www.birdcouple.com