I saw four Lapland Longspurs today (2/4) with 50 to 60 Horned Larks along Sixes Bridge Road about 200 feet west of Keysville Road.  The flock was in a cow pasture on the left heading west on Sixes Bridge.  A juvenile Northern Harrier scattered the birds but they came back to the same field.

Other birds in Carroll County of interest were a Black-capped Chickadee at the Bear Branch Nature Center bird feeders, and a Tree Sparrow and several immature White-crowned Sparrows on Brown Road. The location was just beyond a farmhouse located on the right side after the turn from Route 97. Brown Road is a left turn off of Route 97 a short ways north of Union Mills.

In Howard County the highlights were the continuing Merlin along Old Frederick road two miles west of Route 32. There were also small flocks of Horned Larks and Savannah Sparrows along Old Frederick and Underwood Roads. A flock of 10 Pine Siskins was feeding on Norway Spruce cones located at the SW corner of Font Hill and Carrigan Drives near Font Hill Park. A Yellow-bellied Sapsucker was in the same area.

Jim Wilkinson
Columbia, MD