FERRY NECK-RIGBY¡¦S FOLLY, May 10-24, 2012. A time of mostly clear or fair weather, cool temperatures, and moderate winds, mostly from the E or N, and ¡K meager efforts at note taking.
May 10, 2012, Thursday. 94 Turkey Vultures on the way down from Pennsylvania. On arrival 2 deer in Field 2. Blue Grosbeak.
May 11, Friday. Brother, Gordon, arrives c. 1 A.M. from B.W.I. There¡¦s a Carolina Wren nest with 5 eggs, unfortunately, just in front of the ¡¥Mudhen¡¦s¡¦ transom. As last year I move it a few feet away, higher, and place it in a sort of papier-mache planter. That didn¡¦t work last year, probably won¡¦t now. 2 Cedar Waxwings. Prairie Warbler.
BUTTERFLIES: Red Admiral, Pearlcrescent, American Lady, Cabbage White, Monarch, Buckeye, Red-spotted Purple, Delaware Skipper. 4 Gray Squirrels.
May 12, Saturday, spend the day in Dorchester County participating in the 90th May bird count there, but see a Virginia Opossum on returning at 10:12 P.M. Liz keeps a list for the Talbot bird count finding 29 species incl. a Bald Eagle, a Red-tailed Hawk, a White-eyed Vireo, a catbird, a Pine and a Prairie warbler, and an Indigo Bunting in just a short period of time. Submitted to Lester Coble.
May 13, Sunday. At 2:38 A.M. we receive a phone call that our Philadelphia house is being robbed and deal with this long distance thanks to neighbors, friends, and some family members there. Gordy sees a Raccoon working its way around the shoreline. 3 Bald Eagles, 10 Cedar Waxwings, a Great Egret, a Cattle Egret, 5 Chimney swifts, Red-tailed Hawks. 2 Gray Squirrels.
May 14, Monday. On May 12 George is part of the World Series of Birding D.V.O.C. (Delaware Valley Ornithological Club) team, which places 4th with 192 species. Will Russell is with Pete Dunne¡¦s team representing the Cape May Bird Observatory, which places 1st with 207. By coincidence George (with our daughters Mary and Anne) runs into Will at Heislersville, NJ, today. All will soon be here for Anne¡¦s wedding. Liz sees 2 Green Herons and hears the Prairie Warbler again. Good Green Tree Frog chorus at dusk.
May 15, Tuesday. Big Green Tree Frog chorus again at dusk. Gordy and I visit the grave of Charles H. Cook (Jan. 30, 1869-Apr. 8, 1952), a black man who worked for our grandparents. The graveyard is in a remote area of woods on Ferry Neck. ¡§Charlie¡¨ told Gordy, when Gordy was a teen, folk takes from oral tradition that he later wrote about in the Journal of American folklore (¡§Two Brer Rabbit stories from the Eastern Shore of Maryland,¡¨ vol. 84, 1971, pp. 442-444; item 74 of the 524 in his current CV). A red-eyed Vireo sings at the gravesite.
May 16, Wednesday. 68 Diamondback Terrapin basking out at the mouth of Poplar Cove. Good views of an impressive ¡ñ Broad-headed Skink on the front porch. Will & Beth Russell visit. We all watch and wonder about an extremely fat, rotund, Meadow Vole that just sits motionless on the front porch; not there the next day.
May 17, Thursday. I spot an additional ¡ñ Broad-headed Skink that emerges from inside the empty shell of a Diamondback Terrapin that sits on an Eastern Red Cedar stump by the garage. The skink then enters the stump through a hole and its head is visible looking out from a hole on top of the stump. Somehow a Fowler¡¦s Toad has gotten into my car; this would involve a vertical leap of a foot or so.
May 18, Friday. Medium-sized Box Turtle on the Bellevue Road. 14 Turkey Vulture, 2 Red-tailed Hawks, 9 Ospreys, and 2 Black Vultures in sight simultaneously from the dock.
Will & Beth visit Egypt Road, Blackwater N.W.R., Shorter¡¦s Wharf Road & Cedar Creek Road, finding, among other goodies: 2 ¡ñ Dickcissels, 4 Bald Eagles, a Greater Yellowlegs, a Spotted Sandpiper, 4 Grasshopper Sparrows, 12 Orchard Orioles, a Yellow-throated, a Blackpoll, 2 Worm-eating & 2 Yellow warblers, 2 American Redstarts, 30 Seaside Sparrows, 2 Willets, a Yellow-throated Warbler, a Red-eyed Vireo, some Brown-headed Nuthatches, 20 Dunlin, 4 wood pewees, a Hairy Woodpecker, 4 Black Vultures, 2 gnatcatchers, some waxwings, a Green-winged Teal with a bad leg, 3 Summer Tanagers, a Spotted & 40 Semipalmated Sandpipers, and 5 Ovenbirds.
Rehearsal dinner at Latitude 38 in Oxford. They do well by us.
May 19, Saturday. Day of the wedding. Birds have been noted elsewhere.
May 20, Sunday. No notes today. In recovery. Dinner at the Crab Claw with Whit & Bonnie Mallam.
May 21, Monday. 14 deer in Field 4, one in Field 3. 4 Gray Squirrels. 2 Green Herons. Down towards Benoni Point an Eastern Cottontail, a Gray Squirrel, and one deer. Morning at Blackwater with Bonnie & Whit Mallam.
May 22, Tuesday. Another 2-skink day. 33 Diamondback Terrapin in the cove. 5 Gray Squirrels in the yard simultaneously, at the so-called deer corn. Sitting on the dock Liz and I hear a Pileated Woodpecker and also a downy, both drumming. Later I see 2 pileateds in flight across the cove. 1 Eastern Cottontail (making a comeback on the place?). At Frog Hollow Gordy and I find 11 Painted Turtles, a ¡ñ Peafowl (a.k.a. Peacock), and a d.o.r. Rough Green Snake, seldom seen here, dead or alive. A Great Egret flies by the dock very close; easy to see its bright green loral area, often not illustrated in field guides.
May 23. Wednesday. Gordy and I go to White Marsh and Harrisville roads in Dorchester County by way of the Bellevue-Oxford Ferry, visiting Old Trinity Church and also dropping in on Guy Willey on East Appleby Avenue in Cambridge. Guy worked at Blackwater for some 33 years, retiring in 1985. The floor of his house is covered with enlargements of nature photographs he is getting ready to exhibit. Two of them are of Snapping Turtles, which he gives to Gordy. The snapper is Gordy¡¦s favorite turtle. See 3 Gray Squirrels in Trappe.
At Rigby¡¦s Folly Liz sees a Swainson¡¦s Thrush and a Pileated Woodpecker. 1 Red Admiral. Thunder, lightning, impressive, billowing cumulus clouds towering to the east, and some rain 4:30-5:30. At 7:11 P.M. after pulling the boat, slavishly washing it down, etc., a Great Horned Owl takes off and flies E along the shoreline. Earlier in the morning American Crows tormented it for a good hour. I was on the verge of uncasing the Parker 12 side-by-side. Liz hears a Chuck-will¡¦s-widow.
May 24. Thursday. 4 Gray Squirrels. 1 Yellow-billed Cuckoo. 2 Wild Turleys by Liz in Field 4. 3 Bald Eagles, one trying to kleptoparasitize an Osprey. 25 Diamondback Terrapin at the mouth of the cove. I reach into the secret hiding place to make certain the house key is still there after all the comings and goings of the past 2 weeks and out hops a fat Fowler¡¦s Toad (the word ¡§fat¡¨ is redundant). The key is there, too. Leave Gordy off at B.W.I. c. 2 P.M. 200.8 mi. from Rigby¡¦s Folly to home, but, where exactly IS our REAL home?
Best to all. ¡V Harry Armistead, Philadelphia.
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