Date: Tue, 26 Sep 2000 10:25:13 EDT Reply-To: Maryland Birds & Birding Sender: Maryland Birds & Birding From: Jim Stasz Subject: Re: Red Phalarope @ 4:30 and other birds in the rain MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Hi Folks! I chased the Red Phalarope at Ridgely this morning [9/26] .... with Succe ss! It was not without an agonizing 40 minutes search and two loops around th e east cell. On arrival at 7:45 AM an Osprey and adult Common Tern flew by [I believe the first Common Tern for Ridgely]. Neither lingered. The first driving circuit, with several stops to scan, yielded 6 Semipalmated Sandpipers, o ne White-rumped Sandpiper, 2 Mallards, 2 Ruddy Ducks, and seven Northern Shovelers in the west cell and five Ruddy Ducks, one Canada Goose, 5 4 Green-winged Teal, 5 Northern Shovelers and one Spotted Sandpiper in the east cell. I did a second loop with more stops to scan and stopped about half way around. At that point I figured the game was up and started making the pittiful list. Suddenly a shorebird flew in and landed near the peep flock [all 7 peeps in one group]. RED PHALAROPE!!!! I checked my camera and drove slowly onto the central dike. The peeps flew, but the phalarope stayed and allowed me to take a half-dozen or so photos from reasonably close range. At 8:30 I bolted for work. My thanx to John Churchill on finding the bird and the lousy weather that dropped it in and kept it there. Marshall saw the previous Red Phalarope at Ridgely. Today I caught up another notch in our County List Competition and #318 for my Maryland Year List. Good Birding! Jim Jim Stasz North Beach MD jlstasz@aol.com ======================================================================== To leave the MDOsprey list, send e-mail to listserv@home.ease.lsoft.com with the following message in line 1: signoff mdosprey ======================================================================== ==========================================================================