Date: Fri, 20 Dec 2002 10:33:33 -0500 Reply-To: Maryland Birds & Birding Sender: Maryland Birds & Birding From: Paul Woodward Subject: McKee=Beshers WMA(Mont Co)112-19-02 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit 19 December 2002 Took my first winter count of the season this morning. Covered the entire length of Hunting Quarter Rd. and returned through the central fields.With the recent weather, possible effects of West Nile Virus and general impression from reading recent posts, my expectations were low, but I was delighted to find birds common reminding me why I enjoy this area so much. Ended up with 44 species. Species highlights were 15 Black Vultures feeding on a carcass. a MERLIN over the impoundments, and 2 Am. Tree Sparrows. Fruit eaters were common-13 Eastern Bluebirds, 88 robins, 4 Hermit Thrushes, 137 Cedar Waxwings( haven't been common this fall), and 36 Myrtle Warblers. Other numerical highlights were 11 Winter Wrens and 36 Blue Jays(a species affected by WNV) Finally had all 7 species of woodpeckers (the hairy has eluded this fall). Let me put in a plug again for E-Bird www.ebird.org for entering you observations so they can be used by others. My observations can be found under MD zip code 20837. Paul Woodward Fairfax City, VA 22032 grackling@worldnet.att.net ======================================================================= To leave the MDOsprey list, send e-mail to listserv@home.ease.lsoft.com with the following message in line 1: signoff mdosprey ======================================================================= =========================================================================