Date: Sat, 31 Jan 2004 21:26:02 -0500 Reply-To: Maryland Birds & Birding Sender: Maryland Birds & Birding From: Stan Arnold Subject: Short-eared Owls continue in St. Mary's Co. MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Hi Folks, Following a terrific morning of birding with George Jett and Gwen Brewer in Charles Co. (and running into Stasz, Haffner, and Burchett to enjoy a feast of Am. Bittern, Rough-legged Hawk, Red-headed Woodpecker, Lesser Black-backed Gull, Glaucous Gull, Rusty Blackbird, Am. Tree Sparrow, etc., etc.--see George's post), Bill Hubick and I headed down to St. Mary's Co. to look for the Kelp Gull and Short-eared Owls. We struck out on the former, as Shrimpy was nowhere to be seen around the Sea Breeze Restaurant in Sandgates. The river was totally frozen, and quite devoid of life, except for a few probable Mute Swans on the far shore, and a Great Black-backed Gull landing briefly somewhere near the middle. We were, however, successful finding the Short-eared Owls along Abell's Wharf Rd. recently posted by Marty Cribb, and also previously seen by Matt Haffner. We arrived at this location, just south of Leonardtown (across Breton Bay) around 4:30 p.m. and watched numerous harriers, a Red-shouldered Hawk, and an Am. Kestrel hunting over the ponds and along the road. We also enjoyed 20 or more White-crowned Sparrows under some pines right next to the road. At 5:05 p.m. we saw our first Short-eared Owl flying very high over the road--perhaps 200 feet up--much higher than I had ever seen one flying before. It eventually came back to earth, and we watched it hunt and perch on one side of the road, while another SE Owl did the same on the other side. The owls were still active when we left at 5:40. There was still a small amount of open water in one of the ponds furthest from the road, and with the scope from two different vantage points we were able to pick out Gadwall, Am. Wigeon, Am. Black Duck, Mallard, and many Ring-necked Ducks. It was a fabulous day of birding. The tally: Bill: Life birds--3; State & county--an awful lot Stan: County birds--34 (30 in Charles and 4 in St. Mary's) Many thanks to George and Gwen for being our guides. Stan Arnold Glen Burnie dy.dx@earthlink.net ======================================================================= To leave the MDOsprey list, send e-mail to listserv@home.ease.lsoft.com with the following message in line 1: signoff mdosprey ======================================================================= =========================================================================