My husband Ken Board and I were the two relatively inexperienced birders 
following Bob all over the place this afternoon. Bob was getting ready 
to leave Black Hill just as we got there ... but the grebe never did 
come back while we were there. We had planned to head over to 
Poolesville after that and Bob said he was going there too -- but 
despite driving up and down the stretch of road between the houses and 
the golf course half a dozen times, we ended up craneless. We hadn't 
been planning to go to Lilypons, but Bob said he was heading over there 
and that it wasn't far from Poolesville, and since we hadn't seen what 
we'd come for, we decided to follow him. But the Cave Swallows weren't 
there either.

Now 0 for 3, we were really disappointed. All three would have been life 
birds for both of us, and we hadn't seen a single one! We decided to 
head home via Poolesville and try once more for the Sandhill Crane. We 
got to the site about 4:00 pm, and this time we were in luck. We saw it 
from the roadside in exactly the location that was described. We pulled 
over, jumped out and got a great view of it. At one point while we were 
watching it, it disappeared behind a rise, then reappeared a few minutes 
later -- I suspect it was there all along this afternoon, just toying 
with us.

Sherry Peruzzi
Columbia
nightheron =at= despammed =dot= com




Bob Ringler wrote:

>   I was unable to get out this morning as I had set aside time to work on Maryland Birdlife.  This afternoon I got to Black Hill Regional Park about 1PM just as Kathy Brown from Frederick County was about to leave.  She pointed out the Eared Grebe and I scoped it briefly from the parking lot.  When I walked down to the lake to get a better view it was nowhere in sight.  It did not reappear in the next 20 minutes so off to Poolesville where there were no cranes anywhere in sight near the golf course.  I was not too disappointed having seen cranes in the past but others there were hoping for a lifer which did not appear.  Then on to Lilypons where the swallows had not been seen for a few hours.  I hope I'm not the cause of all these good birds leaving.
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