Off topic in Philadelphia.  When Liz went out to pick up the newspaper
early on Thursday, January 4, she saw c. 150 Snow Geese heading north over
Durham Street, including one Blue Goose, the latter new for our yard list.


RIGBY'S FOLLY, Armistead property on Ferry Neck, Talbot County, MD, 25124
West Ferry Neck Road near Royal Oak but nearer still to Bellevue: 

FRIDAY, January 5, 2007.  4-5:30 P.M. only.  Overcast with fog, visibility
only c. 250 yards or less.  60 degrees F. at 6 P.M., 63 at 3 A.M., Jan. 6,
down to 56 9 A.M., Jan. 6.

Haven't been to Rigby since December 11.  An unusually long absence.  Too
long.  Longest in years.  Has rained A LOT.  The place is a sodden sponge
with currents in the driveway ditches and field furrows.  John Camper has
bush-hogged Field 1 and much of Fields 2 and 3.  The Olszewskis have killed
7 deer here this hunting season, providing the main course for our
Christmas dinner, which fed 14 adults.  

1 male Redhead.  2 adult Bald Eagles sitting cheek-by-jowl in Frog Hollow. 
Hope they're nesting nearby.  1100 Canada Geese, many of them in Field 2. 
2 Eastern Towhees in Woods 2.  12 Song Sparrows out in front of the house
in the weeds of Field 1 and the adjacent driveway hedgerows they've been
favoring since October.  Also 2 bats at dusk along the driveway and 2 Gray
Squirrels.  Many moths.  

SATURDAY, JANUARY 6.  Goes up to 73 sunny degrees today but with very bad
haze and distortion offshore.  Drops to 66 degrees by 6 P.M.  Winds SW - W
at 5 m.p.h. or less.  Two ladies I ran into at Blackwater had seen a
Monarch and a sulphur plus a probable checkerspot.

At Rigby 8 A.M. - 12:30 P.M. only.  2000 Canada Geese.  46 Mute Swans.  c.
155 of the feral Mallards are still with us.  12 Surf, 1 male Black, and 1
male White-winged Scoter, the latter a cripple with its right wing folded
but raised a little, unnaturally, and its feet held abnormally high when it
paddles ineffectually.  1 Common Loon.  1 adult Northern Gannet seen with
difficulty through the haze.  2 adult Bald Eagles again in Frog Hollow.  76
Ring-billed Gulls fly over in one loose group.  5 Northern Flicker.  4
Eastern Bluebirds.  1 Field and 15 Song sparrows.   

Grand Prix of Dorchester County:  95 miles in 5 hours with not that much to
show for it:

Cambridge.  1:15-1:45.  Some action in the greater Oakley Street area but
with only 320 Canvasbacks plus a male Redhead, 595 Canada geese, 55
American Wigeon, 110 Mallards, 60 Lesser Scaup, 35 ea. of Surf Scoters and
Buffleheads, and 25 Ruddy Ducks as well as a Horned Grebe, a Double-crested
Cormorant, 65 Rock Pigeons and 3 Fish Crows.  Lovely to hear the male
wigeon's whistling, one of my favorite ducks, beauties.

Blackwater N.W.R.  2-3 P.M.; then again 4:45-5:30 P.M.  Water in the
impoundments very high, tidal waters a little low.  950 Snow and Blue Geese
(c. 3/4 to 1/4 ratio), 85 Ring-necked Ducks in Pool 1, and perhaps 4000
Common Grackles in the unharvested corn, and I heard rumors of a
Yellow-headed Blackbird.  One Red-bellied Slider in Pool 5B on their
favorite log there.

Gum Swamp,  A sunning Painted Turtle.

Smithville Road S of Beaverdam Creek.  2 Northern Bobwhite.  I think the
Southern Dorchester County Christmas count missed quail on Dec. 26.

Taylor's Island Campground.  3:15-3:45.  I am hoping for a good gannet or
pelican show here but the visibility is poor due to haze.  4 Northern
Gannets.  2 adult Bald Eagles, one with a bad left leg, hangs down at c. 30
degree angle, does not retract.  2 adult Bonaparete's Gulls very close by
to the shoreline, feeding phalarope-style as they sit and spin and dab in
the Bay waters.  

Slaughter Creek at Taylor's Island.  An assemblage of 575 Mallards,
probably pen-raised.

Hooper's Island.  4-4:30 P.M.  55 Buffleheads.  1 Common Loon.  Others I
ran into at Blackwater had seen the Eurasian Collared-Doves today but I
missed them.   

the WEEKEND'S PELICANS.  On Jan. 6 I saw 24 American White Pelicans at
Blackwater at 2 P.M.  On return at 5:15 P.M. there are 27.  Folks I spoke
to reported seeing up to 30, with rumors of 32.  On the 6th it is too hazy
at Hooper's I. to afford much of a chance to see any Brown Pelicans.  On
Jan. 7:  27 white pelicans at Blackwater, all but 2 of them in one tight
group actively preening & best seen from the bend on Wildlife Drive
opposite Pool 5B, plus 33 Brown Pelicans in the Hooper's Island area, 3 of
them way out over the Bay, the other 30 resting on the little sod tump
island just S of Barren Island.  No birds of any kind on the many pound net
stakes at Hooper's.  

SUNDAY, JANUARY 7.  71 miles in southern Dorchester County, MD.  7 A.M. -
12:15 P.M.

Blackwater N.W.R., 7-9 A.M.  Before sunrise a long, strung-out, impressive
flight of Ring-billed Gulls to the NE, heading to fields presumably,
totalling a very roughly-estimated 4,400 gulls.  c. 850 Snow and Blue Geese
heading the same direction at the same time.  10 Bald Eagles.  25 Tree
Swallows.  85 Ring-necked Ducks again in Pool 1 along with 45 Northern
Shovelers and 3 Ruddy Ducks.  130 Northern Pintails.  3 Greater Yellowlegs.
 25 Common Mergansers on the Blackwater River.  2 American Kestrels.  Rain
into Greg Inskip, who keeps the closest watch on Golden Eagles here.  He
says there are at least 3 this winter in the greater Blackwater N.W.R.
area.

Hooper's Island and Swan Harbor.  9:15 A.M. - 12:15 P.M.  Run into Steve
Ford here in his red pickup truck.  The tide is exceptionally low, exposing
plenty of excellent Purple Sandpiper habitat, but I have yet to see PUSA in
Dorchester:

Exceptionally good visibility in contrast to yesterday afternoon.  18
Northern Gannets, all adults, all far offshore except for one surprising
bird over Honga River due east of Narrows Ferry Bridge.  6 Common Loons but
only 1 Horned Grebe.  1 EURASIAN COLLARED-DOVE calling repeatedly from
somewhere along Parks Road and a 2nd bird perched on the wires at 2540
Hoopers Island Road farther N.  After I get home tonight, and the Eagles'
victory, Liz and I watch 'the Virgin queen' on PBS's Masterpiece Theater. 
In the background you can hear an Eurasian Collared-Dove, a species that
has barnstormed Europe also.  There's even a breeding record in Iceland.  

18 Common Goldeneyes.  1 female Black Scoter at the experimental jetties S
of Narrows Ferry Bridge.  70 Surf Scoters.  55 Long-tailed Ducks.  105
Lesser Scaup, 2 flocks flying due North.  375 Tundra Swans, most of them
along the E side of Barren Island.  130 Brown-headed Cowbirds in one flock
at Hoopersville.  1 Red-throated Loon.  2 Sanderlings, 4 Bonaparte's Gulls,
and 115 Dunlin seen from the Birchmeiers' dock at Swan Harbor.  1
Double-crested Cormorant.  5 Bald Eagles.  5 Black Vultures.  4 Northern
Flickers.  

A NICE SIGHT.  Seen simultaneously through my scope in the same field of
view in one short pan:  A skipjack powering S; the Patuxent River bridge on
the western shore; several each of Surf Scoters, Buffleheads, and
Long-tailed Ducks; an adult Bald Eagle in pursuit of an imm. Great
Black-backed Gull, looking as if it really wanted to bring it down and eat
it, plus several other GBBGs behind them.  Now ... you can't get much more
Chesapeake than that.    

ROADKILL(s) DU JOUR.  A Great Blue Heron, old and stinky, on the road at
Gum Swamp.  A fresh Wild Turkey D.O.R. on Rt. 213 between Routes 50 and
301.  

I HEARD A FLY BUZZ WHEN I DIED - Emily Dickinson.  I wake up at 12:21 A.M.
today and read in "The things they carried" for an hour or so, and there's
a fly buzzing along the ceiling of the bedroom.  Hearing loss is an odd
thing.  I can hear this fly so well that at first I think it's a distant
aircraft.  Sometimes I can hear a Great Horned Owl outside beyond the lawn
as I lie in bed even though the storm windows are down and the geothermal
heating/cooling system is woofing away.  I can hear the bell-like ringing
of male Surf Scoters' wings as they flush a mile or more away, a
Chuck-will's-widow or garrulous Long-tailed Ducks at two miles or more. 
Some of my acquaintances with no hearing loss have trouble picking these
sounds up as well as I do.  

Yet I may never again hear a Cedar Waxwing, Grasshopper Sparrow, Blue-gray
Gnatcatcher, Golden-crowned Kinglet, or Northern Parula - singers and
callers those acquaintances can hear well - without my "the Birder" model
hearing aids, and only then if the birds are reasonably close.  On a
Delaware birding marathon a few years ago when Dave Cutler played the
Blue-winged Warbler tape, standing a few feet from it I heard nothing.  

Tinnitis, a permanent ringing in the ears, which I have been blessed with
for over 15 years, is a different, an other issue, bringing me erratic,
occasional sounds like some insects make, and a barely discernible pulsing
very much like my electric alarm clock, plus an overall, pervasive
background noise, a sort of basso continuo, that water mixed with sand
makes as it is pushed along big metal pipes such as the Army Corps of
Engineers uses in its dredging operations.  These sounds that only I, or
someone else with Tinnitis, "hear" of course are most noticeable in the
quiet of the night.  And yet they don't seem to interfere with my hearing
of the normal sounds that I still can hear.  

Why me?  Age?  Genes?  Loudness over the decades?:  The army.  Hunting and
shooting.  Setting off fireworks.  Outboards.  Lawnmowers.  Chainsaws. 
Music.  Carpentry.  Then there was the freighter in 1959.  Lars and I
chipped rust for several days inside a hold that was empty and enclosed. 
Air hammers against metal.  Like being inside a drum.  Couldn't hear much
for several days.  It was a while before the swelling subsided and I could
see my knuckles again.  We also inhaled the rust dust, created in part by
longshoremen urinating on the insides of the ship's hull.  When you're 19
in 1959 you do as you are told.  Back then there probably wasn't an OSHA
and its reach may not have extended to the South Pacific.   

When Tinnitis first registered with me, and my hearing deteriorated, it was
upsetting, as was missing all the birds my friends heard that I didn't. 
Rather suddenly I was not at the top of my birding game, would never be
again.  No longer a hot shot.  But one accommodates to these shortcomings,
becomes almost accepting of them.  At the end of Scheherazade or during
Strauss's 'Also sprach Zarathustra' when the strings hit their high,
attenuated registers, I just turn up the volume.  No wonder I like winter
more and more, when there is more to see and less to hear.  You go, fly.   

With blue, uncertain, stumbling buzz,
 Between the light and me;
And when the windows failed, and then
 I could not see to see.  

HOW TO IMPROVE YOUR LIFE according to "U. S. News & World Report", Dec. 25,
2006-January 1, 2007 (combined issue), p. 47 ff.  Lists 50 ways including: 
study the sky (astronomy), renovate your local park, take an ecovacation,
reduce your environmental footprint, drive with biodiesel, share your ride,
downsize your car, get rid of your leafblower, support local farmers, and
see a glacier before it melts.  I think it was last year that one of the 50
was to take up birdwatching.  I can sing Kumbaya with the best of them but
this conservative news weekly sometimes hits the right note with me.

Best to all.-Henry ("Harry") T. Armistead, 523 E. Durham St., Philadelphia,
PA 19119-1225.  215-248-4120.  Please, any off-list replies to: 
harryarmistead at hotmail dot com  (never, please, to 74077.3176 ....)