As crazy as it sounds, I am fairly certain that I observed a white
morph Gyrfalcon over the spray fields at the North Branch of the C&O
Canal tonight around 4:40PM. My hopes were to find the Short-eared
Owls posted earlier. However, I found 4 Northern Harriers (2 female, 2
male) and what I believe was a Gyrfalcon.  It was about 4:40PM and
just after viewing the four Harriers at once, that I spotted a large
raptor spiraling up by itself about 400 meters to my Northwest (right)
as I faced the spray fields.  My initial impression was a large
Buteo-like raptor.  As I watched the bird spiral upward, it became
apparent that it was quite pale overall.  The tail and wings were
broad and the body was tubular, tapering toward the tail.  The wings
were long and had a rounded, pointed ness to their tips. The tail was
not long, but fanned and broad.  The bird appeared completely white
underneath with no sign of dark markings of any kind, except dark
edging of the wingtips. The upper side of the bird was
whitish/grayish, but not as bright white as underneath.  This
coloration was clearly uniform above, except the edges of the
outermost primaries were again black. While soaring, its wings
appeared flat and sometimes showing a minute dihedral with
ever-so-slightly upturned wing tips.  The few flaps it did give were
quite stiff.  Any comments are welcomed and I will be submitting a
report to Phil Davis.  As you can imagine, this was quite an exciting
observation to have.

Good birding!
-- 
David Yeany II
109.5 Pennsylvania Ave
Cumberland, MD 21502
Cell: (814) 221-4361