Ferry Neck, Blackwater, Hooper's Island, Cambridge, February 10-16, 2021.

[Harry Armistead]

FERRY NECK, BLACKWATER, HOOPER’S ISLAND, CAMBRIDGE, FEBRUARY 10-16, 2021.  A time of overcast days (except Feb. 16), light winds, and temperatures mostly in the 30s, with remarkably little variation.  Steady as she goes, Matey. 

FEBRUARY 10, THURSDAY.  On the way down from Philadelphia an above average 16 red-tailed hawks, contrasted with 8 on the way home February 16, 1 bald eagle, 100s of Canada geese in fields adjacent to Route 301, which ain’t usually the case.  

After the fresh snow (1-3 inches) birds are concentrated along the shoulders of Routes 481 and 309: American pipit 135, horned lark 85, killdeer 4, slate-colored junco 125, white-throated sparrow 120, European starling-red-winged blackbird-common grackle in aggregate 2,000, mourning dove 3, northern cardinal 3, and eastern meadowlark 0.  Good conditions to hope for lapland longspur and snow bunting. 

Arrive at Rigby’s Folly c. 3 P.M., overcast, NW 10, 32 degrees F, snow mostly has melted here, lots of surface water, mucky.  c. 1,000 Canada geese in Field 1.   

FEBRUARY 11, FRIDAY.  1st common grackle at the feed, the beginning of the end.  ugh!   9 species total at the feed with purple finch also new.  300 Canada geese in Field 2, 1,000 in Field 1 along with 8 American wigeon.  1st time I’ve seen wigeon in our fields although they are notorious as grazers, and I’ve seen that in numerous other places.  

overcast, NE10, 28-31, temperatures so steady all day, mostly  at 31.  a dusting last night, all melts today.

FEBRUARY 12, SATURDAY.  Mary, Lucas, and David arrive.  At BELLEVUE, 12:30, common loon 2, bald eagle 1, ring-billed gull 11, bufflehead 22, American goldeneye 1 male, ruddy duck 12, surf scoter 6, and long-tailed duck 1 male.  

A dusk drive with 28 deer in the big field to the east halfway between Royal Oak and the Bellevue turnoff, another one nearby, and in Field 4 8 does and a buck = 39 deer (but only 6 on the same route February 13).  Mary sees a red fox.  c. 1,000 Canada geese in Field 1, 200 in Field 7.  Ice has burdened the neighbors’ bamboo as well as the American hollies all though our woods and especially the young pines 3-5’ high.  New at the feed this time: American goldfinch, blue jay.  

At Field 1 X our lawn edge: 60 robins, 8 bluebirds, 8 waxwings, 145 starlings, and 3 red-winged blackbirds.  At Frog Hollow a roosting bald eagle.

overcast, NE 5-10, 29 degrees F. all day, light, freezing rain.    

FEBRUARY, 13, SUNDAY.  overcast, 30-34 but mostly 34 all day, NW5, thank Heaven little wind, otherwise the frozen branches would be downed by the hundreds.  Out in Field 1, 32 eastern bluebirds, apparently a new winter high count for our property.  Most of our all-time bluebird highs are in November.

From Lucy Point, 4:30 P.M., Canada goose 2,000, horned grebe 1, surf scoter 60 (in nice and close), tundra swan 50, herring gull 5, and bufflehead 12.  225 Canada geese in the Camper’s fields.  Two bald eagles flush 300 Canada geese from the big “deer field” on the east side of Bellevue Road.  

Bruce Olszewski has chainsawed black locusts fallen across the Irish Creek Trail near Lucy Point and placed the resulting 20, fireplace-length logs in a neat pile next to the trail.  

FEBRUARY 14, MONDAY.  Mostly in Dorchester County, by myself (after Cambridge).  OAKLEY STREET in Cambridge.  I wanted Mary, Lucas, and David to see this.  They’d never been here: canvasback 650, surf scoter 26, American wigeon 40, lesser scaup 300, bald eagle 1, mallard 12, redhead 4 males, double-crested cormorant 60 (these  numbers sloppy estimates).  Throw out big bucket of corn.

EGYPT ROAD:  snow goose 1,700, bald eagle 8, ring-billed gull 1,600.

BLACKWATER N.W.R.:  40-43, overcast, mist, visibility 0.5 - 1.0 miles, NE 5, tidal waters low, fresh waters high.  snow goose 210 (very few blues anywhere today or otherwise during this sojourn), tundra swan 95, ring-necked duck 20, common merganser 20, American white pelican 0, great blue heron 1, bald eagle 14, northern harrier 1, red-tailed hawk 1, ring-billed gull 2,000, eastern meadowlark 2. 

SWAN HARBOR: dunlin 70, out on the sandbar roosting.  

HOOPER’S ISLAND: 2:45 - 4:15, 38-42, dead calm, overcast, high tide already but still rising.  REDHEAD 930 (careful “count”, counting by tens; a single flock all the way down at Hoopersville; at times I’ve seen more than a thousand hereabouts), 

sanderling 1, Canada goose 135, tundra swan 0 (most unusual), American black duck 5, mallard 3, canvasback 0, lesser scaup 60, surf scoter 28, black scoter 46, long-tailed duck 8, bufflehead 60, common goldeneye 9, ruddy duck 8, common loon 9, horned grebe 8, great blue heron 3, black vulture 2, turkey vulture 1, bald eagle 3, ring-billed gull 46, herring gull 10, great black-backed gull 3, belted kingfisher 2, northern flicker 1, song sparrow 2, red-winged blackbird 80, European starling 145.

Excellent views of all the ducks, loons, and grebes.      

FEBRUARY 15, TUESDAY.  Mary, Lucas & David leave for Philadelphia.  Unsolicited, Lucas says that squirrels are cute.  indeed.  34-42, overcast, SW5.  Limited activity today.  At 800 feet see with unaided eye what I take to be an errant patch of snow, but with the 10X this proves to be a fox squirrel, on the south side of Field 1.  A minute later a 2nd one appears.  Visit before last see them at 3 spots, a record.  The last visit see none.  Was getting worried, but today’s two are reassuring.  A thousand Canada geese and one deer in Field 4.     

FEBRUARY 16, WEDNESDAY.  clear or fair, NW 15, 27 degree F.  Leave by 10 A.M.  A mile or so N of Cordova, Route 481, 6 bald eagles (2 adults), at a deer corpse and, nearby, thousands of snow geese.  Near route 481 X Hope Road another group of thousands of snows.  Didn’t look these over real careful, but curious not to see ANY blue geese. 

RADISHES VS. TURNIPS.  Thanks to Sam Droege for calling attention to my mistakenly referring to the winter cover crop seen in many Delmarva fields now as turnips.  Apparently they are daikon groundhog buster radishes.  They grow deep into the soil, developing big underground growth that enables water infiltration, soil aeration, and decompose prior to spring planting.  Daikon means large root in Japanese.  Liz and I saw thousands of snow geese feeding in some radish fields in Queen Annes County earlier this winter.

BOOKS.  For some years this has been the golden age of bird book publishing.  Too bad, therefore, that recent issues of the Journal of Field Ornithology and Bird Watcher’s Digest have not had book reviews, as they usually used to.  Western Birds seems to be slacking off in the book reviewing circuit lately.  BirdWatching, however, is exemplary, often featuring notices of 10 or more new titles.  Birding often has 3 book reviews, rather short ones, but does not indicate the books’ list prices.  The 175 or so word reviews are enhanced by longer reviews, over 1,000 words, but to see those one must go online.  

Online is in the ascendancy.  The Auk and the Condor are available pretty much online only.  But who wants to scroll through issues that may be 250 pages long?  In print versions are available at $150 per year, and even life members such as myself have to pay that, which I refuse to.  These are the top 2 professional ornithological journals, and I miss them.  Buteo Books keeps a huge stock of bird books, perhaps the biggest anywhere.  Come to think of it, I haven’t received one of their fine, print catalogs in a while.  

We watch CNN and MSN a lot.  I like it that when a prominent person is interviewed most of them have shelves of books showing behind them.  

Best to all. - Harry Armistead, Bellevue & Philadelphia.