[va-bird] North Alexandria Subsector, DC CBC, 12/14/02

VA BIRDers,

The North Alexandria Subsector of the DC circle lies firmly in the 
residential area of Fairfax Co and includes the business district of the City 
of Alexandria. Just the stuff to challenge birders on a rainy morning!  Its 
part of the Dyke Marsh Sector.  My owling efforts were dismal, although I ran 
into Rich Rieger at the wooden bridge on the bicycle trail at Dyke Marsh and 
he had gotten a pair of Great Horned Owls to hoot alot and fly back and forth 
several times - easily visible at 0630. We lucked into a pair of Green-winged 
Teal flying out of the marsh as we watched the owls fly about.

The daylight area we counted starts at the Dyke Marsh picnic area and goes 
north through Jones Point and the City of Alexandria to Dangerfield Island 
(National Park Service Unit).  Basically, the best areas are the wetland 
strip along the Potomac near Dyke and the mudflats, Hunting Creek Bay, Jones 
Point and Dangerfield Island with a few ducks and such along the waterfront.  
And I should not forget the cemetaries - a good spot for Juncos!

Highlight of the day was the Blue-gray Gnatcatcher found by Gab Markoff.  
Great bird for December in Northern Virginia!  Some other interesting finds:  
Marc Ribaudo dug up not one but two Gray Catbirds at the Dangerfield Island 
NPS site - thick vines and mixed conifer/decidous trees at that location has 
always proved fruitful in past counts.  I found an adult Chipping Sparrow 
near the concrete piers that the new Wilson Bridge will rest upon, mixed in 
with a bunch of Am. Goldfinch and such in a sparse grass/weedy area.  We also 
recorded a bunch of DC Cormorants, two Great Egrets on the pilings near Port 
O'Vecchio, 9 adult and 1 HY Black-crowned Night-Herons near the power plant 
on the river, and a single Fox Sparrow.  

We also had a great raptor day, tallying 12 Bald Eagles, 3 Sharp-shinned 
Hawks, 3 Cooper's Hawks, 2 Red-shouldered Hawks and 6 Red-tailed Hawks.  
Waterfowl seemed a bit thin - we recorded Pied-billed and Horned Grebe and 12 
duck species.

We relocated to the Stone Bridge over GW Parkway overlooking Hunting Creek 
Bay for the gull and crow count at about 3 pm.  Strong winds and a high tide 
likely kept gull numbers down and may have also influenced the crow count as 
few crows were noted flying from MD into VA (usually ca. 500 will cross in 
the late December afternoons).  Gull numbers were much smaller than last 
year, with 1600 Ring-billed Gulls noted (last year = 4500) and Herring and 
Great Black-backed Gulls were similarly affected.  We did count 23 Laughing 
Gulls this year (last year = 200), all seen in the morning and nearly all 
seen later in the day from the Stone Bridge.  

The vantage of the Stone Bridge allows us to effectively count crows flying 
from outside the beltway to a roost site inside the beltway somewhere near 
Shirley Hwy - I estimate we can sample about 25% of the total afternoon 
flight on a good day.  Our tally of 1800 crow sp. was less than last year 
(2610 recorded) but, as mentioned above, the weather may have influenced 
these numbers.  Yet, if one assumes this years numbers area a true indicator, 
then it would appear that crow numbers have been reduced by about 30%, 
suggesting an upper limit to the effect of the West Nile Virus.  Of course, 
statistics from a great number of counts will be needed before we can truely 
plumb the effect of this disease.

Even with the crappy weather, it was a good day of birding.  The route we 
took netted 61 or 62 species, depending upon how you cut it.  This is very 
close to the species diversity seen on this route for the last 3 years (61, 
59 & 64).  Par for the course.

Hope everyone has great fun on the CBCs this year!

Kurt Gaskill


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