I was up early on Saturday, April 10, 2004, not to bird but to get taxes
finished before a day of Little League activities when I glanced out the window
and saw a feeding frenzy on tiny Woodglen Lake. Around 6:45 am I was
astonished to see the local Kingfisher had been joined by over 175
Double-crested Cormorants. They were diving and surfacing with 5 inch long
feeder fish. Then I noticed that one of the gulls circling overhead was
actually a Caspian Tern, so I started scanning the gulls visible through the
trees and found another Caspian Tern among the immature Ring-billed Gulls.
This was just too much, so I left the taxes and headed outside. Wtihin a half
hour all the terns and most of the gulls (I eventually counted 3 Caspians and
10 Ring-billed Gulls) headed north and most of the cormorants headed south
towards Burke Lake, leaving the more normal 10-12 cormorants, pair of Mallards
and 2 pair of resident Canada Geese to keep the Kingfisher company.
Other birds noted:
Great-blue Heron 3
Canada Goose 5
Mallard 2
Belted Kingfisher 1
Red-bellied Woodpecker 5
Downy Woodpecker 2
Eastern Phoebe 1
Crow 3
N. Rough-winged Swallow 1
Carolina Chickadees 4
Tufted Titmouse 3
White-br. Nuthatch 2
Carolina Wren 2
Cardinal 5
Song Sparrow 2
White-throated Sparrow 4
Dark-eyed Junco 6
Lots of other stuff out there, but duty calls.
Sarah Mayhew
Fairfax, VA
You are subscribed to VA-BIRD. To post to this mailing list, simply send email
to va-bird@xxxxxxxxxxxxx. To unsubscribe, send email to
va-bird-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx with 'unsubscribe' in the Subject field.
