Larry Meade and I spent some time yesterday a.m. at Occouquan NWR in Prince
William Co. From the parking lot, we heard N. Bobwhite (or it may have been
the elusive subspecies N. White) as it was only saying "white".
We walked down Easy road to Deephole Point and it was pretty quiet. An odd
call turned out to be a Juvie Towhee and we spied a F. Balt. Oriole perched
atop
a tree. We listened for King Rail at the point where the road crosses the
marsh, with no success. The action heated up a bit when we hit Deephole Point.
We had Prothonotary Warbler, at least two Yellow Warbs, one N. Parula,
Gnatcatchers and one Trails Flycatcher. Phoebes were all over the place. We
walked a
bit north from Deephole Point, to the marshy area and set off two King Rails as
soon as we got there. One Killdeer jumped up from the beach. We turned around
and headed south again, and had the "best" bird of the day - one Northern
Waterthrush. There was one 2nd year Bald Eagle about and one adult as well.
the
river/bay was as smooth as could be and there were quite a few DC corms, but
no ducks at all...
Rich Rieger
