Five members of the Rockingham Bird Club (Tom Lord, Tom Pendleton, Chuck
Auckerman, Mike Smith and John Irvine) went to Prince William and King George
Counties looking for recently reported "specialty birds" on Tuesday, February
24th. The highlight of our trip was finding eight species of sparrows in the
span of twenty minutes close to the monument to Julie Metz in the wetland named
for her on Neabsco Creek: American Tree Sparow 3, Field Sparrow 1, Fox Sparrow
1, Song Sparrow 4, Swamp Sparrow 1, White-throated Sparrow 10, HARRIS'S
SPARROW 1, and White-crowned Sparrow, 1. Thanks to all who have brought their
contributions of seed and concentrated the birds there; we left our
contribution
also. A pair of Wood Ducks and a flock of Green-winged Teal were present
nearby. With an increasing overcast and a beginning gentle rain, the light was
too
poor to ID any possible Rusty Blackbirds among the other Icterids hanging
around in the treetops.
Earlier we had stopped at the Prince William landfill and were rewarded with
a single Lesser Black-backed Gull. The remainder of the thousands of gulls
present were almost entirely Ring-billeds, with only a very light smattering of
Herrings and two Great Black-backed Gulls. We were surprised to find a Common
Raven (both heard and seen) there among the crows.
Birding was difficult in Leesylvania State Park because much of the access to
the water was barred off for some construction purposes although no
construction work was visible anywhere.
Driving south through Fredericksburg we had an excellent look at a
Red-shouldered Hawk perched just off Rt. 1 over a creek. We had to contend
with a cold
wind and a raw rain at the King George quarry ponds along Route 3, where we
scoped through a gazillion Canada Geese looking for the two secialties reported
two days earlier by Fred Atwood. The Blue morph Snow Goose was not too
difficult to find, but we never could spot the Greater White-Fronted Goose;
most of
the geese were sitting in the water and constantly moving around, except for
one large flock on land which unfortunately was just over a hill and a long
ways off so the geese's legs were not visible. Still, we had 14 species of
waterfowl on those ponds, always a satisfying treat for inland birders such as
ourselves, and 17 for the day; so despite missing some of our target birds, we
came home happy. Our trip list for the day was 54 species and Tom Lord had two
life birds and discovered the "blue" goose, so he was on a roll. Next year
we'll plan a club trip up to these good birding places. Our thanks to Marc
Ribaudo for providing excellent directions.
John Irvine
Harrisonburg, VA
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