Baltimore – Page 2 – Birding Boomers

Redcoats and Farmers and Birds

August 16, 2014joannie65354 Comments

So how does it go – “One if by land, and two if by sea”? Wait, my apologies to Henry Wadsworth Longfellow and “Paul Revere’s Ride”, but I think I have the wrong war. Scroll forward a handful of years to the War of 1812 – that would be the one. It is 1814 and the British (yep, them again) are anchored off the sleepy little community of North Point in the mouth of the Patapsco River – you know, right about the point where the Francis Scott Key Bridge crosses the river today. The British are here fresh off an adventure where they cruised up the Patuxent River to Pig Point (which might be somewhere near Wooton’s Landing), then marched up through Bladensburg where they battled their way into Washington.

Okay, this is a blatant call out to Hugh Vandervoort of My Birding Photos who absolutely loves to go birding and “bugging” at Wooton’s Landing (or Wooten’s – whichever works for you). Today, there is little to find at the county park that would suggest there was ever a bustling boat landing or trading post and there seems to be absolutely no trace of the Wooten family who might have owned the land in colonial times. But you will find birds and bugs there and you will find Hugh there taking photos of the bugs and birds on any given day of the year.

But back to the war, the British have sailed up the river, marched overland, battled and won at The Battle of Bladensburg, and on August 24, 1814, have burned Washington, DC (which was then called Washington City). They were probably feeling pretty darned sure of themselves at this point and were ready to take their burning and ransacking on up to Baltimore. Now anyone who knows even one Baltimore Ravens fan knows that the good folks of Baltimore (“Bal-da-mer” or “Bought-More” depending on the neighborhood you live in) do not take lightly to being ransacked and pillaged. It is just a Baltimore thing, hon. At the mouth of the harbor there is a little outpost called Fort McHenry (lovely park today but a strategically placed fort that was armed to the hilt with cannons back in 1814). This fort had to be conquered before the British could enter the Baltimore Harbor and move forward with their plans to burn the place down. And you will recall from elementary school history lessons that a gentleman named Francis Scott Key was a “guest” on one of those British ships that would attack Fort McHenry in the Battle of Baltimore which lasted for 24 hours (13 & 14 September). Mr. Key will be held by the British and will be witness to the dastardly bombardment of Fort McHenry all through the night and he will write about his joy at seeing the flag of the United States raised over Fort McHenry in the early morning light in a poem called “The Defence of Fort McHenry” which was published on September 20, 1814 making him quite famous locally and, ultimately, resulting in the aforementioned bridge being named after him (among a whole plethora of schools and other things) when it was built in March 1977.

But let’s not get ahead of ourselves. Meanwhile, there were other British ships anchored off the shore of a little peninsula called North Point. The British had a two part plan which gets me back to the by land or by sea aspect of it. While those big ole ships would be bombing the fort, the British would land troops who would sneak up through the little farming community of North Point and head on up the road to Baltimore proper and do some serious ransacking and burning. But they had not accounted for those aggravating citizens of Baltimore (ancestors of future Ravens fans no doubt) who got word of the planned attack and had built ramifications to protect the city from just such an attack by land. When the British landed, the landowners and farmers at North Point (about five miles south of Baltimore) sent word on up to Baltimore that the British were on the way and it was time to call out the locals to protect the city…which they did. The Battle of North Point on September 12, 1814 was not a resounding victory for the Americans but it did what it was supposed to do – delay the attack on Baltimore. On the other hand, a couple of days later, the Battle of Baltimore was a victory for the Americans. The British were defeated and retreated back down along North Point Road burning the farms along the way – I guess burning the farms was some sort of a consolation prize for missing out on burning Baltimore and a punishment for the farmers who had not been very cooperative after all. At any rate, the British got back to their ships and sailed away leaving the good folks of Baltimore to do what they do best – drink beer (Natty Bo) and eat crabs.

So the war ended, the words of Frances Scott Key were set to music and later became our national anthem, “The Star Spangled Banner” which is sung (sometimes very badly) at the start of every Baltimore Ravens game. In the meantime, North Point went back to being a sleepy little farming community.

So we scroll forward another hundred years or so to the early 1900’s. Baltimore is a thriving city and seaport but it gets so hot in the summer – hot and humid and sticky. The bricks and mortar of the buildings just soak up the summer sun and the heat is unbearable to the good citizens of Baltimore. So where do you go when it gets hot in the city? You go to the shore. There is just one little thing in your way – the Chesapeake Bay. In 1914, there was no Chesapeake Bay Bridge (or more properly – the William Preston Lane Jr. Memorial Bridge) so you had to take a ferry get to the eastern shore of the Bay and to the beautiful beaches beyond or you had to drive up over the top of the Bay and around through Delaware. It was quite an undertaking. But, if you lived in Baltimore in the early part of the 20^th century and if you didn’t have the time or the money to go all the way to the shore, you could take the trolley to North Point for 30 cents and spend the day at the Bay Shore Amusement Park. How convenient is that?

Bay Shore Park was the place to be. There were gardens, walking paths, a dance hall, a bowling alley, a restaurant, and a pier for fishing or crabbing. There were also just about 6 miles of beautiful shoreline for swimming and even more fishing on the Chesapeake Bay. After a long day of resting, relaxing, swimming, fishing, bowling and dancing, you could head on back to Baltimore totally refreshed or maybe totally exhausted. The Bay Shore Amusement Park was built in 1906 and operated at North Point until 1947 when the land was acquired by Bethlehem Steel and the park was demolished. It was fun while it lasted, I suppose. Once again, North Point went back to being a sleepy little farming community…..and it pretty much stayed that way for the next seventy or so years.

Today, two hundred years (minus 30 days) after the British attack on Baltimore, North Point has become a Maryland State Park with plenty of hiking trails, a lovely visitor center, a swimming/wading beach and, of course, a 1000 foot long pier for fishing and crabbing. The “Defenders Trail” runs through the park and is part of the Star Spangled Banner Trail (map and guide). Little remains of the war but you can track the path the British used with a little imagination and a bit of persistence…there are a few markers but you have to look for them (try this blog for a little help on that part).

The old fountain and the trolley stop from the Bay Shore Amusement Park remain. Both have been restored and the old trolley stop is now a picnic pavilion you can rent for an additional fee. Otherwise, almost all traces of the war or the amusement park have vanished leaving a beautiful park to be enjoyed by everyone.

And, (yes, you knew I would finally get to the birding part) the park is a well-known birding hotspot where more than 225 species of birds have been spotted (eBird hotspot data). The park has more than 1300 acres with several miles of trails through a variety of habitats to include marshlands and meadows. About 667 acres of the park have received protection as “State Wildlands” – The Black Marsh Wildlands. The best part about the Black Marsh trail is that, being designated a wildlands means that no bikes or pets are allowed. This is very good for birding and solitude (but I do wish they would put a few benches along the trail for more quiet contemplation).

It is relatively easy to find North Point State Park with a GPS but it is a bit (a very little bit) off the beaten path – in this case, maybe 5 miles south of Interstate 695 (exit 42/43) south of Baltimore. There is a small fee to enter the park ($4/summer, $3/winter) but it is well worth it to be able to access such a peaceful park.

We visited on a weekday and the park was relatively quiet and not crowded but information at the park website indicates that the park can become very crowded in summer months. Trolley or not, the people still come. If you want to bird, I would advise you to pick a weekday and go early. Don’t expect to find much by way of restaurants in town. We found a pizza/subs place for lunch — the sandwiches were okay but nothing to write home about. Since there are picnic tables and pavilions on the water in the park, pack a lunch – you’ll be happy that you did.

Finally – my apologies to any historian, teacher, citizen of Baltimore, or War of 1812 expert for my quick and dirty overview of the War and the Battles of Baltimore and North Point.

Otherwise, GO RAVENS!

BirdingBoomers Hotspot Review for North Point State Park. (Remember that my reviews are not about how many birds you’ll see or what activities you can enjoy…there are other websites that provide that. I am more focused on the accessibility of the park and how easy it is for older people who are not necessarily in great physical shape to enjoy.)

Chasing A Rare Bird – Red Crossbills

January 21, 2014joannie65353 Comments

Snow. Lots of snow predicted today. Or, should I say, THEY are threatening us with snow again. I once worked with a young man who had relatives who lived in New York City who always said the weather man was “threatening” them with snow as if the weather channel was command headquarters for the big war against sunny nice weather and it was a constant battle between the people who wanted warm weather and the weathermen who were always predicting another “100 year storm” with lots of snow and ice and treacherous road conditions. When snow is on the radar I am always reminded of Rick and the never-ending war against the soldiers of snow and bad weather.

But snow is not always such a bad forecast. Have you ever noticed that of all the types of weather, snow is the quietest and possibly the prettiest? I would certainly agree that a wild and thundering rain storm does reach down to the most tempestuous parts of your soul and can sweep you off on a journey and cleanses the cobwebs out of your head. But snow is silent for the most part and invites you to find a good book, a cup of hot chocolate, a nice bowl of buttered popcorn, and a warm cozy spot to relax, read, and nap and find a little peace and quiet along the way. People do not talk about snow pelting down or raging through the trees. They talk of snow blanketing the earth and making everything more serene and beautiful. It surely puts me in mind of a nice bowl of stew and hot biscuits for supper this evening.

It also brings a location to mind and chasing a rare bird or two. The location is Fort Smallwood Park here in Anne Arundel County. Fort Smallwood is a gem of a park located on the point where the Patapsco River meets the Chesapeake Bay. It was once a fort that helped to protect the Port of Baltimore and still has an old battery on the shoreline. On a clear day, unlike today, you can see the Key Bridge from the park. Unfortunately, our luck in birding here has not included too many clear days. Being on the water, the park has become a birding hotspot in the county for spotting numerous types of waterfowl in winter. I stress ‘in winter’ because most of our visits there have been in the winter and, again, being on the water means that cold winds are almost always blowing in from the Chesapeake Bay. Very cold.

Our first visit to Fort Smallwood was last year about this same time. The winter of 2013 was apparently not so good for Crossbills further up north and so we had an “irruption” of crossbills in the area. We had read reports of the rare bird (for Maryland) being spotted at various locations in the county. After several reports of a nice sized flock of crossbills at Fort Smallwood Park, we decided the time was right to go out in search of the crossbill.

There were two possibilities for Crossbills – the Red Crossbill (Loxia curvirostra) and the White-Winged Crossbill (Loxia leucoptera). It didn’t particularly matter which bird I encountered as either would be a nice addition to my life list. Of course, both would be nice but I figured I should not be greedy about it and just go out and see what we could find. As the name implies, the Crossbill has a crossed-bill, all the better for extracting pine nuts from between the layers of pine cones and seeds from round prickly sweet gum tree balls. Both the Red Crossbill and the White-Winged Crossbill are mostly reddish in color with the Red Crossbill being a bit duller red with some yellow or orangey patches. The White-Winged Crossbill is red with black wings with white markings (okay, wing bars). (Yes, there are more identifying marks that are diagnostic but I leave the research in the field guides today to you.) In a winter world of little brown sparrows, a red bird other than the ever-present Northern Cardinals (Cardinalis cardinalis) should stand out, right? Or so I thought.

We found Fort Smallwood Park with relative ease. Only one problem, on our first visit, the temperature outside at the point was 17 icy degrees. That’s 17 degrees without factoring in the wind chill of the steady breeze rolling in off the Bay. The Park has a roadway that loops through the park. The top of the loop circles the waterfront. There were actually fishermen fishing off the rip-rap which had a nice layer of ice on the rocks. I have come to know that there are always fishermen at Fort Smallwood or, at least there have always been fishermen when I’ve been there. We drove slowly around the loop doing a little car-birding and occasionally braving the wind and rolling the windows down to peek out with the binoculars. We searched every pine and American Sweetgum (Liquidambar styraciflua) tree on the property looking for Crossbills. No luck.

We spotted Eastern Towhees (Pipilo erythrophthalmus), a huge flock of sparrows containing mostly White-Throated Sparrows (Zonotrichia albicollis) and House Sparrows (Passer domesticus), Canada Geese (Branta canadensis), Northern Flickers (Colaptes auratus), and a Yellow-Bellied Sapsucker (Sphyrapicus varius)…..but no Crossbills. I actually tried to get out of the car at the waterfront to check out the rafts of Scaups and Ducks off the point hoping to see something special. I lasted only about 10 seconds that felt more like 30 minutes. Did I say it was cold? I darn near froze to death walking the 50 feet from the parking lot to the bulkhead.

Sometime later that month we tried again after hearing yet more reports of Crossbills in the Sweetgum trees at the park. It was a balmy winter day. The temperature was somewhere in the 30’s so we were confident that this would be the day when we would have much better luck and I would be able to layer up with sweaters and jackets and gloves and a good hat and I would be able to actually get out of the car, do some time walking around and I would surely be able to spot those Crossbills. I don’t suppose I could be more wrong. Everywhere else in the state of Maryland, the skies were overcast but there was really no forecast (or threat for that matter) of precipitation.

At Fort Smallwood, we found freezing rain and snow falling – okay, not falling exactly – horizontally. Not a Crossbill to be found and absolutely no getting out of the car. And yes, there were a couple cars – fishermen – waiting for the micro-storm to abate so they could get back to standing on the shore and doing a little fishing. I am not really sure which group – birders or fishermen – is more persistent at their craft.

I was able to amuse myself by watching Gulls flying directly into the headwind. Well, I say “flying” but the gulls were making very little progress and, in fact, seemed to standing (flying) still. Now, I had always wanted to capture a bird in flight in what I just knew would be an award winning photograph. But in the past, I have never been lucky enough or had a camera that was fast enough to get a good picture of a bird in flight. Here was my chance. There would be little motion on the bird’s part to blur up the photograph. So I braved the cold and the wind and rolled down the window and started clicking away. The birds appeared to be motionless in their effort to fight the wind so I figured getting a shot would be a cinch. Unfortunately, the camera captures the reality and not the illusion of the scene and, in reality, there was plenty of movement by the birds and by the wind and the snow to make the shot a difficult one. A better photographer would have, no doubt, nailed it but, once again, I was left with some more blurry bird pictures. I am getting quite a collection of slightly blurry bird pictures and am thinking about pretending that I take these shots deliberately and it is some special and rare form of art photography. If it catches on, I will be the Leonardo da Vinci of the “blurry art bird photography” genre, hands down.

But back to rare things and rare birds. We never did find the Crossbills at Fort Smallwood although we have found good birds there and there many good reasons that it is a birding hotspot in the county. We have only been to Fort Smallwood once, in the height of summer, when it wasn’t freezing and damp and cold. In summer, the park is delightful and filled with children playing and walkers and bikers and waders and, oh yes, fishermen. But unless you get a good day, it is not so great for birding in the summer since all the activity, especially the kids running and playing and the dogs being walked, seems to discourage the birds. There is a wonderful marshy pond on the property that attracts herons and wading birds so you can usually find birds there though not as many as in winter. It has become one of our favorite spots to go to when we do not have lots of time for birding and a slow drive around the park loop to see what birds there are is very appealing.

Now about those Crossbills – last year was the year for Crossbills. There have been no reports of Crossbills this year and the word is that there is plenty of pine nuts and sweet gum seeds up north for the Crossbills to eat. So, there was no need for the Crossbills to venture further south this winter. But do not despair, all is not lost. Just as we had decided we were not going to get lucky enough to find the Crossbills although we had tried several different locations, a birding friend reported that he had Crossbills feeding at the bird feeders in his yard. Seriously, I thought.

Seriously?

In the yard at the feeders?

Really?

I have been braving winter winds and horizontal snow and this lucky guy has Crossbills right there in his yard. He was gracious enough to invite fellow birders over to see. With his blessings and permission, we drove over to his house (no icy Bay winds or snow here), hung out a bit drinking coffee and chatting with a few other birders, and leisurely watched the Red Crossbills flit in and out of the feeders enjoying their breakfast. Now, that is a good birding morning – a life bird for the list – good long looks – doing the “life bird dance” – more blurry photographs for the collection – good company – hot coffee – and absolutely no icy winds or snow.

Mission Accomplished.