Every bird counts in annual Christmas tally

ORONO – High numbers of woodpeckers and hawks were spotted Saturday by volunteers during the National Audubon Society ‘s annual Christmas Bird Count in the Orono and Old Town areas, local Audubon officials said Sunday.

Also reported was a number of great “saves,” which in birding terms means rare finds, Judy Kellogg Markowsky, Fields Pond Audubon Center director, said after the daylong bird counting effort.

“Somebody found a red-bellied woodpecker – that was one of the high points,” she said. “There were a lot of different woodpeckers.”

Volunteers spotted black-backed, downy, pileated and hairy woodpeckers and flickers Saturday.

Only three species of woodpeckers are on the list of birds volunteers typically find in the area, Markowsky said. Flickers and black-backed and red-bellied woodpeckers are unusual, she said. The black-backed woodpecker is a Maine species, but “it’s very hard to find” because it nests in deep brush.

In addition, volunteers saw a great many hawks within the search area, which was a 7-mile radius around the intersection of College and Stillwater avenues.

“They spotted a harrier hawk, and someone else saw a red-tailed hawk, and a different person saw a Cooper’s hawk,” Markowsky said.

A sharp-shinned hawk also was tallied by one of the 25 volunteer birders. The Cooper’s and harrier hawks are not on the local bird watch list.

“That’s an unusually good sweep of hawks,” the local Audubon director said.

A mockingbird, typically a Southern species, a northern shrike and a white-winged crossbill also are on the list of great saves. Another interesting find Saturday was an Iceland gull.

“The Iceland gull comes down from the Arctic,” she said. “They do come to Maine, but they mostly go to the coast, so to see one inland is quite rare.”

Several Barrow’s goldeneyes, a rare duck that is another Arctic species, also were spotted.

“There were 20 found up and down the [Penobscot] river,” Markowsky said.

Barrow’s first were seen in Maine a decade ago, and their numbers reportedly have increased since.

More than 26 Maine Audubon groups will collect bird counts that will be added to about 3,000 others from across the country.

Christmas bird counts began nationwide Dec. 14 and will end Jan. 5. The results will be published in the annual CBC issue of American Birds.

This year marks the 105th anniversary of the first Christmas Bird Count.

Before the turn of the century, many people took part in a holiday tradition known as the Christmas “Side Hunt,” in which they would shoot as many birds and animals as possible for fun. This all changed when ornithologist Frank Chapman suggested a bird census be held instead.

“This has evolved into what the Audubon Society does now,” Markowsky said.

The event is most important for its ability to track bird trends.

“There are some species that either have increased or decreased that are tracked very well by the Christmas Bird Count,” Markowsky said.

Many of the volunteers are members of the Fields Pond Audubon Center, including Medea Steinman of Orono, who put on her snow boots Saturday to search for birds on Ayer’s Island in Orono with about eight other people.

“The semester just ended, and I needed to get outside,” she said.

Saturday’s count was Steinman’s first in Maine, but in the past she has been active in counts in California and New Mexico.

There are two ways to count birds for the CBC. Participants can choose a section of area to search or can count the birds that use their home feeders. Both tallies are used to create the CBC numbers.