On a quest for white-winged crossbills

HOLDEN – There’s a bumper crop of spruce cones this winter. That only happens every few years. White-winged crossbills fly where the spruce seeds are. They don’t arrive in the Bangor area every year. A crossbill winter brings great joy to birders.

Most white-winged crossbills live in the vast spruce forests of Canada. But they range far and wide to find areas where spruce cones, and therefore spruce seeds, are plentiful.

White-winged crossbills have been reported throughout northern Maine this winter. They were found in the Orono and Bangor Christmas Bird Counts, but I had not seen them yet this winter despite searches in the Bangor City Forest, the Sunkhaze National Wildlife Refuge and the Fields Pond Audubon Center in Holden. A birder can’t let a crossbill winter go by without seeing them – it could be several years before another chance comes along.

Many crossbill reports came from the spruce forests of the Downeast coast. It was time to head for Schoodic Point, a site of tall spruces and spectacular ocean vistas. Audubon member and president of the Bangor Land Trust Lucy Quimby wanted to see white-winged crossbills, too, and she offered to drive us to Schoodic.

Once we were in the Schoodic part of Acadia National Park, my eyes were glued to not the waves, not the surf, not the ice-capped rocks, not even the eider ducks riding the waves – but to the tops of spruces.

Cones covered the tops of spruce everywhere. Outside, it was bitter cold. The first time we walked into the spruce forest, the chittery trills of crossbills were apparent. The spruces were so tall and dense, the birds could not be seen, although they sounded close -one spruce away.

We drove a mile further and stopped again, walking up another gravel road. Again, white-winged crossbills trilled just behind the cone-laden spruce spires we looked at.

We drove again, and stopped – and a female white-winged crossbill, greenish-yellow with faint streaks on her front, landed on a nearby branch. She was only 20 feet away – even the crossed bill was visible. Suddenly she crouched on the branch and quivered her wings. A bright pink male arrived on the branch and fed the female. This was an interesting sight -it’s called “courtship feeding.”

Other birds do that, too – a male tern dangles a small fish in front of the female, then pushes it into her mouth. A female cardinal crouches and quivers her wings, and the male flies to her and pushes a seed into her mouth.

Crossbills are known to nest in any month of the year, and these birds were starting that cycle on a frigid January day in Maine.

They are fascinating, beautiful birds. Males are bright pinkish red with black wings, which are accentuated with broad white bars. Females are a yellowish green with streaks on the body, and dark wings with white bars.

It takes a close look with binoculars to see that the two halves of the bill cross over each other. The bill is only a half-inch long and the bird is not much bigger than a sparrow. We were lucky to get a look at that crossed-over bill and to see a sign that nesting is starting with the crossbill. Apparently, the crossbills will be at Schoodic Point for a while.

For information on Fields Pond Audubon Center, call 989-2591.