Crossbills live in Maine (and the entire northern U.S. and Canada) all year long. They have adapted to feeding on the cones of coniferous trees, so they may travel widely to find good cone crops. They time their breeding to the abundance and availability of this food; therefore – incredibly – they may breed and raise young during any month of the year.

Some years may see widespread failure of cone production, and crossbills “irrupt” en masse beyond their normal ranges to find enough food. The female crossbill we watched that day on Kidney Pond swayed gently in the wind atop the spruce. Then, with a sudden, sharp burst of song, it took off. I wondered what kind of year it would be for her.

Once again we enjoyed good weather and good birds up at Kidney Pond in Baxter State Park. The predicted rain held off, and while wind and clouds did eventually increase, we enjoyed a particularly beautiful calm morning just right for kayaking.

Our friends Meg and Ron Logan generously allowed us to use their kayaks, so we paddled over to the pond’s marshy outlet. Emergent vegetation created intriguing channels through the water as we decided to explore one of these to see where it led.

We passed a new beaver lodge in the middle of construction, and soon we came to a dam, which also looked as if it had been worked on recently. Beyond the dam was an impenetrable alder thicket, so we turned back. Up until this point we hadn’t seen any birds, but I imagined what it would be like come spring – a wall of birds. For the most part, though, we were entertained by magnificent views of Katahdin, The Owl, and OJI.

As we paddled back down the channel, I heard a soft warbling coming from the spruce-fir forest bordering the pond. Sitting right at the tip of a spruce was a white-winged crossbill.

The males of this species have pinkish or red plumage and sport two white wing bars. The females and juveniles are less obvious in dull yellow-olive plumage, also with wing bars. The bird I saw was a female.

Crossbills live in Maine (and the entire northern U.S. and Canada) all year long. They have adapted to feeding on the cones of coniferous trees, so they may travel widely to find good cone crops. They time their breeding to the abundance and availability of this food; therefore – incredibly – they may breed and raise young during any month of the year.

Some years may see widespread failure of cone production, and crossbills “irrupt” en masse beyond their normal ranges to find enough food. The female crossbill we watched that day on Kidney Pond swayed gently in the wind atop the spruce. Then, with a sudden, sharp burst of song, it took off. I wondered what kind of year it would be for her.

I saw or heard many other birds during this trip: rusty blackbirds, pine siskins, hordes of red-breasted nuthatches, red-breasted mergansers, the ever-present black-capped chickadees, boreal chickadees, golden-crowned kinglets, downy woodpeckers and, of course, the grey jays, which are always a highlight of a visit to Kidney Pond. I’ll write about them in upcoming columns.

NEWS bird columnist Chris Corio can be reached at bdnsports@bangordailynews.net