A barnacle goose arrived in a Yarmouth field this fall in the company of nearly a thousand Canada geese. These geese spent many days in October and November grazing in that field. Many birders went to see the rare barnacle goose. There are only about… Read More
Wild turkeys are amusing to watch if they come to visit occasionally – in small numbers. In summer, the females constantly make a soft “keouk-keouk-keouk” to their many young. When they cross the road, they usually go single file, and sometimes an adult turkey stands in the road… Read More
One day, Hope Brogunier was sitting on a bench in her Bangor yard watching a group of blue jays bathing in a birdbath. The blue jays would get in the birdbath and vibrate their wings in the water, causing droplets to fly all around the bird. Read More
In November, not everybody wants to go out on the ocean, but birders do! There are birds out there in the icy, windy surf. An Audubon trip went to Washington County to survey birds that live among the islands of the Roque Island archipelago. It… Read More
I saw a flock of about eight Golden-crowned Kinglets gleaning food from the undersides of leaves. Each bird would hover underneath a leaf and pluck off something small with their tiny bills. They were eating insect eggs. The kinglets were fascinating to watch. I was… Read More
Last week, I went to southern Maine and saw a number of beautiful shorebirds – dunlins, black-bellied plovers, ruddy turnstones – but the highlight was a snake. I went with Trevor Persons to a property of The Nature Conservancy in Wells. He and I are… Read More
A young porcupine has visited the apple tree next to the Fields Pond Audubon Center since August. Most days it eats apples the way a large squirrel eats a large nut, which in this case is an apple. It is a very funny sight. Sitting… Read More
While visiting friends on Deer Isle recently, we were having a congenial lunch on a porch overlooking Eggemoggin Reach, the body of water spanned by the bridge to Deer Isle. Suddenly, a small flock of white-winged crossbills flew in. They landed in the top of… Read More
I had a great month for vireos in September, seeing four species in my yard. Other birders saw yet another vireo species at the Fields Pond Audubon Center – a vireo never seen there before and the 133rd bird species found there. Vireos are interesting… Read More
Maine Audubon offers a pelagic (open sea) trip every year, and it occurred last weekend. Three birders and I set our alarms for 3 a.m., left home at 3:30 in the morning, met our carpool, went to Bar Harbor and arrived there in the dark. We boarded the… Read More
Fran Mitchell called me up and said there was a big, dark bird and it was always sitting on the utility lines next to the former site of Home Depot. She saw it every day as she was going to work at Shaw’s Supermarket, in the vicinity of… Read More
Recently, I went to Islesboro, an island in Penobscot Bay, to visit a college friend and her husband. I do this every year, and it’s a wonderful social event. They give dinners and I get to meet their friends. Additionally, they organize a bird walk, and that is… Read More
Last weekend I finally got a chance to explore a small stream in Mattamiscontis, near Lincoln. I had admired the stream often from a bridge, but I didn’t dare explore it by myself in my tippy little canoe. Over the years, I had observed two… Read More
We have a new eagle nest on Maine Audubon’s property at Fields Pond. The pair of eagles that formerly tried to bring up their young on a small island in Brewer Lake has moved to Fields Pond. It’s a good thing. The latter island was… Read More
I’ve been seeing many eastern kingbirds on the telephone wires lately. They are regal birds, shiny black on their backs and glossy white on the underside with a white band going across the end of the tail. On the wires the bird usually presents a… Read More
This is the season to be feeding hummingbirds. From now until mid-September the adult hummingbirds and their young will be moving south. Those from southeast Canada and northeast Maine will be moving through the Bangor area. That’s a lot of hummingbirds. At this time, I… Read More
Back in July, I received an invitation to go on an evening cruise on the Friendship V, the popular Bar Harbor whale-watching boat, to Petit Manan Island. I had gone to that island often when I was teaching field ornithology. I was thrilled to go there again. Read More
Last week, I was with other birders and we were enjoying (with bittersweet thoughts) the last bird songs of the season. The season of the dawn chorus was ending. A few thrushes were still singing, and we heard hermit and Swainson’s thrushes and also the… Read More
I went with several Audubon friends to a small lake in northern Washington County. We all love nature – birding, tracking, finding wildflowers, canoeing and more. The birding was great. Warblers were everywhere – black-throated blue warblers, black-throated green warblers and yellow-rumped warblers. Most were… Read More
Spruce grouse can be hard to find. Out-of-state birders come to Maine to add the spruce grouse to their “life list.” They go to Schoodic Point, Great Wass Island or Quoddy Head State Park to seek their spruce grouse. Spruce grouse are sometimes found in… Read More
In the forest of northern Washington County, I came by a small pool. On its edge, I saw a dark, tall, graceful sandpiper. It had dark, slim, pointed wings and a tail with white outer feathers. It was a solitary sandpiper. It is a well-named species – they… Read More
Winter wrens have a beautiful song – if you can hear it. On a Fields Pond Audubon Center birding trip, I noted that Julie Keene knew bird songs well. That’s a rare skill. I was looking for someone to take over my Breeding Bird Survey… Read More
An indigo bunting graced the grounds of the Fields Pond Audubon Center last week. A male indigo bunting is a showstopper – a bird related to the sparrows but colored a rich, deep, dark blue on every feather. Its usual habitat consists of hilly fields… Read More
Now that the trees have leaves and it’s hard to see birds in the forest, it’s time to appreciate bird songs. In late May and June, a haunting, beautiful song emanates from the wet lowland forest. People hear this song in the early morning and… Read More
Now that it’s the middle of May, some new warblers appear. A male redstart is a warbler, and a joy and thrill to see – a tiny, hyperactive bird, 5 inches long, and shiny black with flashes of orange in his wings and tail. Those… Read More
The next warbler to arrive will be the black-and-white warbler. Colorful, it’s not but beautiful nevertheless, a study in black-and-white stripes, placed horizontally along its head and body. The first time I saw one was years ago and it was creeping along the bark of… Read More
It’s May and the warblers are here. Warblers are the joy and bane of bird-watchers. Colorful, beautiful and hyperactive little birds, new bird-watchers may be frustrated trying to catch sight of warblers flitting through the trees. googletag.cmd.push(function () { // Define Slot var slot_sizes =… Read More
Ospreys are back at Fields Pond. Several nests are in the vicinity, visible from the Wiswell Road in Brewer, and from the “red bridge,” which is not red, on the Brewer Lake Road in Orrington. Ospreys also are back at a handful of nests along… Read More
By mid-April, most winter birds have left. Pine grosbeaks and redpolls have gone north, but the spring ducks have arrived in their best finery. An interesting transition happened last week. I drive by the intersection of Hogan Road and State Street in Bangor every day. Read More
They are an endearing species, squat and plump with 21/2-inch-long bills. They poke their bills deep into the moist earth, typically to grab an earthworm with the pliable tip. They migrate at night and put down in the darndest places. Jim Bird and Ed Grew… Read More
Last week was unpleasantly frigid. I was frantically searching for signs of spring, and on a sunny day I got into my car. The sun had heated my car – a sign of spring! The sun wouldn’t heat a car in January, but it does now, in April. Read More
Red-winged blackbirds are back – spring is here! The males come back in big flocks, sometimes accompanied by grackles and cowbirds. These big flocks are raucous, making a racket as they perch in trees or walk around on lawns or fields. They poke around in the grass, finding… Read More
Many people in Maine say, “We don’t have a spring.” We really do have a beautiful spring; the sun is strong, but the air is still cool. Keep your winter clothes on, and enjoy spring. We cheered our first chipmunk of the season, under the… Read More
Grackles will be here in big flocks soon. They are known as short-distance migrants by ornithologists because they spend the winter in the southern half of the United States. Long-distance migrants spend the winter in South or Central America. When flocks of grackles arrive in… Read More
Jerry Smith of Orrington is an expert on gulls as well as hawks. Both are hard to identify. In February seven Audubon birders braved the cold, windy weather to learn about gulls from Jerry. They crowded into one car and went from Bangor to Belfast,with… Read More
Guess what – robins are back! I had two in my yard last week. Birders are spotting large flocks of robins in coastal Maine and in southern Maine. googletag.cmd.push(function () { // Define Slot var slot_sizes = [[300,250]]; var new_slot_sizes = []; var has_banner =… Read More
We’ve had many field trips this winter since the Christmas Bird Counts. One was led by Jerry Smith. They found some beautiful birds, such as Bohemian waxwings and pine grosbeaks, the stars of this winter. But the highlight of that birding trip was not a… Read More
It’s been a wonderful season to see the winter finches. I’ve seen many flocks of redpolls this winter – they are tiny, streaked birds with jaunty little red caps. The adult males have a bright pink breast, too. When they arrive from the North, they… Read More
Right in the middle of Bangor, birding is good. A peregrine falcon is seen regularly, along South Main Street or in the vicinity of the parking garage. A Cooper’s hawk often perches on the girders under the roof of the Bangor Auditorium, especially in the morning. Read More
HOLDEN – Toward the end of January, I always remind myself of the beauty of winter. That’s because one needs to find things to appreciate in a difficult, long season. Winter highlights for nature lovers are the beauty of snow and ice formations, the starkness… Read More
HOLDEN – At the Fields Pond Audubon Center, we have been getting reports of barred owls watching bird feeders, and getting hit and killed on the roads. The reason is hunger. googletag.cmd.push(function () { // Define Slot var slot_sizes = [[300,250]]; var new_slot_sizes = [];… Read More
I was out snowshoeing with another birder in deep woods and also in deep, fluffy snow some two feet deep. The woods were beautiful – mostly large spruce and balsam fir, laden with snow. We were bushwhacking – that is, not on any trail. It… Read More
I called Jerry Smith the day after the Bangor-Bucksport Christmas Bird Count. He was jubilant. The highlight was an unusually high count of Bohemian waxwings. He estimated that the total number would be 1,200-1,500 once all the reports were in. For the Orono count, the… Read More
On the day before Christmas, I got a wonderful gift – pine grosbeaks descended into a crabapple tree right in my own yard. We studied the males, a beautiful pink, as they perched on twigs and bent down to get crabapple seeds. Their backs were beautifully scalloped with… Read More
The Orono-Old Town Christmas Bird Count happened last week. At dawn the temperature was 7 degrees, and a foot of snow covered the ground. Thirty birders went out to cover their assigned territory within the 15-mile-diameter circle registered with the National Audubon Society. Some birders… Read More
Last week, a first-year northern shrike came to the Fields Pond Audubon Center. It perched in the top of a small tree, looking around for a meal. Its prey is typically a mouse, a vole or a small bird. The shrike is colloquially called the “butcher bird” for… Read More
An Orono resident called to report a dozen evening grosbeaks at her bird feeder last week – after years without seeing them at all. “Thirty years ago, they were so abundant at feeders in winter, I wished they would go away. They ate so much… Read More
HOLDEN – Last week volunteer Pat Snyder was working in the wildlife garden at the Fields Pond Audubon Center. The garden and nearby fields were a study in different shades of brown. Suddenly she saw something white – a furry little white face with little white rounded ears. Read More
Last week I was walking through a wet field when suddenly a bird flew up from the grass. It gave its alarm call, “Scaip!” as it flew away. It flew back and forth, and then it dropped back into the long grass. It had a streaked, brown back,… Read More
Ed Grew, birder and geologist, found the first flock of pine grosbeaks in Greater Bangor back in early November. These frugivorous – fruit-eating – birds were feeding in crab apple trees between Fogler Library and the Memorial Union on the University of Maine campus. Since… Read More
Hikers have been finding snow buntings on the tops of Maine mountains since early October. I wondered when the first reports would come in the Bangor area. Snow buntings nest in the Arctic tundra, making nests against rocks among short shrubs and clumps of grass. Read More
Many people with a bird feeder say they can’t identify sparrows. If that’s you, give yourself some credit – juncos are sparrows, and they are easy to identify. They are little, dark gray birds that feed on the ground. They have a white belly and a little light… Read More
Last week, Bohemian waxwings arrived in Auburn, Portland and the town of Old Orchard Beach. They should arrive any minute in the Bangor area. They are beauties, looking much like cedar waxwings – silky brown, with a long dapper crest, a yellow band across the end of the… Read More
I love sparrows. They have subtle beauty with the lovely shades of fall. If you look carefully at a sparrow, you can see lines of russet or gray, beige or maroon, black or cinnamon, caramel or cream. Many sparrows have been coming to the feeder… Read More
The Kenduskeag is a beautiful stream, and the woods along it are full of birds in spring, summer and fall. As a child, I played on its banks and watched the spotted sandpiper in summer. I also saw painted turtles, snapping turtles, muskrats, woodchucks and… Read More
HOLDEN – Some birders call sparrows “LBJs,” short for little brown jobs. They can be difficult to identify. October is the month of the sparrows. All month, they migrate through Maine. Also, some flock to the Fields Pond Audubon Center in Holden to eat millet… Read More
HOLDEN – We found a praying mantis at the Fields Pond Audubon Center last week. It was about four inches tall, bright green, and its stance and front legs reminded us of a miniature Tyrannosaurus Rex. Well, maybe not quite as stout. A group of… Read More
While walking along the east side of Lower South Branch Pond in Baxter State Park, I saw a dead shrew right in the middle of the trail. I stopped to look, because it’s seldom that you see a shrew. Might as well study what they look like –… Read More
Recently I was in the northern part of Baxter State Park with family. It was wonderfully scenic around Traveler Mountain, and its trails much less crowded than those in the southern part of the park. We camped near a group of the Friends of Baxter State Park. Some… Read More
One of September’s nature highlights is the migration of sandpipers. It is a moving sight to see a large flock of them pass through Maine as they make their way from the Arctic to South America. To see this phenomenon, one has to go the coast. Read More
Two much-loved bird species appeared at the Fields Pond Audubon Center last week. The first was a beautiful ovenbird, with immaculate plumage – a smooth, dark olive brown on its back and wings, a bright white eye-ring, a stripe of orange lined with black on… Read More
Last June, naturalist Holly Twining of the Fields Pond Audubon Center and I escorted a large snapping turtle off a busy road. June is the time female snapping turtles – and painted turtles, too – leave their pond, lake or river. They head overland to… Read More
HOLDEN – Once a month in summer, we offer a canoe trip out onto Fields Pond under the full moon. We float along the lake shore as sunset darkens and becomes moonlit night. If it’s a clear sky, the full moon is then our escort. Read More
Elaine Elkin of Orrington called in a report of a great egret. She was sure that it was a great egret. It was like a great blue heron, but a little shorter and pure white, with a long yellow bill and black legs. She and her husband, Ronald,… Read More
Goldfinches have been coming to the Fields Pond Audubon Center’s bird feeders all summer. The plumage of the males is bright yellow, while the olive green of the females can confuse the uninitiated bird-watcher. Like the cedar waxwings, goldfinches are finding mates and building nests… Read More
Cedar waxwings are small, elegant birds with a long crest, and smooth, silky brown plumage. Their name comes from the “droplets” of bright red waxy pigment at the ends of their secondary wing feathers – the wing feathers nearer to the bird’s body. The function… Read More
Three birders were walking together in beautiful woods. This forest of beech and hemlock was studded with many big rocks, some of which were topped with the fern polypody. One rock was taller than we were and covered with ferns. We were transfixed by a big granite boulder… Read More
HOLDEN – A group of visiting naturalists came to experience the Fields Pond Audubon Center and its trails. They were from the Midwest, tired of driving, and only had a day to enjoy nature in the Bangor area before heading to the Maine coast. They… Read More
The tools are a timer, thermometer, clipboard, data sheets, pencil and binoculars. More than 3,000 volunteer birders carry out the survey throughout the United States every year. The goal is to supply data about birds. About 30 Maine volunteers have assigned routes on local roads… Read More
A group of Audubon folks went to Aroostook County to find birds of the northern forest, especially those that are hard to find in the Bangor area. We were fortunate to have the help of expert birder Bill Sheehan, who lives in The County and… Read More
HOLDEN – Last week at Fields Pond Audubon Center, a male indigo bunting showed up at the bird feeder. The size of a sparrow, he was a spectacular shade of blue, especially when he was in the sun. He was not the sky blue of a bluebird; nor… Read More
The alder flycatcher was the star of several Audubon bird walks recently. Anyone who was not into birds would be puzzled about that. Why would these folks be so excited about a 5-inch bird, dull olive on its back, and white smudged with gray on its front?… Read More
At the end of May, I met with my Birdathon teammates to see how many bird species we could find in a day. We met in Bangor well before dawn. My teammates had already heard a barred owl and a nighthawk. But we couldn’t count… Read More
A group of Audubon birders were at the Fields Pond Audubon Center in Holden to find as many birds as possible in one morning. They were especially pleased with a Sora Rail that walked across a boardwalk in a marsh. The expression “thin as a… Read More
HOLDEN – Birds from South America are arriving! I love the words of the late Inez Boyd, an avid birder: “It’s not enough just to know the birds are out there. You want to be right there in the welcoming committee.” Many people have been out there on… Read More
Black-and-white warblers returned last week after wintering on Caribbean islands. Participants on several Audubon bird walks saw these interesting little birds. They usually are seen creeping across tree trunks, up and down the trunks and around thick branches, just as nuthatches do. They probe in crevices in the… Read More
David Crouse had an unusual experience last week. He lives in a built-up part of Bangor near Broadway. He found a spruce grouse in his back yard. It was the first time David had seen a spruce grouse, but he had seen the similar ruffed… Read More
Every year at Six Mile Falls on the Kenduskeag Stream, a phoebe arrives in mid-April and stakes its territory. It’s a wonderful territory for a phoebe – it can make its nest under the bridge, perch on the surrounding trees, fly over the pool below Six Mile Falls… Read More
HOLDEN – April 11 is the usual date by which the wood frogs “queck queck” in the frog pond near the Fields Pond Audubon Center. We see their eggs in the water a week or so later. Not this year. Not this spring. Amphibians need… Read More
Woodcocks are an endearing species, squat and plump with a 21/2-inch-long bill. They poke it into the moist earth, typically to grab an earthworm with the pliable tip of the bill. Woodcocks arrived several weeks ago en masse statewide. In the aftermath of the big April snow, their… Read More
HOLDEN – Unstructured outdoor play, the beginning of a lifelong connection with nature, is slowly becoming a thing of the past for children today. Some sobering statistics have been released. More than 60 percent of the nation’s young children do not have access to daily… Read More
A big plump robin was eating dry, withered crab-apples in my driveway last week, a great sign of spring! Male robins migrate before the female. The earliest migrants may get the best territory with lots of food and nesting areas. If a big April snowstorm… Read More
The vernal equinox occurred more than a week ago, and now day is longer than night. The birds’ hormones are flowing, birds are stirring and migrating. Early migrants are already here. The first arrivals touched down in the Bangor area recently. Male red-winged blackbirds have… Read More
HOLDEN – March is the month that owls are the most active and vociferous in this part of Maine. But that doesn’t mean that they are easy to see. Still, the barred owl keeps hooting at the Fields Pond Audubon Center. After last week’s “Day… Read More
March is the month that owls are the most active and vociferous in this part of Maine. A saw-whet owl visited the Orono back yard of Audubon naturalist Holly Twining, her husband Travis Baker and their son Zane. The diminutive owl flew in, landed on… Read More
This is a tale of nature, red in tooth and claw. It is a tale of violence and death, or a tale of a life-sustaining dinner, depending on your point of view. I went with Joni Dunn of Bangor Photo to wrap up a mammal… Read More
Volunteers Jerry Smith and John Wyatt led 10 birders on an Audubon field trip last week, from Bangor to Belfast along the river. In Belfast Harbor, the highlight was seeing eight Barrow’s goldeneyes, a rare species which is now the center of controversy about whether… Read More
In a recent Audubon tracking class, the feature attracting the most interest and excitement was not a track in the snow, but something dead up in a tree. A sharp-eyed participant happened to look up, and saw a dead, dessicated mouse draped over a twig. Only birders would… Read More
One February day, an Audubon class in tracking was scheduled. Audubon folks signed up to participate and the day drew near. I hoped for a good tracking snow to fall several days before, to give animals at least two nights to track it up. My… Read More
John Wyatt is an expert birder, a birding field trip leader and a resident of Winterport. Many unusual bird species migrate down the Penobscot River and stop over in his yard. Examples in the past year have been a western tanager, a yellow-billed cuckoo, a black-billed cuckoo, several… Read More
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… Read More
HOLDEN – Mrs. Boyle, a teacher at the Bangor Christian School, brought her fifth-grade class to the Fields Pond Audubon Center in Holden recently. She wanted the children to learn about animal tracks. The center’s naturalists were a little worried that there would be no… Read More
HOLDEN – Audubon volunteer Jerry Smith, his son Justin, 14 and a third Audubon volunteer were checking the ice on Fields Pond in Holden. The entire lake was covered with a half inch of fairly solid ice, which did not break when they tossed small stones onto it. Read More
A recent weekend found many of Audubon’s best birders scouring the landscape and the Penobscot River for birds in the Bangor-Bucksport Christmas Bird Count. Audubon volunteer Jerry Smith fielded nearly 30 birders, assigning each to a territory within the 144-square-mile circle. Many more were watching their feeders. Read More
MILFORD – The upper and lower parts of most birds’ bills shut neatly. Not so with crossbills. Their curved mandibles cross over like two tiny scimitars. A birdwatcher needs to be quite close to see that the bills cross. The birds are the size of… Read More
Audubon members love watching birds, and they love applying their skills to a good cause, the Christmas Bird Count. Over the years, numbers of birds show changes in the landscape, and perhaps changes in the climate. Southern birds such as mockingbirds, cardinals and Carolina wrens… Read More
HOLDEN – Last week stories of many little animals were revealed written in snow. Many kinds of mice live in the fields, shrubs and forest near the Fields Pond Audubon Center building. Their stories are fun to decipher. The meadow mice, also called meadow voles,… Read More
We’ve been through some cold weather and some snow recently. A few visitors came from the South to watch the birds at the Fields Pond Audubon Center bird feeders. They wondered, from the warmth of the building, how these chickadees, nuthatches and woodpeckers could get… Read More
HOLDEN – Audubon birders were out looking for birds last week around the perimeter of the Sunkhaze National Wildlife Refuge. We were delighted to see two different pairs of gray jays. These uncommon and handsome birds have a beautiful way of gliding to a branch… Read More
HOLDEN – Last Sunday, the bedside alarm clocks went off at 4:30 a.m. in the dark for a dozen local Maine Audubon birders. They were headed Down East for a winter count of sea ducks. The ducks arrived Down East from the Arctic to spend the winter in… Read More