With fall coming on in full force, it’s almost hard to remember the beauty of Maine in June, when the lupine were in bloom and birds were nesting and hatching their young. Gus and I took a drive one evening down to Land’s End in Harpswell. Little did we know then that we would soon be living in that town! This is one of my favorite drives to take down Route 24 from Brunswick as you cross over Orr’s island to Bailey Island and end at the sea.
After a few days of a cold spell with lows below freezing, I awoke this morning to clear skies and rising temperatures. Like everyone else, I am in the midst of holiday preparations. Yesterday I spent the afternoon baking ginger snaps while listening to Christmas music with the Christmas tree all lit up. Yesterday was still cloudy and cold, but today it was already 45F by the time I got up, and 55F by the time I got out of my car at Michael Perry Park to drink my coffee and watch birds.
I am trying to count birds at the park at least once a week until we move. The eBird record for this birding Hotspot is still blank on so many weeks. I am trying to fill in as many of those blanks as I can. I arrived around 9:30 a.m. and spent nearly two hours counting birds. In that time period I saw 24 species of birds, with the highlights being 2 Abert’s towhees, a pair of Black-tailed Gnatcatchers, a Pyrrhuloxia and a gorgeous Plumbeous Vireo I spotted in a pine tree by the restrooms. Its all gray body with two white wingbars, a white throat and belly and sporting a pair of white spectacles made the I.D. unmistakable! I watched as the bird pulled a fat bug from beneath the bark and then gobbled it up! By now I had peeled of the two extra layers I was wearing when I arrived. It had gotten so warm. When I got back to the car and saw the temperature I knew why. In just under two hours the temp had risen nearly 15 degrees to 70F!
The cold temperatures have brought the birds to my feeders in flocks of over 20 Lesser Goldfinches and around 30 House Finches. My Mourning Dove populations are down, however, with the vigilant hunting of a family of Cooper’s Hawks. Sometimes I see the adults and sometimes I find a juvenile. Yesterday morning a juvenile Cooper’s Hawk stood watch from my neighbor’s rooftop where it perched on a vent pip for over an hour. 
Knowing that I am moving to Maine at the end of January makes everything stand out to me. Now each time I see a bird I think that I may not see this species again for a long time. Each day that it is warm enough for me to go outside I think of how cold and snowy it will be in Maine. Each time my grandson hugs me I think of how I will not get these daily hugs once I am gone, and I wonder if he will even remember me?
For those of you who do not know, Gus and I are moving to Maine in January. I’ve known this was a possibility for over two months now, but when the company called him with a job offer right before Thanksgiving I think we were both stunned. We have been married for 36 years and lived in Maine twice, but have never been able to get a job in that state. My husband is a native “Maine-iac” and though he told me he wouldn’t miss the state and that this would be our last move when we moved here to Tucson I just knew when the opportunity presented itself that he would not turn it down if it was offered to him. While he scored a job interview within two weeks of applying for the job, it took another three weeks before it was offered to him. I made the announcement last weekend here and on the Birding Is Fun blog. Now I am just trying to get my own head around it, and enjoy my last few weeks here in sunny Tucson. Moving to Maine in January seems like the height of insanity but once the spring comes I know I will be happy. Gus’ job is in Bath, Maine, so there is the possibility that we will live near the coast. In all of our travels across the United States we have never actually lived near the coast. Even when we lived in Maine before we lived far inland. This time I believe we will stay put until Gus retires.
As for my other birding adventures, well, Chris and I are still getting around. We took a trip to the San Rafael Grassland a few weekends ago, then we drove out to the Santa Cruz Flats this past Sunday where we finally got our Mountain Plovers! What cute birds! We tried so hard earlier this year to find this species without luck, and since there are no Mountain Plovers in Maine, I was sure happy to get this bird on my Life List before the move! Leaving Chris will be very hard, but we are already planning for him to visit me on the east coast this summer where we hope to bird all over New England. And with both him and Celeste back here in Tucson, as well as my son, I will be coming back to visit them all and go birding! Stay tuned for more birds and part 2 of my Cave Creek Canyon birding Adventure!
Note: all of today’s photos were taken with my smartphone.
Great Blue Heron 6-28-13
There is a small parking lot on one side of the pond and beyond the pond lies an inaccessible bog. Often there is a great blue heron perched on a snag in the bog, though sometimes it is hunting or sunning on the near shore. There would be no sunning on this day as it was wet, gray, and dreary. The heron was on the shore when I arrived, but quickly flew to its favorite perch. Can you see it in this photo?
Here is a close-up of the bedraggled bird. Believe me, I felt almost the same way!
A family of geese was nesting here again this year.
I kept watching a pair of orioles fly in and out of this maple tree at the edge of the pond near the parking lot. When I saw one of the parents fly out and drop a fecal sac over the water I decided to take a closer look.
Can you see the nest?
Here’s a closer look with momma bird’s hind end sticking out!
She popped out to check on me and see what I was up too!
Many mornings I would get my coffee and sit at these tables to relax and watch birds. Lion’s Pond is also a fishing pond, and in the winter it is used for skating. If you are an eBirder, it is also an eBird Hotspot. So, if you are ever in Colchester, grab a coffee and come sit a spell. It’s a tiny bit of nature in my hometown!
Perhaps the guardian of the pond will be there waiting for you!
Mom’s backyard, Colchester, CT 7-2-2013
While I was in Connecticut I spent a good part of my time there either sitting in or looking out the windows to Mom’s backyard. Though she lives in the center of town, her yard is a virtual wildlife habitat. She has both red and gray squirrels in her yard, chipmunks, and a family of groundhogs which lives somewhere nearby and comes into the yard to nibble the grass and eat the watermelon rinds mom and her friends toss out for them. I observed at least one adult and 4 young at one time in the back yard! 
Of course, there are the bird feeders as well. This year we hung hummingbird feeders and I saw at least two Ruby-throated hummingbirds at one time in her yard. While I did see hummingbirds at this feeder, they really preferred the one below.
This pole and squirrel baffle are from my apartment in Andover. Though I sent it home with family for Mom no one set it up for her since I left last year. I finally got it set up and hopefully she will be able to keep it full even during the winter. Both of these are new feeders I bought for her while I was there.
Of all the things in Mom’s yard, I love this fountain the most. It has a gentle sound and all the birds, animals and stray cats come here to get a drink. Yes, I counted at least six stray cats in her yard while I was there. I chased them away whenever I could. It was a daily reminder to me of why cats belong indoors. Still, it was so peaceful to sit at the table near this fountain and eat my meals or write, or just plain watch birds. Often I would sit here and Facebook on my smart phone!
Back here in Arizona the monsoon is painting gorgeous sunsets for us. While I miss the east coast, it sure is nice to be home!
Chris and I at Agua Caliente Park 9-9-2012
I’ve been wanting to write this post for awhile. Today I am finally getting around to it. No, there is no actual condor in the room. This is just my birdy take on the old saying, “The elephant in the room.” It means when one is avoiding the obvious, the thing that everyone can see, but no one is talking about. Well, I am talking it today, and that is my friendship with Chris Rohrer.
When I first moved here last August I was very depressed. Though I had lived in Tucson before and loved it, I had also loved being back on the east coast near my family. With the discovery of my Mom’s breast cancer while I was there, and her subsequent treatment and recovery, it was suddenly very hard to leave her, and it has never been this way before in all the times I’ve moved away over and over again.
When I first met Chris he was still a bit new to birding. But once I showed him eBird, he took the bit in his mouth and was off and running. Soon he was chasing birds more than me. He would call me up and say, “I’m stopping by Sweetwater after work. Want to meet me there?” Or, “There is a Canada Goose down at Kennedy Park, let’s go see it!” For my part, I got excited about showing him all the birding locations that I knew. I love to share my passions. That is why I write all the blogs I do. You don’t spend so much time with someone if you do not like them. I like Chris. He is a good friend. Our birding styles are similar and we get along great. I think we are both sensitive to the other, we both care passionately about the birds, and we accept each other for who they are. It wasn’t long before I knew that I had made a lifelong friend.
However, I became aware of one thing. Soon all my blogposts were about Chris and I and our biridng adventures. There were few, if any blogposts about me and my own thoughts and my own birding adventures. In some ways I felt like I was losing myself and becoming this new entity. I was left with the question, how do I maintain my friendship with Chris, and still be myself? I realized that my birding life and my blog had changed, yet I didn’t want to end my friendship with Chris. That would be stupid. I just needed some down time. I just needed a chance to be alone and think by myself again.
Just about two weeks ago I fell while hiking and birding with Celeste in Saguaro National Park. Chris was working at the time, then headed to Flagstaff for the weekend with his partner. The fall really cut up my left leg and knee, which is still healing, but it also presented me with some down time, a chance to be alone and get my thoughts back together, and get back to being myself. I started writing poetry again, and getting caught up on photo processing and blogposts and visiting other blogs.
It is always a dilemma for me: stay home and blog, or go out birding and have great adventures and see wonderful birds but then have not time to blog about it! I know Chris faces the same dilemma. We talk about it all the time. It’s all about finding balance, and that is up to each of us.
So, what’s the end result here? I like having Chris for my friend. My birding life is enhanced by having someone to share it with. We will continue to have many birding adventures and sometimes I know that I will still overdo it. I am and will always be “Kathiesbirds,” but sometimes I will also be The Adventures of Kathie and Chris. And that is okay with me. As Robert Mortensen put it so well, having a birding buddy allows us to find more birds. We now have two pairs of eyes, two pairs of ears and two cameras to capture the birds with! Chris gets me to go places I would not go by myself. I taught him to list. He has taught me to chase! Chris hears better than I do; I see better than him. Chris researches all the birds beforehand. I like to go where no birder has gone before! As for the Condor in the room, well, I think I have set it free. I have never actually seen one a real one, and neither has Chris…Yet! Chris, can you say, “Road Trip!”
Western view from my balcony in Tucson, AZ 12-31-2012
I first met Trudy smith when I was 16 years old. She gave me my first bird guide. She showed me the birds in a way no one else had ever shown them to me. Trudy was a nurse, and an ornithologist. I helped her catch and band birds at a bible camp in New Hampshire. She was the first woman I had ever met who loved nature as much as I did. She wasn’t afraid of snakes or lizards or frogs. She saw God’s beauty in all the world around her and she loved to share her love of nature and God with others. Trudy was 50 years old when I first met her. I was amazed that someone that old could hike up Mount Washington with me. Now that I am in my fifties, I am still amazed! I remember her climbing the trail and looking left and right and all around for birds, lichens, flowers, anything. Her curiosity was endless; her energy boundless.
Even at the age of 98, Trudy still kept and maintained her bird feeders. When I was there in 2008 we visited for awhile, then we went out to dinner together with her husband, Earl. He was going blind, so she was his eyes, and he was her ears!
Because, you see, one of the most amazing things about Trudy was that she was deaf. She lost her hearing as a child from an illness and never got it back. So, though she loved the birds, she could never hear them sing! From her I learned patience and not to fear someone who is different or handicapped. Since Trudy did learn to read lips, I only had to touch her arm when I wanted to speak to her, but then I had to remember not to look away! She needed to see my mouth move to understand what I was saying! In spite of her hearing loss, she never seemed handicapped to me at all! I only saw Trudy one more time after this, in 2010, when Gus and I moved back east for two years. He took me to see her in September of that year, and though she was still strong, I could tell her memory was fading as she tried to remember me. Still, as I hugged her and cried I could still fell her love for me coming through the clouds of her memory. A year later I started to feel like she was gone, but with Mom’s cancer and other things going on in my life I didn’t check up on it. I was afraid to know the truth. finally, right before we moved back to Tucson I could bear it no longer and I googled her name. It took me awhile but I finally found out that she passed away in the spring of 2011. She was 102 years old! This month is National Poetry Month, and I have been participating in NaPoWriMo 2013 exercise to write 30 poems in 30 days. When I read the prompt for today was to write a Valediction, which is a poem of farewell or good-bye, Trudy was the first one to spring to my mind. I decided to write this post today and post my poem here, because Trudy was MY birding mentor. Without her they might not be a Kathie’s Birds! This is my way of bidding her farewell!
A Valediction for my Mentor
Even now I see your face Faded blue eyes shining with Joy As you show me the oriole on your feeder.Long ago you nurtured -this bird love in my heart, --this God love in my heart, --this love for all of nature.
I remember the last time I saw you, shrunken and gnome-like with the pink, leathery skin of old age, Yet eyes that still shone like a child’s.
Oh how I loved you, and love you still. I think of you now like a constant thing, Like birds, and God’s Love.
I knew the last time I saw you It would be our last good-bye, You were 101 then—time had run out on you. I hugged you tight while tears streamed down my face in a flood.
I could tell I was but a faded memory In your aged mind, but, you still loved me, you still loved God, and you still loved the birds.
I wanted to hold you so tight as if my love could keep you from the inevitable.
How is it that you are gone from this life, yet still so alive in my heart?
In the birds I see everyday —I see you, —I see Love.
If parting is such sweet sorrow, then remembering is sweeter still, and saying Good-bye is but a brief moment in time.
~Kathie Adams Brown (April 6, 2013)
I am just a little bird
Standing on this shore
Trying to decide if I
Should fly away once more,
The world out there is big and wide
Dare I take a chance?
To stay behind is to live a life,
Void of all romance,
And since I have these wings attached,
I am not anchored here,
So with a stretch, a flap, a leap,
I’m off into the air!
Who knows what I will find when I
Land on that distant shore,
But I must go I feel it
In my wings, my heart, my soul!
~Kathie Adams Brown (August 14, 2012)
I had my first ever visit to Gilsland Farm on August 7th when I took my Mom to visit her cousin in Falmouth, ME. After lunch and an ice cream cone we drove over to the Gilsland Farm Audubon Center. We arrived just before the visitor’s center closed and the first bird I saw was this wild turkey preening itself on the patio! We did a brief bit of shopping, then Mom and her cousin went home and left me here for an hour! While the visitors Center was closed, the grounds were still open until dusk. So, I took my bins and walked around the farmland, but I didn’t venture far since I knew I would get lost in my reverie and never get back in time! Still, in the short 1/2 mile walk I took around the main farm area I saw so many birds and added greatly to my Life List for Cumberland County, ME!
(This sculpture is so large you can walk right underneath it!)
Birds seen at Gilsland Farm 8-7-12
