The First Warm Day of Spring

 My First of the Year (FoTY) Northern Flicker in my yard 4-3-15

I can tell spring migration has begun. My list of species seen this year has jumped from 70 at the end of March to 78 in just three days! On Friday we had our first warm day of spring with temperatures rising to nearly 60 degrees in the afternoon! Before I even left home for my Physical Therapy appointment I added a Yellow-bellied sapsucker and Northern Flicker to my yard and year lists. While I missed getting a photo of the sapsucker, which flew in, landed on a tree trunk and was gone, I was ready for the northern flickers when they flew in.

 Northern Flicker 4-3-15 Mere Point Cottage

While I managed to get a picture of one of the flickers on the ground, I missed getting them both in the same frame. I was so disappointed that I would have to spend a good part of the day inside, what with PT in the morning, and another doctor’s appointment in the afternoon. However, as I was heading out the door I got a call from my other doctor to reschedule my afternoon appointment! I was now free for the rest of the day! Yeah!

My FoTY Ring-necked Duck pair at Sawyer Park in Brunswick 4-3-15

There were so many birds in and around the parking lot of the building where I have my physical therapy that I stayed there and counted birds for awhile before moving on to Sawyer Park. Sawyer Park is on the Bath Road in Brunswick and all winter it has been gated shut, so when I decided to head to Bath to count birds, I was pleased to see the gate open and the road plowed! I quickly turned in and started counting birds. While I encountered a few chickadees and sparrows on the road in, I hit the jackpot when I got to the boat launching site. There in the New Meadows River I spotted a pair of Ring-necked Ducks! I used to see them all the time during the winter in Tucson and Andover, MA, but I had not seen that species here since June 6, 1999 when we lived in Presque Isle!

Across the river the melting snow formed ice sculptures along the rocky banks. On this side of the river I am in Cumberland County, but that side is in West Bath and it is part of Sagadahoc County!

 

 I love the blue I can see in this chunk of ice. Soon it will all be melted and gone. I will not be sorry!

 

 I found many more duck species out here in the water, including buffleheads, mergansers, and black ducks, along with a few gulls.

 This is the view looking east towards the sea.

 Ice chunks in the New Meadows River

After leaving Sawyer park, I headed up top Bath, Maine to count birds at the Bath-South End Launch Facility. It was so nice to be able to stand on the banks of the river without having to wear gloves! Once again there were ducks in the river.

 I saw Common Mergansers swim past me.

Later some red-breasted merganser drakes all paddled by.

Farther downriver I counted 3 double-crested cormorants sunning and preening beneath someone’s private dock, but the funniest thing was to watch the mallards and black ducks floating down the river on an ice floe! They didn’t even look at me as they drifted by on their icy canoe!

2 mallard drakes (left), American Black Duck (middle), female mallard (right)

 

But, I was even more surprised when this Eastern Phoebe showed up!

I kept looking for an osprey to fly over. Everyone in Maine is waiting to see them return. So far I had not seen any. Most of the birders on the Maine Birds Facebook group had not either. I had a pair of adult Bald Eagles fly over, and later an immature flew by even closer!

 Immature Bald Eagle at Bath South End Launch Facility 4-3-15

After awhile I decided it was time to move on. It was my intention to head for the North End Launch Facility (those are the official names on the signs) but as I was driving north on Washington Street in Bath I decided to pull into the parking lot of the dog park. I had seen and then heard about this place but never stopped to investigate since it is just north of the south boat launch. It turned out to be a lucky thing that I did. Though it is only a short distance up the road from the south boat launch, I saw different birds here than I did down there. I discovered it has a wonderful cement pier hanging out over the water where one can watch the birds or boats. There is a good view of Bath Iron Works and the bridge over the Kennebec River. The one drawback is the dogs. It is an off-leash dog park so there were lots of dogs and kids and people walking and running around. Everyone was very nice and it was such a nice day that everyone wanted to be outside just like me. I really like dogs. But having them around is not conducive to birding. However, I managed to see a few species anyways, and I did get to pet an English Setter puppy! I was just heading back to my car after talking to a nice lady about her dog and birds and birding. I had just told her how I was waiting to see my first osprey of the year, but so far no one has seen any, when lo, and behold! Look what came sailing in overhead!

 My First of the Year osprey landed right on the huge stadium light pole!

 Then, it just watched all of us puny humans below!

Finally I headed to the North End Launch Facility! By then I was very hungry! I had not eaten before I left home in the morning, and I had not stopped anywhere to get lunch. I was too busy birding! I found every last granola bar in my car and consumed them while I was at the south boat launch, but I would not be deterred! I hurried north to the boat launch hoping to maybe catch a straggling glaucous or Iceland gull, but no luck. While I saw a couple more Bald Eagles and scads of ringbills, herring, and Great Black-backed gulls, I never saw anything else.

Herring Gulls and a Great Black-backed Gull in the Kennebec River.

I could feel the temperature starting to drop, and my tummy starting to growl, so I did not stay long. There were hundreds of gulls out on an ice-covered island in the middle of the river when suddenly they all took wing! I  immediately started looking for an eagle because it seems they always do this when I am here, but I saw nothing in the sky. But then I looked down at the empty island and saw a large, brown raptor. It looked a like an immature bald eagle to me, but later I read an eBird report from the same day where someone thought they saw a Golden Eagle! Could this be it?

The bird was so distant that even with my 300 mm zoom I could not get vey good pictures. If it had taken wing I might have stood a better chance of identifying it, but it stayed on that ice the rest of the time I was there. It was almost sunset by the time I got home. I had been outside all day! I was so tired and so hungry and so happy! My sweet happy made us sloppy joes for supper, so I went inside to eat, but on my way I counted the evening birds in my yard and later went outside to listen to the peenting of woodcocks in their annual springtime courtship display! I can’t get enough of the birds!

Below are the links to the my eBird Lists for this day and the poem I wrote about the first warm day of spring:

• At Last—poem
• Mere Point Cottage 4-3-15 eBird checklist
• 430 Bath Road checklist
• Sawyer Park checklist
• Bath-South End Launch Facility checklist
• Bath South Dog Park checklist
• Bath North End Launch Facility checklist
• Mere Point Cottage evening checklist
• Kathie’s Poet Tree—it’s National Poetry Writing Month and I am trying to write 30 poems in 30 days!

 

 Ducks on ice in the Kennebec River, Bath, Maine 4-3-15

Notes from my Nest: It’s a Gray Day in Maine

 I photographed these Ring-billed Gulls just about a year ago at Wharton point in Maine shortly after we moved here. My Birding is Fun blogpost is up with photos of some of the

Spring Birds in Maine

So far the only “spring birds” I have seen are starlings in the yard!

 Meanwhile, this gray and dreary day has made me pensive, and so I wrote a poem which is also posted on Kathie’s Poet Tree:

Gray Day

Looking out the window panes

On a gray landscape;

Gray squirrels playing on gray tree trunks,

Gray sky waiting

Steel clouds billow and flatten

Dove skies bleed

Drops of liquid silver

Dull earth waits for water it cannot absorb

Gray birds sing in wet trees

Late winter rain turns gently to snow

And paints the world in white despair again.

Kathie Adams Brown (March 14, 2015)

Preparing for a Blizzard

 Saturday’s Snow in the yard 1-24-15

On Saturday I knew a storm was coming, so Gus and I got up early to go to the store for groceries and supplies. But since the snow was coming and I had been stuck inside all week except for doctor’s appointments, I decided I needed to squeeze in a little bit of birding on the way to the store.

So Gus drove me slowly along Rossmore and Mere Point Roads.

I asked him to pull over on Rossmore Road so I could get out and walk.

The marsh was gently quiet and I relished the sounds of birds.

it felt good to walk and breathe fresh air and smell the pines and spruces.

As a few flakes started to fall I knew we should get to the store.

By the time we were done shopping the parking lot looked like this!

 

By the end of the day our driveway looked like this!

 

By Sunday morning the newscaster were predicting the coming blizzard.

Yet the skies were so blue and my driveway looked like this.

So Gus filled all my feeders for me…

And then we did the most logical thing…

He took me birding again before the storm!

I saw on the MAINE Birds Facebook page that someone had seen a Northern Pintail Duck in West Bath. I had not seen a Northern Pintail Duck in the State of Maine yet, so off we went! We found the pond with loads of ducks.

And in the midst of over 100 mallards, I found my Northern Pintail taking a nap!

(unfortunately you cannot see him in this cell photo but I have a picture to post later)

The Northern Pintail Duck makes Species 199 for my Maine Life List! I wonder what species number 200 will be? Arizona is my only state with over 300 bird species. At the moment, Maine is the closest to reaching the 200 species mark for me!

Then, for a change of scenery, we decided to drive to Fort Popham in Phippsburg.

As we drove along the road we stopped to watch the waves roll in on Popham Beach! At Fort Popham I counted Common Eiders, Herring Gulls, Great Black-backed Gulls, Red-breasted Mergansers, Rock Pigeons, and a Common Loon, but nothing new for this year. Being the greedy birder that I am, I wanted to find one more bird! So, I put out a call for Hooded Mergansers sightings on Maine Birds. I chased down a lead that led me to a new eBird Hotspot that I had not heard of.

I found myself at Bay Bridge Landing off the Old Bath Road near Brunswick.

What a pretty spot!

Bay Bridge Landing Wetland Park

But the tidal pool where the mergansers were seen two days ago was totally frozen over. As the water shifted beneath the ice, I listened to it crack and shift.

I watched the late afternoon sun setting over the Androscoggin River.

The only birds I saw and heard, were chickadees and crows.

Time to head home and prepare for the worst!

The Sunday night news was filled with predictions of the worst blizzard of the decade!

With the sunlight streaming through my windows this morning,

it’s hard to believe it is coming!

Such a pleasant winter scene out my kitchen window!

But, I do take this seriously, so…

I am boiling eggs!

I need to get all my cooking done before we lose power!

At least we can eat hard boiled eggs, or make deviled eggs with them!

A half empty freezer is not good, so I am filling plastic containers to freeze.

 

It will stay frozen longer if the freezer is full of ice!

However, I still see some empty space I need to fill!

I am getting all my laundry done and tonight we will fill containers with water so we can flush the toilet. When you lose power in the country you cannot flush your toilets because the well pump runs off electricity. It is a different story when you live in town and have a town water supply.

In the backyard, I’ve had my eye on this leaning birch tree ever since we moved in here.

We’ve had plenty of snow, wind and rain storms in the year since we moved here and still it stands, but will it be able to stand 2 to 3 feet of snow and wind gusts upwards of 50 to 70 MPH?

Will I?

I’ll let you know when it’s all over!

Meanwhile, my sweet guy is keeping the feeders full for me and the birds!

 

That’s my Gus!

2015 Stats

	Life	Year	Month
2015 Year Birds	478	51	51
2015 Maine Birds	199	51	51
2015 Yard Birds	109	36	36
2015 Checklists	7451	77	77

Birding the Best that I Can

 The Androscoggin River January 6, 2014

I am slowly healing from my surgery and feeling more like myself everyday. Yesterday my daughter came down to help me out and after cutting my hair, filling my bird feeders and changing the sheets on my bed for me, she drove me into town for errands. Along the way we stopped to count birds on Bowdoin Island in Topsham after I saw a small flock of ducks down in the river as we crossed the iron bridge near the dam and the old Fort Andross Mill. I had never driven into the parking area here, though there is an eBird Hotspot marked as the Seadog Brewing Company. It took us a few minutes to find a place to park that gave us a view of the ducks but we finally found a spot and I got out in the freezing cold weather to count birds!

Down in this little cove created by a bend in the river and just below the dam I counted a dozen Common Mergansers! While I had seen red-breasted mergansers a few days ago down in Harpswell, these were my first Common Mergansers this year. As most avid birders will know, a New Year means a New List! I am so used to doing a Big January ever since I started my first blog, Sycamore Canyon, so it feels weird not to be out there pushing to get as many birds as I can. I still feel the pull of it, and so my husband and now my daughter have helped me find a few birds. I know my list will not be as big as it has been in past years, but I still feel the need to do a Big January as best as I can. I see that many other birders are seeing wonderful birds around the state, but I can only go so far right now. It will be interesting to see what shows up in my yard and at the Boat launch!

Though it is quite cold here as well as across the rest of the nation, I must admit that there is still beauty to be seen here in winter. This view is looking Northeast up down the Androscoggin River toward Merrymeeting Bay.

On January 1st Gus drove me over to Wharton Point to count birds and watch the sunset. I took this picture from the car. Another person was there watching the sunset as well. It must of been cold on those rocks! It was so cold and the cloud shelf was so low that we left, but we should have waited just a few minutes longer, because look what happened to the sky as we were driving south on Mere Point Road on our way home! Scroll down to see the first sunset of 2015 for me!

January 1, 2015 Sunset as seen on Mere Point Road.

While we were out and about i counted my first birds of the New Year at the Mere Point Boat Launch, on Rossmore and Mere Point Roads, and at Wharton Point. On the drive home we also saw 3 Wild turkeys in someone’s yard, but the best bird was the Barred Owl we saw hunting in a field on Rossmore Road! It was my first Barred Owl in Maine as well as my First of the year!

The next day after we did a couple of errands, Gus drove me down to Orr’s and Bailey Island in Harpswell to count birds. I added several species there, including these FoTY Canada Geese! 

I was looking forward to getting out more, but then this snow came on January 3rd! It’s kind of kept me house bound since, as I don’t dare risk going out by myself and falling! My body still has lots of healing to do.

So, I watch birds out the windows instead.

Some days I see all the same birds, but some days something different flies in. Today I had my FoTY Purple Finch! I have not had one here in over a month! She made species Number 41 for this year!

On January 5th the wind was blowing a gale out there, but it did bring a few birds close enough to shore for me to see them from my living room window. Here is a list of my yard birds and my 2015 Year Birds so far:

2015 Bird List

2015 Yard Birds	2015 Big January
1. Red-tailed Hawk/ 1-1-15	1. Red-tailed Hawk
2. Mourning Dove	2. Mourning Dove
3. Red-bellied woodpecker	3. Red-bellied woodpecker
4. Downy Woodpecker	4. Downy Woodpecker
5. Hairy Woodpecker	5. Hairy Woodpecker
6. Blue Jay	6. Blue Jay
7. American Crow	7. American Crow
8. Black-capped Chickadee	8. Black-capped Chickadee
9. Tufted Titmouse	9. Tufted Titmouse
10. White-breasted Nuthatch	10. White-breasted Nuthatch
11. American Tree Sparrow	11. American Tree Sparrow
12. White-throated Sparrow	12. White-throated Sparrow
13. Dark-eyed Junco	13. Dark-eyed Junco (slate colored)
14. Northern Cardinal	14. Northern Cardinal
15. House Finch	15. House Finch
16. American Goldfinch	16. American Goldfinch
17. Bald Eagle/ 1-3-15	17. Common Eider/Mere Point Boat Launch 1-1-15
18. American Robin	18. Black Scoter/Mere Point Boat Launch
19. Pine Siskin	19.  Cooper’s Hawk/ Rossmore and Mere Point Roads 1-1-15
20. Common Eider/ 1-5-15	20. Herring Gull/ Rossmore and Mere Point Roads
21. Herring Gull	21. Barred owl/ Rossmore and Mere Point Roads
22. Purple Finch/ 1-7-15	22. Ring-billed Gull/ Wharton Point 1-1-15
	23. Wild Turkey/ Maquoit Road 1-1-15
	24. Bald Eagle/ Brunswick 1-2-15
	25. Rock Pigeon/ Brunswick 1-2-15
	26. Long-tailed Duck/ Orr’s Island 1-2-15
	27. Bufflehead/ Orr’s Island
	28. Canada Goose/ Bailey Island 1-2-14
	29. Mallard/ Bailey Island 1-2-14
	30. Surf Scoter/ Bailey Island 1-2-14
	31. Red-breasted Merganser/ Bailey Island 1-2-14
	32.  Common Loon/ Bailey Island 1-2-14
	33. Black Quillemot/ Bailey Island 1-2-14
	34. Great Black-backed Gull/Bailey Island 1-2-14
	35. European Starling/Bailey Island 1-2-15
	36. American Robin/ my yard 1-3-15
	37. Pine Siskin/ my yard 1-3-15
	38. Common Merganser/ Seadog Brewing 1-6-15
	39. American Black Duck/ Mere Point Boat Launch 1-6-15
	40. Common Goldeneye/ Mere Point Boat Launch 1-6-15
	41. Purple Finch/ 1-7-14

I see more window birding in my future!

Notes From My Nest: Yards Birds

Thursday, December 11, 2014 Mere Point Cottage: The heavy rain is over, though we are still getting a few on and off showers. In the gray outside world the birds are coming to empty feeders,while I watch helplessly from inside. Gus would gladly fill them for me, but he leaves before dark and returns after dark, and often he has to stop at the store to pick things up since I cannot yet drive myself to the store. After days of being stuck inside by snow, sleet, ice, rain and a bum knee, I am getting restless and frustrated and I am feeling trapped.

I look out the window at the mostly bare yard. While not completely healed up, I am getting around better than I was at the beginning of the week. I start to think that maybe I can put on my  leg brace and go outside. Maybe I can fill the feeders. So, I walk to the back door and set my crutches down. I put my warm and fuzzy fur lined rubber shoes on and wrap my knee in the leg stabilizer that I have not worn since the day they sent me home with it last week.  I put my coat on, tuck my cell phone into one pocket and some suet into the other, and head out the door! Getting down the stairs in the tricky part, but I am using only one crutch, so I can grab the stair railing with one hand while I work my way cautiously down the steps. I have already placed the container of bird seed on the steps, so once I am down I can use the crutch under my right arm and carry the seed with my left hand. It works!

I test the ground, but it is soft and not slippery and I have no trouble making my way to the first and closest feeder, which doesn’t need to be filled, but instead needs the wet seed swept away from the openings. Next, I toss a little seed on the ground beneath the spruce tree so the ground feeding birds as well as the squirrels can get a little food. I have numerous gray squirrels here, and one feisty red squirrel who constantly chatters at me and everyone else and fiercely defends its territory! It’s a short walk to the apple tree next to the driveway which has become my best tree for hanging feeders from. These feeders are also full, but once again need the wet seed wiped away. I take down the busted meal worm feeder to bring in inside. Hopefully I can repair it and refill it. I have discovered that chickadees love meal worms. I used to be squeamish about filling the meal worm feeder, but when I saw how much the chickadees love them, I got over it. I am a bit surprised that they are the ones to eat the meal worms. I thought it would attract some of the other birds, but they are the species I see on it most often. One thing baffles me though. During the summer I had no trouble finding meal worms at the stores to fill my feeders with, but the birds did not eat them very often then, probably because there was an abundance of fresh bugs and grubs out there for them, but now that winter has come and the birds are gobbling them up, I cannot find the meal worms in the stores! Someone out there does not understand bird feeding habits!

The air feels cool and fresh on my face as I make my way to the back yard. This will be the longest distance I have to walk, and the most treacherous as it is down hill and still has a bit of ice and snow, since it is the northwest side of the house. Still, I am able to pick my way slowly until I am at the edge of the thicket and beneath the ash tree whose gracious branches hold my feeders. I can hear the chickadees scolding me from the thicket as I take the first feeder down and refill it. This one is easily filled and replaced. I move to the next feeder, which is a bit more tricky.

This is the feeder that baffled Gus on Sunday. While I love it because the birds love it and use it all the time, it is a bit difficult to refill. I have to pull it down with one hand while holding onto the container of seed with the other, and then scoop the seed up with a paper cup and slip it between the top baffle and bottom tray. I don’t take the feeder off the hook because it is actually more work to get it back up there. Sometimes the branch bounces back too high for me to reach it and, well, I really can’t climb a ladder or step stool at the moment!

I’ve managed to use up all the seed in the container. I feel the breath of the the wind caress my face.  A light rain is falling and I am cold and damp, but it feels so good to be outside that I don’t care! The neighborhood crows are calling in the distance. Behind me the little juncos and house finches move restlessly in the thicket, waiting for me to leave. I look back at the distance I have to walk to get to the back door. I know that I can make it if I just go slow. I am not tired. I start to wonder if I could walk over to the boat launch. I have not counted birds there in over a week, but I decide that just might be pushing it too far. So, I hobble back to the steps, set the bird seed container down, and make my way up the steps one at a time. Once inside I grab the container and the broken feeder off the step and close the back door. Why am I going to all this trouble? Because I want to, need to see these birds!

 Red-bellied woodpecker 11-13-14

Ever since early November I have had a female Red-bellied woodpecker hanging around. I have tried and tried to get a picture of her, but she is very shy. I sat quietly on the back step in November and just barely snapped this out of focus shot before she flew away again. However, she does come to the feeders almost every day and sometimes several times a day. She especially likes peanuts, but so do the greedy Blue Jays, who swoop in and gobble them up! You can tell she is a female because the red on top of her head does not go all the way to her beak. A male would have a full red strip from his beak to the nap of his neck.

 Here is just one of the several Blue Jays that hang around my yard.

 I happen to love woodpeckers and am always pleased to see the Hairy Woodpeckers when they show up. During the snow storm earlier this week I actually had three in the yard at once! Often I will see them and the little Downy Woodpeckers foraging together! Besides the much larger size of the bird and it’s bill, I look for the absence of black hash marks along the stiff outer white tail feathers when trying to distinguish the Hairy from the downy. there can be a size overlap, but the Downy woodpecker always has little black hash marks on its white outer tail feathers. This is a handy thing to know!

The American Goldfinches have all molted into their winter plumage by now but they are also here on a daily basis. Sometimes there are just a handful, but at other times I have had two dozen or more in the yard! I took down the feeder pictured above because some animal came by in the night and busted it up. It was probably one of the resident raccoons, but you never know.

One of the things I like about living on Mere Point is the overlap of habitat. Living so near the ocean, I often see ducks and other marine birds, like ibises or osprey. I also get to see quite a few hawks and eagles. I knew right away that the larger bird pictured above was a juvenile Bald Eagle. It actually drifted quite low over the house, and fortunately I had my camera with me, but what of the smaller hawk? I was unsure what species it was until I enlarged the photos. Here you can clearly see the two coma-shaped white spots at the edge of the wing tips that only Red-shouldered Hawks have. The light is just catching its reddish barred breast and you can just make out the black barred wings and tail. All of these yard bird photos were photographed on November 13th this year.

So, now that my feeders are full again and I am safely and snuggly back INSIDE my house, I think it’s time to make some homemade hot cocoa and sit back and watch the birds while my Christmas music plays in the background! Sounds cozy, doesn’t it!

Hairy Woodpecker 11-13-14

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