When you hear the word “cuckoo,” you think of one of two things: 1) A crazy person or 2) The bird behind the famous “cuckoo” clocks. But did you know that during the summer months, Maine is home to not one but two species of cuckoos? Black-billed Cuckoos can be found throughout the state during […]
Many people would think birding in Maine in the winter months is horribly dull. “It’s freezing cold,” they say. “Everything is under feet of snow,” they point out. “How on earth can birds live there? Have fun staring at chickadees.” They would be wrong! Birding in Maine is perhaps the best in the winter. Seabirds […]
It was 2013, and my first summer birding days in Maine were drawing to a close. I had seen pelagic birds, I had seen forest birds, and I was close to hitting a major birding landmark: 100 species on my Life List. So close in fact, that as my husband-to-be and I drove towards my […]
See Parts I and II here and here. I don’t remember if I slipped, slid, jumped, or flew to the other side of the boat, but in an instant I was along the rail with my parents and Brian, watching in disbelief as a Finback Whale, 70 feet long, surfaced a second time barely 75 […]
Read Part I first! We continued out into the open ocean. A giant seal finally slipped past, but they are easily spooked and the seal dove beneath the water before any of us could really get a good look at it. From everyone’s faces (and the retching we heard from some unfortunate passenger on the […]
The weather didn’t look very promising. My then boyfriend (now husband) and I waited in line for the Odyssey whale watch that was scheduled to depart at 9 a.m. sharp. My father, mother, brother, and grandmother (my unlucky sister had to work in Portsmouth all day) were off searching Portland’s cobbled streets for coffee and […]
Recently I spent time in the Maine North Woods, looking for warblers. As part of my National Geographic Young Explorer’s grant, I camped along Fifth Saint John Pond, my expedition perfectly timed with the spring warbler migration. I did well with warbler species, spotting nearly ten in the few days I was there. And yet, […]
I look forward to summer as much as anybody, but there is one sad element to the changing of the seasons: the absence of shorebirds. Shorebirds are undoubtedly my favorite group of avian species. They make their home on beaches and mudflats, where it is generally easy to see and photograph them. In addition, they […]
Though I have birded across Maine and across the United States, there’s something special about birding in my very own neighborhood. I grew up in the town of Cumberland, and am lucky that my parents still live there. Behind our house is a large tract of unbroken forest, dominated by the deep green of hemlock […]
Continued from Fishing for Loons. Loons are smart birds, and over the years certain loons on certain lakes have discovered that when an angler catches a fish, that fish is ripe for the taking. They swoop in like underwater torpedoes, stealing the trout and zooming off. While it may be a boon for the loons, […]
