The National Audubon Christmas Bird Count season has begun. This column is the first of three in which I will describe some of the notable sightings of some of the Christmas Bird Counts (hereafter, CBC\u2019s) conducted in Maine.<\/p>\n
In a recent column, I wrote about the phenomenon of irruptions of northerly birds into Maine.\u00a0 From the first CBC data, this winter does not appear to be an irruption year.\u00a0 Perhaps I may change my tune by the end of the CBC season on January 5.<\/p>\n
Saturday, December 14 was a bitterly cold but clear day.\u00a0 Intrepid birders braved the weather, encountering a nice diversity of birds.\u00a0 We\u2019ll look at the highlights of three counts conducted on that day.<\/p>\n
The Lewiston-Auburn CBC yielded a count of 47 species.\u00a0 The cold weather over the past week caused most open water to freeze with only the Androscoggin River and the middle of Lake Auburn available to waterbirds.\u00a0 Despite the reduced open water habitat, three Common Loons were found.\u00a0 Five species of ducks were found with the 479 Mallards far outnumbering the Common Mergansers, Hooded Mergansers and Common Goldeneyes.<\/p>\n
Seven species of birds of prey were pretty impressive, headlined by a Snowy Owl and three Peregrine Falcons.<\/p>\n
Lingering birds included two Carolina Wrens, six Eastern Bluebirds, an Eastern Towhee and two Field Sparrows.<\/p>\n
The only waxwings were 4 Cedar Waxwings.\u00a0 The only finches were 33 House Finches and 81 American Goldfinches.<\/p>\n
A quick glance at the totals of any CBC reminds one of the impact that humans have on bird diversity and abundance.\u00a0 The two most common birds on this count were introduced birds: 875 European Starlings and 825 Rock Pigeons.\u00a0 The 765 American Crows were the most common native birds.<\/p>\n
The Augusta CBC produced a total of 46 species.\u00a0 Waterfowl were hard to come by with 40 Mallards and American Black Ducks the most common.\u00a0 A single Common Goldeneye, three Common Mergansers and 27 Hooded Mergansers rounded out the list.<\/p>\n
Four species of finches were found with a lone Pine Siskin and nine Purple Finches joining the more common American Goldfinch and House Finches.<\/p>\n
Lingering birds, soon to depart I am sure with the arrival of snow and extended cold, included Belted Kingfisher, a Northern Flicker, five Eastern Bluebirds (spectacular against the snow), two Hermit Thrushes, and two Northern Mockingbirds.<\/p>\n
The Greater Portland CBC usually takes pride of place with the most species of any CBC in Maine.\u00a0 This year, 46 counters found 92 species.\u00a0 The seabird counts were a bit low, in large part because of the sea smoke that limited visibility over the ocean water.<\/p>\n
Twenty-two species of waterfowl were found.\u00a0 Highlights included a pair of American Wigeon, three Northern Pintail, two Ring-necked Ducks, six Barrow\u2019s Goldeneye, and a singleton Ruddy Duck.<\/p>\n
Grebe and loon numbers were on the low side: six Red-throated Loons, 118 Common Loons, 31 Horned Grebe, and 30 Red-necked Grebe.<\/p>\n
Lingering birds included three Double-crested Cormorants, six Turkey Vultures, three Northern Harriers, an American Coot, a Killdeer, six Belted Kingfishers, three Yellow-bellied Sapsuckers, 11 Northern Flickers, eight Carolina Wrens (all-time high for this count), a Ruby-crowned Kinglet, 40(!) Eastern Bluebirds, five Hermit Thrushes, two Gray Catbirds, five Yellow-rumped Warblers, four Savannah Sparrows, a Lincoln\u2019s Sparrow, and a White-crowned Sparrow.\u00a0 Whew!\u00a0 That is a remarkable list of birds, most of which are surely struggling to survive in Maine while other members of their species are in much more equitable climates.<\/p>\n
The eight Snowy Owls were a high total for this count.\u00a0 Three Peregrine Falcons were nice to see.<\/p>\n
Six species of gulls were found with only one Bonaparte\u2019s Gull found.\u00a0 Both species of white-winged gulls were found: two Iceland Gulls and seven Glaucous Gulls.<\/p>\n
No irruptive finches were found; American Goldfinches and House Finches were the only finches tallied.<\/p>\n
[First published on December 29, 2013]<\/p>\n\n
The National Audubon Christmas Bird Count season has begun. This column is the first of three in which I will describe some of the notable sightings of some of the Christmas Bird Counts (hereafter, CBC\u2019s) conducted in Maine. In a recent column, I wrote about the phenomenon of irruptions of northerly birds into Maine.\u00a0 From […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":146,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_s2mail":"yes","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[419],"tags":[],"builder_content":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/mainebirds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/635"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/mainebirds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/mainebirds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/mainebirds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/146"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/mainebirds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=635"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/mainebirds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/635\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":636,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/mainebirds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/635\/revisions\/636"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/mainebirds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=635"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/mainebirds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=635"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/mainebirds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=635"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}