Our Mid-Coast Maine Big Day is over and I’m exhausted. My “much much” younger wife doesn’t seem to be at all weary from 18 straight hours of birding. We ended up identifying 102 species which exceeded our goal of 100 bird . . . but fell short of the 108 we got on a California […]
May 14, 2022 is Global Big Day . . . a day where teams of Birders throughout the world compete to see as many species of birds as possible in a 24 hour period. Last year, 51,816 Birders in 192 counties, identified an astonishing 7,234 species. This year, Ingrid and I will be doing our […]
To celebrate Mother’s Day (this is gonna make me look really really bad), this morning I took Ingrid to a sand quarry located near the Auburn Mall (behind Hobby Lobby to be exact). There, last summer I counted 134 Bank Swallow nests and watched dozens and dozens Swallows moving in and out to feed young. […]
In June 2013, when I could barely discern the difference between a Bald Eagle and a Black-capped Chickadee, Ingrid dragged me . . . ah . . . err . . . invited me to the Acadia Birding Festival in Bar Harbor. The prospect of three days of tromping through mosquito infested forest, had […]
Spring Migration is rolling so time for our Warbler Quiz. Test your know knowledge of these beautiful little visitors. The questions will get harder as we go along. At the end there are no awards, prize money or new cars . . . just the satisfaction that you’ve added to, or confirmed, your knowledge of […]
Ingrid has been a teacher for well over 30 years, a profession she loves and it has wonderful benefits. While she has regular and generous vacations . . . there is no flexibility. April vacation is always the third week of month and accordingly airline prices sometimes triple during that period (as they do […]
Its mid-April, we’re in Seattle and sixty miles away stands Mt. Rainier . . . Clark’s Nutcrackers, Canada Jays, Ptarmigans, and many many more. We’re in the Pacific Northwest for vacation, a vacation we designated as non-birding, but we took our cameras and binoculars along. Our van tour picked us up just southwest of the […]
Last Christmas I was stumped on what to give Ingrid. Earrings??? Nah, been there done that. Clothes??? My taste is awful. A new vacuum??? Grounds for divorce. So finally I decided upon a vacation trip to Seattle. Ingrid had never been to the Pacific Northwest and had always want to visit . . […]
A discussion of Ethan Whitaker’s 2021 Maine Big Year for Bath’s Patten Free Library. Audio, video, audio and photos of some of the record 324 birds that were identified during his adventure. You’ll enjoy hearing about the unexpected and absurd encounters one has while traveling 60,000 miles, crisscrossing the State.
Yesterday, Ingrid and I were birding over at Great Salt Bay, one of our favorite hotspot in the nearby town of Nobleboro. We were seeing an overlap of winter birds that have yet to move north (Northern Shrike and Buffleheads) and migrating birds that have recently arrived from the south (Pied-billed Grebe and Tree Swallows). […]
Maine’s local ABC affiliate, WMTW 8, ran a story on my Maine Big Year and Book . . . Total Maine
Some days it’s fun to set little challenges for one’s self. When I used to run, it would be cover so many miles in such and such at time. In recent years it’s been about finding birds. Each spring, it is exciting to spot the first returning Red-wing Blackbird (early March); the first Eastern Phoebe […]
For the first time in ten years, yesterday a Trumpeter Swan showed up in Maine. Once thought to be nearly extinct, the enormous Trumpeter was heavily hunted for food and feathers. In the early part of the last century, the population was thought to be down to 70 bird in a remote corner of Yellowstone […]
Join me for a Zoom Presentation on my Maine Big Year this Wednesday, April 6 @ 7:00 pm-8:00 pm (edt). We’ll be showing video, audio and photos of some of the record 324 birds that I identified during my 2021 adventure. You’ll enjoy hearing about the unexpected and absurd encounters one has while traveling 60,000 […]
This weekend Ingrid and I went to visit my sister Ellen and her husband Carlo at their University Park, Maryland home . . . just outside of Washington DC. They live in a charming suburban neighborhood about at mile from the University of Maryland. The homes are mostly brick, the streets treelined and kids sell […]
The endangered Piping Plovers have returned to Maine beaches as they do each spring. While most of the nesting beaches require dogs to be kept on a leash after April 1st, the Plovers are now returning to Maine in late March. Today I saw several dogs run through a group of Pipers foraging in the […]
During our winters, the Dickcissel travels to South America and gathers into enormous flocks of thousands of birds. Then during the summer this Sparrow-like bird returns to the North American grasslands to breed. Today I photographed a Dickcissel, loosely associating with a flock of House Sparrows in the Potts Point neighborhood at the very tip of […]
If one follows bird sites on social media, you’ll occasionally nearly white birds. Early on I was told these are not “albinos”, but leucistic birds. The difference: An albino individual is unable to produce melanin pigments. This leads to a good diagnostic feature with which to distinguish leucistic and albino individuals – the colour of […]
This morning I decided to take a break from CNN, consume a little $4.29 a gallon gasoline and head for Greenland, New Hampshire. A couple days ago, a Northern Lapwing had been seen in a Greenland cornfield. The Lapwing is a common sight in Europe, browsing in meadows, mudflats and farmland. Every couple years, one […]
Birders are gossips. We’re always listening to other birder’s conversations, searching the internet or simply asking others “have you seen anything good?” Today Ingrid and got two lifers (birds we have never seen before) without any intelligence before hand. While searching a beach east of Corpus Christi we saw a shorebird . . . probably […]
Our tallest bird, averaging 5′ 2″ with a 7 and a half foot wing span, the Whooping Cranes is a life birds for Ingrid and me as our birding trip to Texas continues. A critically endangered species due to hunting and habitat loss. By 1941 only 15 birds wintered in Texas. Serious conservation issues and […]
As Ingrid and I prepare for our Big Year in 2024 (the Birds of the lower 48 states) we’re scouting different locations. Having a general idea where and when regional birds are being seen goes a long way toward a successful Big Year. We are currently halfway through our third trip to Texas since 2015 […]
Maine’s local NBC affiliate, WSCH 6, ran a story on my Maine Big Year . . . WCSH 6 207 Magazine
After two year of birding only in Maine (Pandemic and Maine Big Year), yesterday evening Ingrid and I flew into the Gulf Coast of Texas for a week of catching up. First stop was the Leonabelle Turnbull Birding Center in Port Aransas, Texas where we saw dozens of species including White Pelicans . . . damn […]
This afternoon while taking a break from Book promotion (a lot more than I expected) I did some birding from the car. While driving north of Damariscotta Lake I saw something large fly across the road in front of me. I figured it was probably a Red-tailed Hawk but I slowed to check it out. […]
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