Cape Elizabeth birding report

On a sunny Saturday afternoon (January 18) two adult Bald eagles flew high above Shore Road. These regal raptors mate for life and can live 30 or more years in the wild. In 2020 there has already been five sick eagles found in Maine with elevated levels of lead in their blood. During the winter months when our lakes and ponds are frozen, Bald eagles transition from eating fish to eating other types of meat including roadkill and discarded deer carcasses. Animals shot with lead bullets contain a significant amount of tiny lead fragments. If ingested, a piece of lead the size of half a grain of rice can kill an adult Bald eagle. If you know anyone that hunts, ask them to use copper ammunition instead of lead.

Through January our backyard feeders continue to attract solid numbers of House Finch, Tufted Titmice, Black-capped Chickadees, White-breasted Nuthatches, Mourning Doves, Downy, Hairy and Red-bellied woodpeckers and Cardinals. On January 19 I counted 23 Goldfinches on our niger tube and around dusk I counted eight bright red males and three female Cardinals present. White-throated sparrows and Black-eyed juncos are noticeably fewer than this same time period last year. Other mentionables include, nomadic flocks of 50 or more Robins, Common Ravens, Carolina wrens, Eastern bluebirds, a single Northern mockingbird (Pond Cove) and daily yard visits from Coopers hawks.

In other birding news, January has been a big month for birds in the national news. Starting with the bad - the state of Virginia made headlines when they paved over the largest seabird nesting colony in the state as part of a massive road and bridge expansion. South Island has been the home to over 25 thousand nesting seabirds since the mid 1980’s and includes birds like the Gull-billed tern which is on the endangered species act and the Royal tern. South Island has provided a reliable breeding habit for 98% of the Royal tern population in Virginia. Compounding the situation is the Trump administrations 2017 interpretation of the century-old Migratory Bird Treaty Act which allows devastating construction to take place as long as the purpose or intent is not to take birds, nest or eggs. Because of this seismic rollback Virginia is not required to provide mitigation, e.g. building a new island.

Now for the good news, in a study published this past month in Science, researchers describe 10 new birds found in Talibu, Peleng, and Togian islands off the eastern coast of Sulawesi. Amazingly, this is the highest number of newly described bird species discovered from a geographically limited area in more than 100 years!