Local birding report

The second and third weeks of May where both exhilarating and exhausting at times as enormous numbers of songbirds and shorebirds pushed through Cape. Migration analysis done by The Cornell Lab showed multiple nights of 500 million birds aloft. Radar data on the nights of May 14-15 showed songbirds at very high altitudes (10,000 feet and above). Amazingly, birds are able to find optimal supportive winds in complete darkness, leading to the formation of high-altitude migration layers. Birds that are migrating at these heights often will fly for longer distances and be more spread out over suitable stop over habitats.

On these two days in May warblers swarmed in the woods for miles. In our backyard alone I counted nineteen different types including many Ovenbirds, Wilson’s Warblers even more Magnolia Warblers. Black-and-white Warblers and Northern Parulas seemed to be dripping from every tall oak and maple tree. Common Yellowthroats also showed up in huge numbers as did Black-throated blue Warblers, Chestnut-sided Warblers and American Redstarts.

Also, on May 14 I spotted an elusive Lincoln’s Sparrow singing its wren like song below the Pond Cove pedestrian bridge. A bird of bogs and heaths, this transient sparrow is not known to nest in southern Maine. Adding to this memorable day was a handsome, White-crowned Sparrow that showed up on our feeders exactly one day later than the previous year. I also spied a single, Black-billed Cuckoo (out our back window) for all of five seconds before it slipped away into the brushy edges of the yard.

On May 15, my senses were startled by an exquisitely colored spring male Cape May Warbler persistently pursuing insects. The bird appeared from the shadows of an old White Spruce along Shore Road; its tiger striped breast with bright yellow belly and orange-chestnut ear patches were aglow. An uncommon to rare migrant in Maine, this gem breeds in small pockets of northern and western Maine.

Adding to this dreamy day, many Blackburnian Warblers were spotted in the treetops plucking insects (also called “hover-gleaning”). Breeding males have a flaming orange throat that is mesmerizing.

Identifying warbler species in particular groups with similar song types is very challenging. One warbler that falls into this bucket is the sought after, Bay-breasted Warbler. Time spent listening to recorded versions of this bird’s call paid off on May 19, and I was able to locate a Bay-breasted in the depths of the thickets bordering the Spurwink Cemetery and marsh. Unfortunately, I never saw the bird, however later that day I was sitting at my desk when I heard the call and turned to see a Bay-breasted hopping around the mid-section of a Red Maple tree.

Late that afternoon within the cool, moist woods of Runaway Farm my wife, son and I spotted a brown thrush watching us. Short of hearing this thrush’s haunting refrain in the twilight, the distinctive “buffy” (light brownish yellow) spectacled look was the giveaway. The Swainson’s Thrush may have, at one point, bred in Cumberland County however it is no longer known to. Other mention worthy sightings this day in Gull Crest were a single Golden-crowned Kinglet and a Solitary Sandpiper.

As for my local patch, the Carolina Wrens and the Bluebirds that nested within ten feet of each other (wrens in my overturned canoe and bluebirds in the side of the house) both fledged two chicks each by May 16. Adding to the yard chatter, more than a few Baltimore Orioles were chasing one another, and gathering nesting material. Of note, with a little undercover work I was able to determine that the odd, shrill cry that I had been hearing in our backyard was coming a male Purple Finch courting a rather coy female.

Other notes from the field include Great-horned Owls with begging young along Bowery Beach Road on May 17, first of year Least Flycatcher on May 19. A flock of twenty or more Common Terns in Pond Cove on May 20, Cedar Waxwings appearing locally throughout Cape starting on May 21 and a Indigo Bunting and Prothonotary Warbler in Hinckley Park on May 22. Interestingly, in the state of Maine there has been only a single summer record of a male Prothonotary Warbler (singing on Swans Island from 1989).