The Acadia Birding Festival is Maine’s premiere bird watching festival and was established in 1998.
This year, the Festival is from 28-31 May, plus two post-festival trips on 1-2 June, and over these days it visits 27 different birding locations.
The Acadia Birding Festival is Maine’s premiere bird watching festival and was established in 1998.
This year, the Festival is from 28-31 May, plus two post-festival trips on 1-2 June, and over these days it visits 27 different birding locations.
This page shows my own remaining photographs, with very little commentary. If any of our WWNP group that went with us to Presque Isle send me suitable images, I’ll create an additional gallery on a third page.
Watching a male Baltimore Oriole starting the construction of a nest under the watchful eye of his mate was a light-hearted moment. She was certainly keeping an eye on his every move!
American Redstarts were present in significant numbers. One of my shots of these was of an immature bird and another was a grab-shot of a male flying above us, with the sun gleaming through the orange patches on his tail.
Perhaps it is too easy to ignore some birds on the basis that they are ‘common’ or drab, but I — for one — actually find that hard to do.
My one wader/shorebird of the day was well camouflaged against dead cat-tails and reeds:
Next, a species I have so far failed to identify, so if any good birders out there can help me with this one, I would be grateful. (Please use the ‘Leave a Comment’ link at the top of the page, if you can help.)
And some more of the warblers that we made our 210-mile round-trip specifically to see:
<– The End! 🙂
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My inspiration for this post comes directly from the Oakmoss Education blog, where Mary Jo Graham has written an interesting post about tree swallows.
What I would like to do is mention similarities and differences between the swallow family (more technically known as hirundines) in the USA and the swallows and martins in my native Britain, where there are only three such species, compared to America’s eight regular species and two ‘casual’ visitors.
video from BTO explaining how to identify UK hirundines & swifts
Two of these species are found as regular summer visitors in both countries. The bird that Brits call just the ‘swallow’ is known in the USA as the ‘barn swallow’ (Hirundo rustica). The British birds spend their winters in Africa whereas the American birds head down into South America. Interestingly, the North European subspecies are always white-breasted, whereas the American birds are a buff or cinnamon color underneath. I’ve also seen many birds of this species in several African countries where some of them are very bright orange underneath, and I presume these are yet another subspecies — perhaps one that is resident year-round in the so-called ‘Dark Continent’.
Is it worth knowing these differences, here in the States? Well, if you travel within North America it might be, because two of the white-breasted, Eurasian subspecies are casual visitors here. Hirundo rustica rustica and Hirundo rustica gutturalis are both occasionally seen in west and north Alaska, and the latter has also been seen in the Queen Charlotte Islands.
Another hirundine that is found on both sides of the Atalantic is the bank swallow (USA) or sand martin (Britain). Again, the scientific name — Riparia riparia — shows that these birds are indeed the same species.
Britain’s third member of this family is the house martin (Delichon urbica), which has been seen on both sides of North America: Western Alaska, where it is a casual visitor in spring, and a record of a single bird at an island off the coast of Newfoundland.
Although not closely related to swallows, swifts cause some confusion to new birders. North America has four regular species, only one of which — the chimney swift — is to be found on the eastern side of the continent. Britain, on the other hand, only has one — the common swift (Apus apus) — which is an ‘accidental’ visitor to islands off both Alaska and Newfoundland. Records of visits also exist for Bermuda and (quote) “probably the north east” of the USA.