I spent a pleasant morning today birding in and around Biddeford Pool. The Pool is a tough place to beat, especially during shorebird migration, which is now rolling along at full force.

There are a number of places to bird in the area, and I find it difficult not to want to thoroughly comb ALL of them. That is why I don’t go there too often – it takes me too long to leave! But, I had the time today, and the tides were right, so I took full advantage of it.

I began at dead low at Hill’s Beach, tallying shorebirds – led by 101 Semipalmated Plovers and a good count of 92 Short-billed Dowitchers, including one of the interior “hendersoni” subspecies. That was added to 85 Semipalmated Sandpipers, 28 Sanderling, 6 Ruddy Turnstones, 2 Black-bellied Plovers, 2 Spotted Sandpipers, 1 Piping Plover, and 1 lone Least Sandpiper. 4 Roseate Terns joined Common Terns – including quite a few recently fledged juveniles - on the beach, along with about 30 Bonaparte’s Gulls. And, at least 100 Tree Swallows, many juveniles, were swirling overhead – and quite a few were sitting on the beach, preening, which was a most unusual sight.

East Point Sanctuary didn’t hold too much, but I did see 5 Red-breasted Mergansers in the rocks. Three of those looked like youngsters; did they breed here this year? Meanwhile, a holdover from the winter, one immature Great Cormorant was still around.

I walked through the neighborhood – no migrant passerines were detected yet – and around the shore to Biddeford Pool Beach. There were a handful of birds in the wrack as the tide was coming in, but nothing noteworthy as I moseyed along. However, my timing was perfect – for a change – as the tide was just beginning to fill in the Pool when I stepped into the marsh behind Hattie’s Deli.

As the tide rolls in, birds leave Hill’s Beach and head either into the Pool or overhead to Biddeford Pool Beach. Meanwhile, birds that have been feeding in the Pool are concentrated along the shoreline – it’s impressive how quickly the mud becomes inundated here. This provides a great opportunity to study birds at close range – I just sit and wait for the water to push them to me. And today, the Pool was quite busy. One Willet of the western subspecies – an uncommon migrant in Maine – joined a good-sized group of at least 35 of our “regular” Eastern Willets. 4 Whimbrel foraged on a mud bar, and at least 400 Semipalmated Sandpipers were either feeding or flying about. 44 Semipalmated Plovers, 19 Short-billed Dowitchers, 4 Least Sandpipers, 3 Ruddy Turnstones, 2 Greater Yellowlegs, and one Black-bellied Plover were also present.

As the water covers the feeding areas, the birds depart for their roosting spots. The “tall” shorebirds, such as the Whimbrels and Willets, usually roost in the tall grass on the island in the middle of the pool. The smaller shorebirds, such as the peeps and Semipalmated Plovers usually fly overhead and congregate on the rocks along Ocean Ave (that runs along the shoreline at the east end of the Biddeford Pool neighborhood.

When I was all out of exposed mud, and birds, at the Pool, I walked back towards the beach - with waves of peeps flying overhead, looking for where the shorebirds were roosting today. I finally found the main group of birds on the rocks roughly in front of the old Coast Guard building off of Ocean Ave. There, on the rocks along the shoreline, had amassed at least 600 Semipalmated Sandpipers, 30 Semipalmated Plovers, and 10 Ruddy Turnstones (and likely more were out of view or on rocks a little further offshore). It was quite a sight – the rocks looked alive when the flock would shuffle.

And to top it off, a male Harlequin Duck – another winter species that has been lingering this summer here – was spotted on the rocks, topping off the morning’s good birding.