The end of October and early November is “Rarity Season.” We’ve learned that this is a great time of year to find vagrants. A number of factors likely result in this. 1) Cold weather concentrates birds at concentrated food sources like feeders and thickets. 2) All of the vagrants wandering the countryside begin to concentrate at coastal locations and other migrant traps as they continue their peregrinations. 3) Strong cold fronts are pushing across the country, and perhaps pushing birds with them. 4) Coastal lows are intensifying, possibly carrying some birds with them. 5) There are fewer birds around to sift through for rarities. 6) There are fewer food sources to check for birds, and the lack of leaves helps in detecting birds. 7) Crazy birders like me are extremely actively searching for said vagrants. And, there are likely some more factors that I’m not thinking of at the moment, but you get the idea.

Anyway, hoping to kick off “Rarity Season,” with a bang, Jeannette and I headed down the southern York County coast yesterday. We began at Fort Foster, which was quite birdy. An “Ipswich” Savannah Sparrow was my first of the fall – finally – and a decent amount of other sparrows were in the scrub. But, the bird of the day, was the Western Kingbird that we discovered flycatching from trees along the park’s easternmost shoreline. (A complete list and totals from the park are below)

We spotted the bird simultaneously, as it flew across the path a short distance ahead. I do believe the bird was called by both of us with a “What the . . . ?” Although one or more Western Kingbirds show up every fall in Maine – there was one on Monhegan a couple of weeks ago – this was my first for the state. And, to make it even more satisfying, I had called it earlier in the day.

As we usually do, Jeannette and I made our “requests” as we headed out in the morning. These requests are usually for 3 birds. One possible, one unlikely, and one very, very unlikely. While my “possible” Northern Shrike and “very, very unlikely” Chestnut-collared Longspur requests were not met, fulfillment of my “unlikely” request of a Western Kingbird was exciting enough.

We then had another treat at nearby Seapoint Beach. One small shrub held two immature White-crowned Sparrows, both facing away, but one of which looked noticeably larger. When it turned around, the clean lores and big, clear orange bill of the gambelli subspecies was clearly evident. This was my first “Gambel’s” White-crowned Sparrow in Maine, and with all of the White-crowns that were around this fall, I have been diligently searching for this western subspecies. Meanwhile, another “Ipswich” Savannah Sparrow was seen, and huge flocks of hundreds of Double-crested Cormorants (with a peppering of Great Cormorants mixed in) were passing overhead.

Moving on, Kittery Town Landing hosted 50+ Bonaparte’s Gulls and the family group of 4 Mute Swans continues at Legion Pond. Today, a drake Gadwall, a drake Wood Duck, and a single American Coot joined the Mallards, American Black Ducks, and “Pond Pigs” (as I call Mute Swans) here.

As with all of our outings to the Kittery area, Jeannette and I combined a little bit of “fooding” with our birding. We had received a tip that Carl’s Meat Market on Route One had real, imported from New Jersey Pork Roll. This tip panned out, and I was happy to score a couple of servings (my body really can’t handle much more that that anymore) of this Jersey-cana favorite. Also called Taylor Ham, pork roll – born in Trenton, NJ – is not easy to find outside of the Greater NJ area, so having a source for this up here was just another highlight of the day. Then, we just had to stop at Enoteca Italiana for cannolis (for a treat to hold us through to a late lunch at Flo’s Hot Dogs) and other provisions.

Finally working up the coast, visits to the York Harbor Cliff Walk (4 Yellow-rumped Warblers), the neighborhood around the Nubble (a handful of the common sparrows), and Perkin’s Cove (my first 10 Long-tailed Ducks of the season), were followed by a stroll around Beach Plum Farm. This often sparrow-ific location did not disappoint today, as we had 2 Field Sparrows among the usual cast of characters. Finally, with another flooding high tide, we stomped the edge of the marsh at Community Park in Wells, which yielded 3 Nelson’s Sharp-tailed Sparrows.

So, we ended the day with 63 ½ species of birds, a state bird, and pork roll. What a day!

Checking the radar from the last couple of nights, I notice that very little moved Monday night into Tuesday morning, with a weak system passing to our north, and light southwesterly winds in the southern part of the state. Winds were predicted to turn to the east last night, but alas, they did not, and a light WNW to NW flow allowed for a fairly decent flight overnight. Unfortunately, I was not at Sandy Point to ground truth that.

Here’s the 2am radar image, for example:

Instead, I was at Hedgehog Mountain. The woods were very, very quiet as they usually are this time of year. In fact, I totaled all of 13 species in over an hour here today. However, one of those species was a Common Redpoll – I believe the earliest that I have ever recorded one in Maine, and definitely a sign of things to come for the winter.

A little later, a truant immature female-type Indigo Bunting briefly visited the store’s feeders, an excellent bird for the last day of October.

And, finally, here’s the complete run-down from Tuesday’s visit to Fort Foster.
Location: Kittery--Fort Foster
Observation date: 10/30/07
Number of species: 34

American Black Duck 8
Mallard 7
Common Eider X
Red-throated Loon 1
Common Loon 5
Double-crested Cormorant X
Great Cormorant X
Bonaparte's Gull 11
Ring-billed Gull X
Herring Gull X
Great Black-backed Gull X
Downy Woodpecker 3
Hairy Woodpecker 3
Western Kingbird 1 Flycatching from trees along park's
easternmost shoreline. Photographed.
Blue Jay 3
American Crow 1
Black-capped Chickadee 20
Tufted Titmouse 8
White-breasted Nuthatch 1
Golden-crowned Kinglet 2
Ruby-crowned Kinglet 1
Hermit Thrush 1
Yellow-rumped Warbler 3
American Tree Sparrow 3
Chipping Sparrow 1
Song Sparrow 36
Swamp Sparrow 1
White-throated Sparrow 4
White-crowned Sparrow 1
Dark-eyed Junco 15
Snow Bunting 4
Northern Cardinal 7
House Finch 1
American Goldfinch 7

This report was generated automatically by eBird v2(http://ebird.org)