Well, it turned out to be quite a bit nicer than we expected this weekend, huh? In fact, Saturday night – partly cloudy skies, mild temps, and little wind – would have made a fine and dandy evening for a Woodcock walk. Too bad I pulled the trigger on Friday morning to postpone our Woodcocks Gone Wild Walk at Pineland Farms. Hoping to give folks enough of a heads-up, I didn’t wait for the pair of low-pressure systems to miss us: one stayed to our south, and the other that passed to our west, leaving us with a mostly dry Saturday – except in the mountains and far southern York County. Well, I apologize if this inconvenienced anyone, but I hope you can make it to the walk NEXT Saturday (once again meeting at the Pineland Farms visitor center at 7:00pm). Let’s hope for even NICER weather next weekend.

Anyway, on Sunday, I joined up with Lysle and Luke for a little birding in the Freeport-Yarmouth area. Gulls and ducks were fewer in the Thornhurst Farm fields than they were yesterday, but we did have 6+ Killdeer and 2 American Kestrels. A pair of Greater Scaup and a Bald Eagle was at Winslow Park, 16 Double-crested Cormorants were off of Sandy Point Beach, and 2 Ospreys were fishing off of the causeway to Little John Island. Afterwards, I took a walk at Bayview Preserve, which was quite productive: 27 Green-winged Teal at the river’s edge; 2 Wood Ducks in the partly-open pond; a Ruffed Grouse; and a total of 5 singing Eastern Phoebes. I also heard a Spring Peeper and a couple of Wood Frogs.

So, after our attempt to visit Vinalhaven Island failed last week, we’re going to give it a go again this Tuesday – but this time with RESERVED ferry tickets. Therefore, I’ll be up on Bradbury Mountain for the day on Monday, giving Dane his day off. Light northwest winds and mostly sunny skies are predicted, which shouldn’t be bad at all. At this point in the season, we’ll get birds moving on almost any wind, even normally unproductive winds, if they are light enough. Milder temperatures won’t hurt either.

And don’t forget to tune into Bill Green’s the Green Outdoors on the 6:00 news on our local NBC affiliate on Monday to see his story on our hawkwatch!