Bird is the word for fall
By David Harry
Staff Writer
Consider it a way of establishing a natural twitter account.
A walk through the 220-acre Fuller Farm preserve in Scarborough or a stroll out to the end of the land at Biddeford Pool are scenic, refreshing and colorful as the foliage turns.
Those walks are also good ways to learn birding, and the trails are among eight recognized in a statewide birding guide compiled by the Maine Office of Tourism and Maine Audubon Society.
Birding is a hobby that can be pursued by installing a bird feeder and looking out a window or traveling around the world while accumulating a “life list” of birds that have been viewed, said Scarborough Town Councilor Karen D’Andrea.
D’Andrea, who has occasionally summoned birds using calls programmed in her cell phone, lands on the more passionate end of the scale and has been birding for more than two decades.
Marie Louise St. Onge, the executive director of the Kennebunk Land Trust, is less sophisticated in her approach.
“I am a perennial novice and I like keeping it that way,” she said.
Kennebunk Plains is a 135-acre site stretching across both sides of Route 99 outside downtown Kennebunk. Fuller Farm is a 220-acre site owned by the Scarborough Land Conservation Trust since 2001.
Those sites, along with the 40-acre Hinckley Park in South Portland, are listed as local inland areas in the birding trail guide. The preserves afford chances to see sparrows, towhees and other species inhabiting grass and woodlands, according to the guide.
October is considered an optimal birding time in the areas except Hinckley Park, which is home to migratory warblers that are winging it back to Central and South America for the winter.
Along the coast and wetlands, a 30-acre sanctuary at Biddeford Pool, the Scarborough Marsh, Pine Point in Scarborough, and Kettle Cove and Dyer Point in Cape Elizabeth present year-round opportunities to view shorebirds, ducks, herons, egrets and cormorants.
St. Onge directs the land trust that oversees the Kennebunk Plains, a sandy preserve where hikers are asked to stay on established trails, but can be surprised by the sparrows, sandpipers and towhees in the long grasses and low stands of trees and shrubs.
“It’s relaxing,” St. Onge said, “and in keeping with what I enjoy – seeing the outdoors.”
D’Andrea has entertained visitors from around the country and England with marsh tours and said activity is abundant now in the deep grasses. She is reticent to routinely call birds using the programmed calls, but said learning to bird by listening as well as watching expanded her enjoyment.
“We all get fooled,” D’Andrea said about walks in the woods where the glistening of the strand of a spider web or a leaf dropping to the ground catch the eye and a bird remains unseen while singing nearby.
At Fuller Farm, haying is delayed until nesting season is over, and it is still possible in the fields to startle sparrows that seem invisible until they take flight.
Along the shoreline at Biddeford Pool, ducks float on the ocean last week as cormorants take wing overhead. The sanctuary trail winds past private homes and a golf course and, on a recent visit, a cardinal flitted along tree limbs as golfers lined up putts nearby.
In both Fuller Farm and the Scarborough Marsh, D’Andrea said it is important to step lightly and stay on paths so as not to disturb nesting birds. At Kettle Cove and Dyer Point, birders should be aware the rocky shoreline can be steep, wet and slick.
D’Andrea said keeping a life list of birds she has seen is easier than updating an annual list, and she enjoys warblers because of “the challenges they [the birds] meet” in the distances they migrate.
She has also led visitors through the marsh so they can see the Nelson’s and saltmarsh swallows living in the tall grasses.
The basics to begin birding are simple, said St. Onge and D’Andrea. Good binoculars, footwear and an illustrated guide such as ones compiled by David Sibley or Roger Tory Peterson are the primary tools.
“They are really interesting and do bizarre things,” D’Andrea said about bird behavior.
Copies of the 26-page brochure detailing birding areas throughout the state can be downloaded at www.visitmaine.com by clicking on the brochures tab.
Staff writer David Harry can be reached at 282-4337, ext. 219
Staff Writer
Consider it a way of establishing a natural twitter account.
A walk through the 220-acre Fuller Farm preserve in Scarborough or a stroll out to the end of the land at Biddeford Pool are scenic, refreshing and colorful as the foliage turns.
Those walks are also good ways to learn birding, and the trails are among eight recognized in a statewide birding guide compiled by the Maine Office of Tourism and Maine Audubon Society.
Birding is a hobby that can be pursued by installing a bird feeder and looking out a window or traveling around the world while accumulating a “life list” of birds that have been viewed, said Scarborough Town Councilor Karen D’Andrea.
D’Andrea, who has occasionally summoned birds using calls programmed in her cell phone, lands on the more passionate end of the scale and has been birding for more than two decades.
Marie Louise St. Onge, the executive director of the Kennebunk Land Trust, is less sophisticated in her approach.
“I am a perennial novice and I like keeping it that way,” she said.
Kennebunk Plains is a 135-acre site stretching across both sides of Route 99 outside downtown Kennebunk. Fuller Farm is a 220-acre site owned by the Scarborough Land Conservation Trust since 2001.
Those sites, along with the 40-acre Hinckley Park in South Portland, are listed as local inland areas in the birding trail guide. The preserves afford chances to see sparrows, towhees and other species inhabiting grass and woodlands, according to the guide.
October is considered an optimal birding time in the areas except Hinckley Park, which is home to migratory warblers that are winging it back to Central and South America for the winter.
Along the coast and wetlands, a 30-acre sanctuary at Biddeford Pool, the Scarborough Marsh, Pine Point in Scarborough, and Kettle Cove and Dyer Point in Cape Elizabeth present year-round opportunities to view shorebirds, ducks, herons, egrets and cormorants.
St. Onge directs the land trust that oversees the Kennebunk Plains, a sandy preserve where hikers are asked to stay on established trails, but can be surprised by the sparrows, sandpipers and towhees in the long grasses and low stands of trees and shrubs.
“It’s relaxing,” St. Onge said, “and in keeping with what I enjoy – seeing the outdoors.”
D’Andrea has entertained visitors from around the country and England with marsh tours and said activity is abundant now in the deep grasses. She is reticent to routinely call birds using the programmed calls, but said learning to bird by listening as well as watching expanded her enjoyment.
“We all get fooled,” D’Andrea said about walks in the woods where the glistening of the strand of a spider web or a leaf dropping to the ground catch the eye and a bird remains unseen while singing nearby.
At Fuller Farm, haying is delayed until nesting season is over, and it is still possible in the fields to startle sparrows that seem invisible until they take flight.
Along the shoreline at Biddeford Pool, ducks float on the ocean last week as cormorants take wing overhead. The sanctuary trail winds past private homes and a golf course and, on a recent visit, a cardinal flitted along tree limbs as golfers lined up putts nearby.
In both Fuller Farm and the Scarborough Marsh, D’Andrea said it is important to step lightly and stay on paths so as not to disturb nesting birds. At Kettle Cove and Dyer Point, birders should be aware the rocky shoreline can be steep, wet and slick.
D’Andrea said keeping a life list of birds she has seen is easier than updating an annual list, and she enjoys warblers because of “the challenges they [the birds] meet” in the distances they migrate.
She has also led visitors through the marsh so they can see the Nelson’s and saltmarsh swallows living in the tall grasses.
The basics to begin birding are simple, said St. Onge and D’Andrea. Good binoculars, footwear and an illustrated guide such as ones compiled by David Sibley or Roger Tory Peterson are the primary tools.
“They are really interesting and do bizarre things,” D’Andrea said about bird behavior.
Copies of the 26-page brochure detailing birding areas throughout the state can be downloaded at www.visitmaine.com by clicking on the brochures tab.
Staff writer David Harry can be reached at 282-4337, ext. 219
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