Day 17.360: Wedding

Exile #2 and I had the great pleasure of attending a wedding today. I had a good vantage point for the ceremony thanks to some last-minute tech duties.

Day 17.359: Hunting for birds

On Wednesday, Exile #2 and I went for a walk at Scarborough Marsh hoping to see some birds. 

Common loon

Belted kingfisher

I tried to move to get a clear view but he was having none of it

Right after the kingfisher we spotted this slightly sad looking duck decoy which tipped us off…

The duck hunters were out and about. Not surprisingly, we saw a lot fewer birds than usual. 

Likely a northern harrier

Common goldeneye

We decided to make a second stop at the river in Saco. We had a nice walk but not too many bird sightings. 

Common merganser

Day 17.358: Birding into 2025

Thursdays mean early morning birding even when it’s January 2nd. Here is some of what we saw. 

Red-tailed hawk perching quietly just above our heads as we tried to locate a calling titmouse

Another - or the same hawk spotted a little later

We estimated there were around 300 Canada geese on the mudflats within our field of view 

And another 100 flew over as we stood there

Cooper’s hawk

The same Coop. 

There were a few interloping ducks both American black ducks (pictured) and mallards

Red-tailed hawk soaring

Later, we once again found ourselves standing right underneath the tree that this red-tailed hawk was perched in

Our pileated woodpecker friend stuck his head out a few times then went back inside for some noisy home-improvements

Common merganser

Pair of common mergansers 

Day 17.357: End of year backyard birding

Here are some of the birds that have visited our feeders over the last few days.

Two Carolina wrens showed up on counting days after two consecutive weeks when our counting days were pretty much the only days we didn't see one

In contrast, the fox sparrow seems to only appear on counting days - two weekends in a row but with no other sightings.

This orange-ish house finch has caught our eyes several times. Apparently this coloring is within the bounds of normal, but all the others are much redder and this orange stands out.

Nothing much to say about the downy woodpecker, except that it posed nicely for this picture