After the great day at Shelburne Farm yesterday, I thought I’d give the waterfront another try this morning, so I hiked down to the lake and this time, I headed north. Things got off to quite a slow start, and I was all the way up to North Beach Park, about 2.5 miles from our Airbnb, before this little eastern phoebe called for my attention. We see them in Estabrook, but not since April.
That seemed like a nice start, so I wandered around the park a bit until I heard a chirp that I thought might be a raptor. Since I haven’t gotten pictures of many this trip, I immediately started searching for it, and as I rounded the bath house, I heard it again, but closer to the ground. Well, I must have made more noise than I thought, because right about then someone poked their head up to see who I was.
You may be forgiven for not recognizing that face because I haven’t been able to show you a picture of it very often. Happily, its owner hopped up a little higher to get a better look at me.
That’s right, campers, we’ve got ourselves another pileated woodpecker, and this time it is not hiding behind the leaves of a tree. His red cheek and forehead make him a he, and I was torn about what to do next. I really, really wanted a nice pileated picture, but I also very much didn’t want to chase off the bird. Since I was already quite close, and it hadn’t fled yet, I opted to maintain that same distance and see if it would let me ease around to the side of that stump. My luck held, my plan worked, and here’s our beauty and the mine it was excavating.
In fact, I had so many pictures, and the bird just kept digging, that it finally occurred to me to take some video, so here you go. Mmm, mmm, carpenter ants and their larvae!
Finally, I’ve gotta wrap this up ’cause it’s late, so here’s the lemon gumdrop on top, a northern yellow warbler with a beak full of the bugs it has collected for its fledgling nearby.
Tomorrow, Bob and I are gonna see if we can’t find as many species here in Maine as we had the good fortune to find in Vermont. Wish us luck!
Signs of Life in Estabrook Park 