Columns

A Bird's Tale

Common cuckoos may be common in Europe and Asia but they are decidedly rare in the U.S. Individual birds have been found only four times including this one from Long Island, New York, in October, 2025. Courtesy of Amy Simmons

Tuesday is Election Day. 2025 being an off year, there is less to vote on then some years, most notably a couple referendum questions. There is a decent amount of buzz around these, and…

A Bird's Tale

'Dark Swift and Bright Swallow': Memories of Birds, Music and Ithaca

The spring peeper-like song of Swainson's thrush migrating overhead at night are a signature sound of fall in Maine. Photo by Cephas, courtesy of wikimedia commons

This Week in Lincolnville: The Ghosts Among Us

Ah, the spooky old house. That Halloween icon — the abandoned home, once a place where a family lived, now just the dwelling of ghosts. Every neighborhood needs a haunted house.

…

A Bird's Tale

Fall Bird Musings

Yellow-bellied sapsuckers have been appearing around the authors' neighborhood during this fall migration, though not as many as were counted flying to the mainland from Cousin’s Island in Yarmouth in the fall of 2011 - that total reached 358! (Yellow-bellied sapsucker photo courtesy of Jeff Wells)

This Week in Lincolnville: On Domestic Bliss and Dishwashers

On the holiday Monday, my wife and I set off to purchase a new dishwasher. Ours, only seven years old, had stopped working, defying all Tracee’s attempts to fix it. For the last several…

A Bird's Tale

Sharing Bird Connections on Warm White Beaches under Soft Blue Skies

The authors enjoyed looking for birds on the warm, sandy beaches of Florida in October. Courtesy of Reese McAtee.

Soft powder blue skies extend in all directions. The sea is shades of blue as well. Dark steel blue in the distance flecked with lines of white from barely curling wave…

This Week in Lincolnville: A Fall Drive

In the autumn of 1992, my father and I packed up the car for a trip out of Lincolnville. It was my senior year at Camden-Rockport High School, and I had spent the spring and summer looking…

A Bird's Tale

What are Evening Grosbeaks Hiding?

This evening grosbeak was photographed in northern Minnesota. Note the large bill and bright yellow body. Photo courtesy of Lauri Shaull, wikimedia commons

This Week in Lincolnville: 50 Years of the Lincolnville Historical Society

Ma, aka Diane Roesing O’Brien, submitted a piece she wrote in honor of the Lincolnville Historical Society’s Fiftieth Anniversary this week.

Our Historical Society…

A Bird's Tale

Traveling Bird, Traveling Bird Exhibit

As the authors were standing on a jetty overlooking the Gulf of Maine in Rockport, Massachusetts, they heard a mysterious but familiar call note fly in off the water - a lapland longspur (here the species is shown in breeding plumange). (Photo Wiki Commons: By Ómar Runólfsson - Flickr: Lapland Longspur - Calcarius lapponicus - Sportittlingur, CC BY 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=19955368)

Where It's At

ARTinME 2025: Destined to be a 'best ever' for BRAF

ARTinME 2025 First Place awarded to Helen Matthews' "View" by jurors David Estey and Jaap Helder. Courtesy of Lauren Palmer/BRAF

I walked into Boothbay Region Art Foundation (BRAF) last Saturday night for its annual ARTinME opening reception and awards. And, wow. Just wow. I’ll say it now (and probably later as well): This…

Caching for the Winter

Black-capped chickadees are among just a few birds that cache food for later use. Courtesy of Jeff Wells

Special Town Meeting Sept. 29

This Week in Lincolnville: The Fair and Memories

We went to the fair Sunday morning. The only fair I got to this year, the Maine Organic Farmers and Gardners Association’s Common Ground Country Fair.

I’ve been attending…

A Bird's Tale

Five Things We Love About Birding in September

Once rare in Maine, lesser black-backed gulls have become more frequent, likely due to an increasing number that nest in Greenland. Image courtesy of Crossly ID Guide to Eastern Birds, Wiki media Commons

1. The Weather – How can you not love the weather of September in Maine? Mornings start crisp and fresh with dew on the grass as you watch for warblers in the shrubbery. By afternoon, you’re…

This Week in Lincolnville: Listening and Learning

The Lewis R. French anchors off Ducktrap for the evening. The Lewis R. French launched in April 1871, and claims the title of America’s oldest windjammer. (Photo by Heather Moran)

My older brother Bill recently moved back to town. He retired from his career as a high school math teacher, purchased a little place up on Masalin Road, and plans to offer tutoring for…

A Bird's Tale

Golden Birds of Aroostook County...and Brazil

American golden-plovers, like this adult still showing some vestiges of breeding plumage photographed in fall on Aruba, are strong flyers that travel incredible distances from north to south each fall and back in the spring. An individual banded in Utqiagvik (formerly Barrow), Alaska, in June 2009 was found thousands of miles away on the island of Aruba (off the northern coast of South America) in October 2009. Courtesy of Michiel Oversteegen www.birdwatchingaruba.com

This Week in Lincolnville: Thoughts on a Rainy Sunday Morning

It was a blessedly damp Sunday morning. The rain was so very welcome after an extremely dry spell.

I love a rainy weekend morning. The weekend chores…

A Bird's Tale

The Last Time We Saw One

The pigeon-like head and large, dark eye, and buffy breast and yellow legs are distinctive among North American sandpipers. Courtesy of Michiel Oversteegen

This Week in Lincolnville: Protecting the Farm

Trigger warning, as this column contains descriptions, sanitized, of life on a small family farm, and the steps that sometimes need to be taken to preserve the livestock…

A Bird's Tale

While Watching Hurricane Waves We See Good Terns

Though not "hurricane birds," the authors saw several Forster's terns while watching hurricane surf at a southern Maine beach. Where the Forster’s terns come from that make their way to Maine in late summer is a mystery. Photo courtesy of Wikipedia Commons by Mike Baird

This Week in Lincolnville: The Big City

For a guy who rarely leaves the Rockland to Belfast circle of the Midcoast, I have traveled a fair bit this year. This weekend finds me in Brooklyn, N.Y., for a family wedding. As the aunt…

A Bird's Tale

Merlins are Always Special

In the late 1970s and early 1980s, merlin populations had just begun to bounce back from declines as a result of DDT and other pesticides. Photo by Rhododendrites, courtesy of Wiki Commons

This Week in Lincolnville: Stone walls in the forest

I went for a little walk Saturday. Parking at the trailhead at Stephen’s Corner, Youngtown and Beach Road, I hoisted a backpack with a large bottle of water and a midday snack, put in my…

This Week in Lincolnville: The Steady March of Time

Time seems to be moving faster than it used to. We approach mid-August. The days are still warm, but as sunset approaches, earlier every day, one may reach for the sweatshirt. Evenings are…

A Bird's Tale

The Wonderfully Mysterious Solitary Sandpiper

On the breeding grounds in the Boreal Forest region of Canada and Alaska, the solitary sandpiper can be found in and near peatlands and shores of lakes and ponds. The bird in this photograph certainly had a nest somewhere nearby. Photo by Peuple Loup, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons

This Week in Lincolnville: The Postal Service

So there has been some chatter around Lincolnville recently. On the social medias, on the Lincolnville Bulletin Board, about town. People are not getting their mail as expected.

…

A Bird's Tale

North and South Meet in Downeast Maine as Birds

Pink birds don't occur in Maine often, but as of this writing, a roseate spoonbill is making a showing in Cutler, in Downeast Maine, about 1,200 miles from its breeding grounds in South Florida and along the Gulf Coast of Texas to western Louisiana. (Photo courtesy of Ethan Whitaker)

This Week in Lincolnville: Reading Under a Tree

It has been a lovely weekend. I spent the bulk of it reading.

In between running to the dump and grocery store, and driving children to and from work and friends’ houses…

A Bird's Tale

Fork-tailed Flycatchers in Maine

Fork-tailed flycatchers are quite unmistakable, looking a bit like an eastern kingbird but with a gray back and an elegant, very long tail. These photos were taken in Uruguay where the species breeds. Courtesy of Dominic Sherony, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons

This Week in Lincolnville: Hitting Up the Farmstands

I have written before about Lincolnville’s agrarian past.

Subsistence farming is generally the best we have done. There is a reason we lost so much of our population in…

A Bird's Tale

Five Reasons to Love Birding in July

July birding yields any number of surprises. The authors were delighted to spy this three-fer along the Kennebec River, where great blue herons can be readily seen but great egrets, less so. (Photo courtesy of Jeff Wells)

A Bird's Tale

A Sound You Will Never Forget

Upland sandpipers, a bird of open grasslands, will sometimes perch on human-made structures like fences as well as on bushes and shrubs, making it easy to see their mottled plumage, long bill and legs, and large, dark eye. (Photo by Wild Return, courtesy Wikipedia Commons)

A Bird's Tale

“Restaurants and Hardware Stores” for Your Bird Neighbors

The authors have noticed a resurgence in American robins singing as they walk through their neighborhood. (Photo courtesy of Jeff Wells)

A Bird's Tale

Five Surprising Facts About the Potato Chip Bird

American goldfinch males do what is called a Butterfl0y Display flight during the breeding season, one of many things about these familiar birds that you may not know. Photo by mdf courtesy of Wikimedia Commons

A Bird's Tale

Throwing Your Bird Investments in the Trash

For more than 100 years, thousands of people have been affixing simple bands to the legs of birds in order to understand more about bird movements and answer other questions about their biology. Here, a bird bander is banding a northern cardinal. (Photo USGS)

A Bird's Tale

The Bird that Loves Snakeskins

Despite the name, great crested flycatchers don't have a prominent crest. But the bright yellow belly, rufous tail, wingbars, and gray throat are distinctive. Photo by Mykola Swarnyk, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons

WHERE IT'S AT

The banjo magic of Alison Brown

Alison Brown and Band. Opera House. June 13. Get tickets! Courtesy of the artist

She’s a genre blender. Innovator. Three-time Grammy winner. Gotta be Alison Brown. If you missed Alison and the Band last June, I advise you not to make that mistake again: They are returning to…

Remembering Lost Birds and Other Creatures

The authors were surprised to hear a yellow-bellied sapsucker drumming recently in their in-town neighborhood, where they've only seen or heard them a few times over the last 20 years. Courtesy of Jeff Wells

A Bird's Tale

A Sea of Birds in the Night Sky

Lilacs glowing in the night provided the perfect backdrop for the authors as they sat on their porch listening as hundreds, maybe thousands of birds migrated overhead from their southern wintering grounds to their breeding areas in the North. Courtesy of Jeff Wells

A Bird’s Tale

Five Surprising Facts About the Familiar American Robin

During the breeding season, American robins are one of the first birds to begin singing each morning, often breaking into song when it's still quite dark. (Photo courtesy of Jeff Wells)

A Bird's Tale

Stilt Birding

Maine is currently hosting several of the rare-to-the-state black-necked stilt this spring, including in Cape Elizabeth, where this photo was taken. Courtesy of Rob Speirs

A Bird's Tale

Listening to the Acoustic Symphony of Life

During a pre-dawn start to the day, the American robin was the only bird singing. By the time the sun rose, there was a symphony of bird song. (Photo courtesy of Jeff Wells)

Battle of Mobile Bay: Of 18 northern vessels, one was the gunboat 'Kennebec,' launched in 1861 in Thomaston'

Half Seas Over: Damn Those Torpedoes!

Peter Clifford of Northport was a friend as well as a fount of information about all things maritime. Maine lighthouses, lost propellers, shipwrecks, he and I corresponded and visited often. We…

A Bird's Tale

Listen to the Mockingbirds

The authors once recorded a northern mockingbird that imitated not only bird songs but also a car alarm and sirens! (Photo courtesy of Allison Wells)

A Bird's Tale

The Magic of Cranes

During a recent visit to their favorite local "pop-up pond," the authors finally find what they had hoped to see there for years: sandhill cranes! Courtesy of Allison Wells

A Bird's Tale

Maine’s Arctic Canada Connection

Some long-tailed ducks migrate from the Maine coast to the Nunavut Territory thousands of miles to the North in order to nest. The official adoption of the Nunavut Land Use Plan will be crucial to ensuring their breeding grounds remain intact and healthy. (Photo by Wolfgang Wander, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.)

A Bird's Tale

The Early Bird Gets the Snow

While birding following the recent snowstorm, the authors noted large flocks of sparrows along roadsides. Courtesy of Jeff Wells

A Bird's Tale

Maine's Tiniest Duck

The green in the wing of the male green-winged teal may not always be visible, but the green patch in the rufous head is always striking. Courtesy of Mykola Swarnyk, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons

Half Seas Over: A Flare for the Dramatic

The Very Light Pistol has been used in maritime rescues and military operations for years. Pretty cool that its inventor was Edward Very, a native of Belfast, Maine!

Born in 1847, his…