I took advantage of the nice afternoon yesterday to ski and bird the trails into the East Loring section of the Aroostook National Wildlife Refuge. The trail from the headquarters building connects onto the old railroad bed that used to be used to move the nuclear warheads in and out of the former Loring Air Force Base. The Friends group has groomed a trail through the deep snow making for great access into this otherwise remote area.
-- The first bird I saw was a Common Raven holding a freshly killed vole. Later, near the "Weapons Storage" part of the refuge, I encountered an adult Northern Shrike. This too was carrying a vole. I wondered if the compacted snow of the groomed ski trail presents a barrier to the tunneling rodents and makes them come to the surface. If so, it seems the avian predators have figured this out.
I also spent some time with a flock of 15+ Pine Grosbeaks silently budding on the upper branches of the young fir and spruce along the trail. These birds seem parrot-like to me in the way they reach and dangle, almost upside down, to get at their food.
I understand that an auto loop will be opening into the East Loring portion of the refuge in summer 2017.
Good birding
Maine birds mailing list
maine-birds@googlegroups.com
http://groups.google.com/group/maine-birds
https://sites.google.com/site/birding207
---
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Maine birds" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to maine-birds+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com.
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
0 comments:
Post a Comment