Hi everyone:
As we being the third breeding season of the Maine Bird Atlas, I'll be sharing weekly challenges if you all need some direction on what to be looking for. If you are new to the atlas, all the materials or info you can can be found at: maine.gov/birdatlas
**KICKOFF EVENT**
Our 2020 Kickoff Event is now going digital! We'll have more details to share soon but you can save the date of April 25th for an online event that will include presentations on preliminary results, special species survey opportunities, and atlasing strategies and workshops for beginning, intermediate, and advanced Atlasers.
**SAFE DATES**
Spring migration is underway but some birds are all ready breeding. Keep in mind that only birds we are currently within their safe dates should have possible and a few probable (S7, M, P) codes used. However, any other probable and all confirmed codes supersede safe dates. For example, Red-shouldered Hawks are still migrating in Maine so we've got another month+ until we enter their safe dates. So don't use the lower codes, like H-In Appropriate Habitat, but if you see one building a nest then you should code that confirmed, using NB-Nest Building. A chart of Breeding Safe Dates Sorted by Starting Week can be found here: https://www.maine.gov/ifw/fish-wildlife/maine-bird-atlas/docs/Safe%20Dates%20Graphs%20sorted%20by%20start%20date.pdf
**BE SAFE**
I've intentionally picked challenges that you can hopefully do near your homes or away from crowds. Please review the Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Widlife's recent blog post on "How to safely spend time outside": https://www1.maine.gov/wordpress/insideifw/2020/03/26/how-to-safely-spend-time-outside/
Here are the challenges for this week:
1) American Woodcock - Visiting a wet field or meadow near you shortly after sunset should give you good odds of hearing a calling woodcock. As a reminder, only hearing the "peent" call should be coded as "S-Singing Bird" but some extra effort to observe the flight display will let you bump that report to probable using the "C-Courship, Display, Copulation" code. This species will be a tougher one to confirm breeding but we should be able to do a good job filling in blocks with probable records.See their map here and target blocks that don't currently have probable records: https://ebird.org/atlasme/map/amewoo (and check out that AWESOME effort by Jeff Cherry to fill in blocks around Damariscotta!! Great evidence that these birds are quite abundant and easy to detect if we just put some effort in.)
2) American Crow - Nest building began this week for my backyard crows. I've watched them daily breaking branches off one of our large maples, discarding most, but flying off with that one that is "just right" - which I coded CN-Carrying Nesting Material. So watch your crows this week! See if there are any blocks needing confirmed crows near you: https://ebird.org/atlasme/map/amecro
3) Nest Boxes - I've seen a few photos on the MAINE Birds Facebook group of Eastern Bluebirds already at work building nests in boxes. House Sparrows count too but after confirming them, I'd recommend cleaning out that box to have it ready for Tree Swallows or other secondary cavity nesters yet to arrive. Great advice for House Sparrow management can be found here: http://www.sialis.org/hosp.htm
Anyone who completes one of the challenges above will be entered to win any item of their choice (any product, style, color, size, etc) from the Maine Bird Atlas online store: teepublic.com/user/mainebirdatlas/. One entry per person per challenge (complete them all for 3x the chances of winning) from checklists submitted by 10 April 2020.
Good birding and happy atlasing!
Doug Hitchcox
Maine Bird Atlas - Outreach Coordinator
Maine Audubon - Staff Naturalist
207-781-2330 x237
dhitchcox@maineaudubon.org
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