[Maine-birds] Baxter Backpacking Trip

For the past 9 days I have been hiking and backpacking in Baxter with a group including Garrett Erickson-Harris, another young birder. There were a number of avian highlights, although the trip was hiking-focused and I didn't even have binocs with me for most of it. 

Our first three nights were at Roaring Brook, which was very very quiet, despite what the name would suggest. Maybe it had something to do with the fact that the roaring brook completely drowned out the birds... We hiked Katahdin on 8/4. 

From 8/6-8/8 we were at Russell Pond. The area around Russell Pond is very boreal in every direction. From the lean-to there we heard White Winged Crossbill calls almost every 10 or 15 minutes, and heard Siskins nearly as often. Russell Pond had a solid 5 species of finches. All except one of our BOCHs were within 3 or 4 miles of Russell Pond, and they were the only boreal year-rounders we encountered. 

For the last two nights we were at South Branch Campground, which was fully deciduous and had by far the most bird activity (along with the day hike from the campground up to North Traveller Ridge).

56 Total Species, including totals of:

• 7 Boreal Chickadees (1 on our Katahdin Hike, 2 on the Russell Pond Trail, 3 on the Wassataquoik Lake Trail including one 3 feet from my face, and 1 on the Pogy Notch Trail)
• 1 Woodcock surprise (Pogy Notch Trail)
• 1 Yellow-Bellied Flycatcher (Katahdin)
• 60+ White Winged Crossbills (Everywhere at Russell Pond, and a small group each at North Traveller Mtn and Basin Ponds on Katahdin)
• 50+ Pine Siskins 
• 10+ Red Crossbills
• 6 Blackpoll Warblers
  
• Hundreds of GC Kinglets

Matthew Gilbert

Cumberland

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