June 2025

Tuesday June 3 Perfect spring day, sun, slight breeze, 70F. Went to Mass Audubon's Broadmoor sanctuary in Natick for a walk though the woods, along the marsh and across to the Charles River. Lots of turtles basking on logs.

And I was tickled to see this tree swallow, peeping out of a nest box.

Friday June 6 Had a lovely day at the Norcross Wildlife Foundation conservation area a few miles southwest of Sturbridge, in central Massachusetts, on an outing with Mass Audubon. Arthur Norcross inherited 100 acres of land from his father in the 1916 and gradually amassed 3000 acres by the time he set up the Foundation in 1964. Additional land acquisitions over the last 60 years have increased the property to 8600 acres, roughly 13 square miles, equivalent to a circle 4 miles across. To improve the fishing on his property, Norcross built dams to create a series of ponds. Mass Audubon is advising the Foundation on dam removal to restore the original wetlands. To give you an idea of the size of the property, the Foundation owns almost everything you see in this photo.

Norcross made his fortune from the greeting card company that he founded in the mid-1920s; it was the first to create Valentine's Day cards. The room we met in at the conservation area had a display of the company's cards; this one stood out to me.

Saturday June 7 At the pond this morning, we saw two turtles laying eggs. And my friend Dale texted to say she spotted one laying at Stony Brook, too. The female wood duck at the pond still has 7 ducklings, getting bigger and venturing further from mom now.

 

 I've been enjoying the flowers in my neighborhood over the last few days. 

Dogwood in my front garden

 

Monday June 9 Walking at the pond this morning, I heard a plop into the water, saw circles of ripples just a couple of feet from the edge of the pond and then something swimming towards me. And out popped a drenched squirrel that had fallen from an overhanging tree branch. It ran up to a fork in the tree and just stood there for a while, maybe a little stunned. Very embarrassing.

 

Drove to the National Audubon's Hog Island bird camp in Maine to give a talk on bird bills to both the adult and teen campers. When I arrived at the dock, I noticed that the osprey nest on the boathouse was empty. When I asked one of the Audubon staff about it, he told me a great horned owl had killed the adult female while she was sitting on the nest. Yikes! But on the upside, just as we were all about to head indoors for my talk, a bald eagle flew overhead. Very cool! 

After my talk I met Drew Weber, who oversees Cornell's Merlin app for identifying bird calls/songs that you record. He said when they were developing the app, they weren't sure if the app would be able to identify the birds instantly, or if it could handle multiple birds singing simultaneously, but they worked it out. It's one of the pleasures of using Merlin - if you haven't used it, you need to get it (free from the App store).

It was fun seeing enthusiastic teenagers at the camp. In high school, it's not cool to be the bird nerd. But at Hog Island, they meet other teenagers who are equally bird obsessed and feel that they've found their people. One of the staff told me that some of the teens keep in touch after camp and a few have even ended up marrying!  (They reminded me of newly arrived first year students at MIT realizing that everyone at MIT thinks science is great and it's cool to be good at science.)

View from Hog Island

 

Tuesday June 10 Drove up to Northeast Harbor in Acadia this morning.  Walking the trail by Long Pond, I spotted a loon.

Long Pond

Wednesday June 11 Spent the day in Acadia National Park, walking around Jordan Pond in the morning and part way around Eagle Lake in the afternoon. As I was driving the last half mile to the Jordan Pond area, a pileated woodpecker flew low across the road a couple of car lengths ahead of me and landed on a tree at the side of the road, so I got a good look at it. They're the largest woodpecker in North America, and I'm always impressed when I see one.

At one end of Jordan Pond near a little side bay/marsh, I spotted a female common merganser with 7 merganser-lings, some getting a free ride on her back. They came quite close to the footpath; you can see how shallow the water is in the photos. Pretty cute. 

 

After lunch, I moved on to Eagle Lake. Near the start of the path, a heard a loon calling, then saw a pair close to the path, at first dipping their bills into the water and diving. After a bit, they both started calling back and forth, and diving over and over, keeping it up long enough for me to get this video.

 

And at the end of my walk, I spotted an osprey with a gleaming fish in its talons, perched in a tree. What a great day for birding!

 Thursday June 12 Overlooking the Bay of Fundy at St. Andrews, New Brunswick.

Saturday June 14 The view from the dock at my friends' house near Mahone Bay, Nova Scotia. In the water, we spotted a jellyfish and a couple of starfish, one crawling around.

 Tuesday June 17 On our way to Wolfville, Nova Scotia, a bald eagle flew close by, low over a field towards the highway. After lunch on the patio of a brewery in a renovated church, we drove up the Blomidon bluffs to get a view over the Minas Basin, one arm at the northern end of the Bay of Fundy. The huge mudflats result from the gentle slope of the basin and the ginormous 30' Fundy tides. Hundreds of thousands of shorebirds feast on invertebrates in the mud during their southward migration in July and August.

And shortly after we parked at the overlook, these two happy dogs arrived in style, complete with goggles over their eyes. I helped pull the goggles off their eyes and over their heads.

After Blomidon, I started making my way back to Boston, driving as far as Shediac, New Brunswick today.

Wednesday June 18  This morning, went to Hopewell Rocks, with its "sea stacks", columns of rock sculpted by 30' tides, timing my visit to arrive shortly before low tide. The tides come high up the rocks, allowing trees to grow only at the top. Walking along the ocean floor, I was impressed by the shapes of the rocks, especially ones that had eroded down to a skinny section supporting a wider top.

 

As I got near the end of the walk, I could hear birds screeching and thought maybe they were peregrine falcons (Jeannie and I had seen peregrines nesting on the cliffs on a previous visit). As I searched, others spotted a peregrine standing at the opening of a cavity in the rock face. As we all watched, a second one appeared, and then a third! After staring at photos of adult and juvenile peregrines on All About Birds this evening, I think all three were juveniles. So great!

 

Later on, at the visitor center, I noticed this Motus antenna (helpfully labeled "Motus"); motus is Latin for movement. Ornithologists who study bird migration put tiny tags that emit radio waves on birds to track their movements. These nanotags weigh 0.13 grams, about an eighth the weight of a paper clip, and work the same way as radio collars on larger animals such as wolves. But instead of people driving around holding an antenna to detect the birds, Motus has installed a network of stationary antennas on buildings and towers, so that when a tagged bird flies past, the antenna picks up its radio signal. Each bird has a unique signal, allowing individual birds to be tracked. Tracking data is stored on the receiving stations so that the birds don't have to be recaptured. The data is uploaded to a central Motus database using the internet or cell phone networks and can be downloaded by researchers anywhere that has an internet connection. You can see a map of the worldwide Motus antenna locations here. (Motus was started by Birds Canada, along with three Canadian universities, Western, Acadia and Guelph, with support from the Canada Foundation for Innovation. You know how I'm proud of all things Canadian.)

Further along on my drive, I stopped at Fundy National Park, near Alma, NB, to take in this view of the bay. You can just make out Nova Scotia on the far side of the bay.

Sunday June 22 Back home in Jamaica Plain. Saw the wood duck at the pond with her 6 ducklings, nearly as big as she is, being a bit more adventurous, swimming further away from her. Also saw a turtle laying eggs. 

Monday June 23  A Baltimore oriole stopped by my back garden this morning to check out some of my bushes and the little water basin. Lovely to see it!

This afternoon, I stopped by Ward's Pond to check on the swans and their five cygnets, looking all fluffy and perky. 

Tuesday June 24 Hot, hot, hot today: the official high, measured at Logan Airport which is on a man-made peninsula is surrounded by ocean, was 102F (39C). The hottest June day ever recorded in Boston. My thermometer in Jamaica Plain read 105F (40.6C) in the shade. Another thermometer I put out in the sun exceeded its maximum reading of 120F (49C). Ugh. 

 

Wednesday June 25 Slightly less hot today. Saw a robin splayed out on the wood chips in my back garden, with its beak open, panting in the afternoon. Yikes. 

Thursday June 26 Sitting in the sun room this morning, I watched a chipmunk chase a robin around the stone water basin in the middle of the garden, looking like something out of a Hanna Barbera cartoon from the 1960s.

Sunday June 29 This morning's fog at the pond.