For the second year in a row, our resident loon family has successfully hatched a baby loon. Just one this year rather than the usual 2. I noticed one parent or the other hanging around the nest area today and saw one loon, presumably the male, chasing another loon around in a classic loon “get out and stay out” territorial battle, and suspected  that hatching was near. Please give them a wide berth.

[27 June UPDATE]: We have 2 loon babies! No idea how the second baby escaped notice this long, but it did. No pictures yet, but I clearly saw two babies when over visiting our Treasurer this morning.

The loons are still sitting on their nest and while it’s sitting rather high out of the water, I think it’s still surrounded by water which is important for keeping predators away from the nest. The lake has fallen almost 5″ since I discovered the nest on May 31st. If the water falls too much or recedes too far from the nest, they’ll have to abandon it. For what it’s worth, the lake which just hit -48″ below the normal high water mark is now only falling about 1/4″ per day and any rain we receive will help slow the fall further. The biggest threat from fluctuating water levels is flooding and with yet another drought setting in, I don’t see flooding as a big risk this year.

I’m not sure when the loons laid their eggs so I don’t know when they’ll hatch but seeing as how they were sitting on May 31, barring complications the eggs should hatch around the last week of June. Gestation is around 27 days and can often stretch to 30. Fingers crossed.

I have not had a chance to get the Loon Nesting signs out but will try to get to it later this week. In the meantime, please avoid the marsh on the southwest corner of the lake by Route 126.

Loon Nest May 31 2018

Margaret and I spotted this year’s loon nest yesterday evening, it’s located over on the southwest corner of Clary Lake not far from Route 126. I haven’t checked yet, but it’s undoubtedly visible from the road. This is the same place they tried to nest back in 2012, a nesting effort that failed when heavy rains caused the lake level to rise, flooding the nest (pictures in the Summer 2012 photo gallery). That year the loons attempted to nest a second time over on the north shore in the more traditional location (See News from 2012) but a falling water level resulted in that nest being abandoned as well. The loons didn’t even try to nest again until the summer of 2016.

Please give the nest a wide berth as much as possible. We’ll put the Loon Nesting signs out shortly, and I’ll try and get some better pictures.

Woah. Epic fail on my part: that so-called “domestic goose” I posted about last week appears based on photographs David Hodsdon sent me today to be a Trumpeter or perhaps a Tundra Swan (though still awaiting definitive determination by experts). In my own defense, all I had to work with were a couple of pictures that I took at long-distance showing the back of the Swan. I didn’t get a good side or front view. There are only 3 species of Swan in North America (Trumpeter, Tundra, and Mute) and Maine is not known to be within the range of any of them. Frankly it looks to me like a Trumpeter Swan, but IF&W Wildlife Biologist Keel Kemper took one look at the above picture and believes it is a Tundra Swan, rarely if ever seen in Maine.

I’ve got some Maine birders looking into this and will post an update when available.

[UPDATE]: The expert birders have reached a consensus: Tundra Swan. According to this Cornell University site, these birds spend their summers mating along the northernmost fringes the Arctic Tundra of Canada and Alaska and only migrate south into the United States Maine in Winter. Maine is not generally considered part of the Tundra Swan’s migratory range. How exciting to have spotted this bird on Clary Lake!

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The 2017 fledgling loon, now about 14 weeks old, is pretty much on its own and is rarely seen with it’s parents anymore. It is about full size but it doesn’t have full adult plumage yet so is easy to identify. I spotted it this morning while David Hodsdon and I were out for our last water monitoring session of the season, and was able to get close enough to get this picture. It was a little leery of us and wouldn’t let me get any closer. In the next few weeks it will be flapping around the lake, strengthening it’s wings before it takes off and heads for the coast.

The baby loon is growing quickly. It is diving now. It’s stomach feathers are white. Pretty soon we’ll see it flapping across the water, exercising it’s wings in preparation for flying this fall. I’ve gotten quite close to it a few times when I was out fishing, but I didn’t have my camera with me. I shot this picture as the youngster and a parent swam past my shoreline the other day.

Loon Chicks, July 2017

Arolyn Antognoni used to call the southwest corner of Clary Lake the “l0on nursery” as the loons seemed to hang out in this area a lot with their newly hatched chicks. For whatever reason once the loon chicks arrive, the loon family does in deed seem to spend a lot of time in this area. This includes the cove on the west shore by Ron Rollins property south around what we used to call the “Erskine Swamp” and along the Fergusson property over to Ward’s Point. Yesterday they spent the morning hanging out right off my shoreline, at times approaching within less than 50′ of where I had my camera set up and their antics feeding the babies afforded me some wonderful opportunities to record their behavior.

I’m a little (OK, a lot) late on this loon update. I started it back on the 4th of July when we had 2 loon chicks (above). By the next day we were down to one: it appears as has happened in the past, one loon chick out-competes the other for food and attention and ends up being killed by the more dominant chick, while the parents look on. Harsh yes, but the chances of the survival of the remaining chick are greatly increased. It doesn’t always happen, but if often does.

Last Saturday was the annual Audubon Loon Count which takes place from 7:00 AM to 7:30 AM on the third Saturday in July. Mary Gingrow-Shaw and her husband Ernie went counter clockwise around the lake in their boat while I in mine, accompanied by my wife Margaret, went the other direction. 4 loons in all were sighted including the one loon chick (picture at left) Both parents were down in the southwest end of the lake and a lone adult loon was spotted off of Hodsdon Lane, not too far from the State boat launch.

The next morning Tom Vigue called to tell me that a dead adult loon had washed up on his shoreline. He said he’d drop it off later, which he did. It is now in my freezer waiting pickup by an IF&W Wildlife Biologist. It will be sent off to Tufts University which has an ongoing loon mortality project (http://www.tufts.edu/vet/loons/). There have been reports of a loon hanging out at the east end of the lake for a few weeks, acting strangely. It is undoubtedly the 4th loon spotted during our count the previous day, the likely victim of a territorial squabble with the nesting loon pair, defending their territory. Life is hard. We had a dead loon turn up in roughly the same place back in 2012. You’ll find a write up about that event in the News from 2012 page (see entry for 13 July 2012). There was an interesting update about it in 2013 from our friends at Avian Haven.

That’s all for now.

We have baby loons on Clary Lake! For the first time since 2008 our resident Loon family has successfully nested, despite a falling water level that has threatened to strand the nest too far from the water. Yesterday afternoon there was a loon sitting on the nest, so the eggs must have hatched sometime today. I first spotted the nest back on June 7th and I estimated at that time that the eggs had been laid on or about May 31st. That date turned out to be right on the money. Fortunately, and no thanks to the dam owner who left the dam gate wide open all month, the lake level has not fallen as fast as expected, having dropped only about 11″ (0.36″ per day) since the nest was started. Given the lack of rain in June and with the dam’s gate wide open, I expected the lake to have dropped twice as much or about 3/4″ per day. I’m still struggling to explain that discrepancy. Continue reading →

The Good Folks at Avian Haven have issued their Favorite Bird Pictures from 2016→. Check it out!

Avian Haven is a non-profit organization founded in Freedom, Maine as a wild bird rehabilitation center dedicated to the return of injured and orphaned wild birds of all species to natural roles in the wild. They have a great site and do good work.

Yesterday afternoon I stopped to check on the loon nest and found it abandoned, with no evidence of any eggs. There was a loon floating nearby but it wasn’t fishing or tending babies, it was just sitting. Randy Wing was with me and he told me that he’d seen eggs in the nest the day before. I too had seen a loon sitting on the nest that day. I decided to check back in the morning. This morning I checked the nest and it was still abandoned with no loons in sight so I grabbed my camera walked around the edge of the cove to look for the nest. I found it without difficulty (picture, at left). I was surprised to see how far the water line had receded from where it was when we first started watching it, 30+ days ago. When first spotted, the water was right up to the edge of the nest and we were concerned about the possibility of flooding; this morning it was a good 6′ away from it- not obvious from our vantage point on shore due to foreshortening. Flooding turned out to not be a problem. Continue reading →

An immature Glossy Ibis spotted poking around on the shore of Clary Lake. Definitely an unusal breed of bird for these parts. Photograph by George Fergusson 13 July 2016

It’s been a good summer for rare and unique bird sightings on Clary Lake. First, back on July 13th I was on my way home from an afternoon fishing when I spotted a relatively large black wading bird poking around on the shoreline over on the Relyea property next to the Antognoni home. The light was fading and it was a little challenging taking pictures with good definition, but I got a few. I’d never seen a bird like it and was unable to identify the bird, so I sent a few pictures off to some birder contacts of mine and they quickly identified it as an immature Glossy Ibis. I’ve never seen an adult one let alone an immature one. They are known to nest as far north as Southern Maine but occasionally venture further north.

Great Egret, Clary Lake. What a graceful bird! Not unheard of around here, but definitely an unusual sighting. I’ve only seen a Great Egret one other time on Clary Lake. Photograph by George Fergusson 17 July 2016

Then yesterday afternoon I was out fishing over on the north shore when I spotted a Great Egret standing in the shallows. In all my years on Clary Lake I’ve only seen a Great Ibis one other time. They’re rare but not unheard of around here.

I checked this morning and one of the loons was sitting on the nest but there is still no sign of the loon eggs hatching, and I’m concerned that the eggs may not be viable.  While the nest was first spotted around June 12th, we’re not certain when the eggs were actually laid. Looking back at my log, I first obtained photographs of the loon eggs on June 24th which was 25 days ago, though it is likely the eggs were laid sometime before that. In any case, as long as the loons are sitting on them, I’ll hold out hope they’ll hatch.

I’ve posted a few more pictures of these birds in the Spring/Summer 2016 photo gallery.