Another spring has come to an end, and with that, the Hitchcock
Center Spring Birding Class has come to a successful end. Our last trip of the
spring season was spent up in Northern Vermont & New Hampshire. We left the Hitchcock Center at 6AM (Friday
June 12th) and headed up Rte
91 to our first stop…The P&H Truck Stop in Wells River, VT. This Restaurant
(Truck Stop) has become a class favorite over the past couple of years, and
hasn’t disappointed us yet. From there we headed north to MOOSE BOG. This area
is one of the more reliable locations for finding Spruce Grouse; unfortunately
this was not the case this day. However, we managed nice views of Black-backed
Woodpecker, Black-burnian Warbler, Ring-necked Duck and three singing Rusty
Blackbirds.
We departed Moose Bog in mid-afternoon and headed to
Colebrook, NH. Colebrook would be our home base for the next two days. We had a nice dinner that evening, but would
not look for Moose this evening because of the heavy rains that were rolling
through the region that night. The next morning we were up early and headed
north the Pittsburg, NH. During the twenty-five minute trip up to Pittsburg, we
could see the effect the heavy rains had on the region…..streams, and the water
fall on Rte 145 was spectacular.
Our first road we birded was East Inlet. This has always
been a productive road over the years. We had several Gray Jays, Boreal
Chickadees, Yellow-bellied Flycatchers, and several species of warblers
including Bay-breasted, Northern Parula, Canada, Black-thr.Green, along with
Winter Wrens, Ruby-cr.Kinglets and
Purple Finches.
That evening after dinner we headed up to Moose Ally (Rte
3) in hopes of locating a Large brown mammal. This would be a life mammal for a
number of the group…I’m happy to report Moose Ally didn’t let us down….one
young Bull Moose put on a nice show for all.
Our last day was spent birding Day Road in Pittsburg.
Certainly more of the same cast of characters, but a few new species for the trip….Olive-sided
Flycatcher, Mourning Warbler, more Gray Jays and Boreal Chickadees. We logged 674 miles during the trip, ended up
with 78 species and a handful of mammals.
Nice thing about this trip…everyone got great looks at
just about everything. Enjoy the photos
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| The Falls on Rte 145 between Colebrook & Pittsburg, NH |
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| Gray Jay-Adult |
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| Boreal Chickadee-Day Road, Pittsburg. |
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| Black-throated Green Warbler-Day Road. |
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| Cliff Swallow- Moose Ally Ice Cream Stand. Cliff Swallows have been nesting here for years, sadly a high count of 32 nests have dwindled down to only 2 nests now! The owners have been working with New Hampshire Audubon to try and bring back the colony -stay tuned. |
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| Common Loon on 1st Connecticut Lake |
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| Gray Jay-Juv |
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| Mourning Warbler-Day Road...put on a great show for the group. |
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| Northern Parula- Day Road |
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| Olive-sided Flycatcher- fairly distant...amazing how far their call carry's. |
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| Moose-young male. Locals say the Moose population is starting to do better in recent years. However, a ways to go from the time 15 years ago when we had 17 in one evening! |
