Birds come to Maine to make babies. Lots of babies. They come up here merely to fornicate. Maine is an inviting place to raise a family, because we have an awesome supply of insects. Almost all warblers, sparrows and thrushes leave us and go south when the kids are raised and temperatures are dropping.
We’re seeing the results of all that baby-making now. Fledglings are everywhere. Be alert for family groups. The chipping sparrows in my yard have been particularly reckless — at least half a dozen fledglings chasing weary parents all around me. Three young yellow-bellied sapsuckers — saplings? — are still following mom and dad around the treetops.
Even our year-round residents are getting into the act. Along the highway, look for crows in bundles of four to six. Ravens are in family groups of four or more. Blue jays, too. Watch for begging behavior.
Then there are the cedar waxwings. These wanderers make their babies in Maine, but then they may roam in and out of the state all year. They are gregarious, and winter flocks can number in the hundreds. Their presence is given away by the high, reedy notes they continuously whistle. Birds that fly in flocks routinely vocalize on the wing. It helps keep the flock together.
Cedar waxwings are always in flocks except for one time of year. That time is now. Anecdotally, I see them in groups right up until the wild strawberries are gone from the roadsides. Then they pair up, disperse and start families. When I see and hear them now, they are only in pairs. As I write this, a pair just flew over me, whistling the whole way. They’re about to make babies.
Courtship is a ritual. The male does a hopping dance and passes berries to his potential mate. If she’s attracted, she will perform the dance and return the berry. The dances repeat until it’s time to do the deed. The female chooses the nest site, but both mates build it. She incubates the four eggs for a couple of weeks while the male feeds her. Then they both raise the chicks, first by stuffing them with insects for a couple of days to build up their protein, then with regurgitated berries for a couple of weeks to build up their energy. Since the whole process takes less than a month, waxwings can start a family almost any time in summer.
Waxwings get the name from the colorful red secretions that adorn the tips of their secondary wing feathers. Goldfinches were the bait that got me interested in birds while I was in first grade, but it was waxwings that set the hook. As soon as I was old enough to ride a bike, I haunted the children’s library in my home town. Cedar waxwings were frequent visitors, eating the berries in the mountain ash trees outside. A creamy color mix of yellow and gray, with a black eye mask, a crest, yellow tail tips and red wing tips — I wondered, how a bird could be that pretty?
Berry eating is what they do. Technically, they are frugivores, able to subsist on fruit for months at a time. They get most of the protein they need in summer, often hawking insects over fields and streams, snatching them in the air as acrobatically as swallows. Then, it’s berries for the rest of the year. Flocks can roam as far south as Panama, looking for a good berry supply. In Maine’s autumn, they are often seen in big numbers, wolfing down ripe fruit. Then, when those are gone, they leave for a while. They return in winter when some of the tougher ornamental berries and crab apples have been softened by frost. Waxwings can even get drunk on fermented fruit.
Berries provide the pigments for their reds and yellows. In fact, birds that grow up in areas of honeysuckle develop orange tail tips.
In a few weeks, cedar waxwings will flock up again. As is their custom, they will land in berry trees right under your nose. The youngsters will have streaky breasts, a common sign of a first-year bird. Even the baby chipping sparrows traipsing around my yard have streaky breasts. Adult chipping sparrows are plain white underneath. Streakiness is Mother Nature’s way of camouflaging babies until they are old enough to avoid predators without parental help.
Waxwings don’t live long, so they need to make a lot of babies. In Maine, they came to the right place.
Bob Duchesne serves as vice president of Maine Audubon’s Penobscot Valley Chapter. He developed the Maine Birding Trail, with information at mainebirdingtrail.com. He can be reached at duchesne@midmaine.com.