Keep Calm and Bird On: October 2026
“If you don’t look, you don’t see. You have to go and look.”
-Edith Andrews
Photo of a Merlin by Ginger Andrews
September’s nor’easter brought some welcome migrants to Nantucket’s tangles where food and shelter gave refuge, and it’s likely we will see more of them on the back of bad weather in the ensuing weeks.
But this is also a good time to stop and appreciate some birds we take for granted, that have become unusual on the mainland.
Merlins, for example, were probably breeding in a couple of their usual secret places on the island. So we have been seeing them— or hearing them—fairly frequently. But Merlins are few and far between for many parts of the mainland.
Carolina Wrens still gave their piercing “teakettle-teakettle-teakettle” song at first light all summer long, or purred in the hedges. But it was a harder winter on the mainland and according to one observer their numbers are way down all over New England.
Think back to the days of their first arrivals in the 1980’s: we coddled them with fancy suet mixes and live mealworms, before our warmer winters became the norm. They are prolific and will rebound. But suddenly it seems we shouldn’t take them for granted.
This is also true of the
Northern Harriers, another locally breeding raptor. We love their looping, moth-like flight over the dunes. But they are not as easily come by across the pond.
So, along with the
Prairie Warblers and the
Black-throated Greens, the
Northern Parulas
and the immature “Yellow-starts” that will transform into
American Redstarts
by next spring, take time to appreciate the Merlins and the Harriers, and yes, those tiny, noisy, pert little wrens.
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