Somes Meynell Wildlife Sanctuary
The Somes-Meynell Wildlife Sanctuary is dedicated to conservation, research, and education in the Somes Pond-Long Pond watershed and beyond
The Upper Hadlock loon chicks are doing well. These photos were taken this past Monday by Sanctuary volunteer Ray Yeager when the chicks were 3 weeks old. They are growing fast, and you can see why, given the size of the fish being delivered to one of the chicks. It took a lot of whole body contractions to work that fish down towards its tiny stomach. Loon chicks are very good at converting fish to bigger bodies in pretty short order. If these chicks are able to survive, in a little more than 2 months they will be approaching the size of their parents and be able to fly away from their natal lake.
We had a great lichen ID workshop this past Saturday at the Sanctuary thanks to Maine Master Naturalists Grace Bartlett, Ellen Gellerstedt, and Janet Myers. We had class time inside starting out for some lichen facts, sorting into categories, and learning some focal ID cues; then headed into the woods in 3 groups to see what we could find on or in trees, on rocks, and on the ground.
There was enough interest expressed by people who couldn't make it for this class (and we were maxed out for class size) that we will be offering another session on Saturday August 15th from 10:00-12:30. I'll post a description here when we get closer to the date, but you can let me know if you'd like to attend beforehand.
The Upper Hadlock loon chicks are still surviving, at 2.5 weeks of age, and the resident adults continue to fend off early morning visits from unwelcome loons (see captions for details of each image; photos from Sanctuary volunteer Ray Yeager this past Wednesday, and some phone shots from me on our public walk yesterday).
The parents have both been present on the pond with their chicks this year more than in the past, which is a good thing for the youngsters in terms of getting fed and a lower likelihood of getting picked off the surface by an opportunistic eagle. We think that in several of the past breeding seasons that the pair lost one of their 2 chicks due to lack of attention (being far away from the chicks) or just not being present on the pond (often one of the adults, sometimes both) making eagle predation much easier.
Yesterday just one parent was present, fishing for the hour and a half we watched, and feeding the chicks who followed behind at various distances from the diving adult.
