 The main Audubon Society is offering a wide range of field trips that will show you the many wonders that our main environment has to offer. Brian Knoblock spoke with adult educator Michael Windsor about their upcoming walks and tours, including some that will take you where few visitors ever venture. Mike, we're here at Gilson Farms. We're slowly drying out from all this rain that we've had over the past weekend, six and a half inches or so. What effect does the rain have on the local habitat? Sure. Well, one of the things that I'm most familiar with is how it can affect birds. Lots of birds right now are in the process of incubating their eggs or starting to raise their young as they hatch out. And when you get a lot of rain like this, it can really affect the birds. The parents, first of all, have to keep themselves fed, have to keep themselves warm. If they have trouble finding food for themselves, they can abandon their eggs. They can abandon their young. The one good thing about all this is at least it's relatively early in the spring. So a lot of these birds will hopefully get an opportunity to re-nest again. I was just talking with our piping plover biologist yesterday. She's in the midst of trying to figure out how this has affected all of the piping plovers that are nesting up and down the coast. And it looks like they have lost a bunch of nests as well. But hopefully they'll get an opportunity to re-nest and come back. So the nests are in the trees and they're affected by the rain or they're on the ground? Well, different species are nesting in different locations. In the case of the piping plovers, they're definitely nesting on the beaches, on the ground. We have other bird species that are nesting up in the trees. So it could affect them all pretty equally. We have several events coming up in June and July. What's coming up? Yeah, we do. So I've got here on Gilson Farm, I have a couple of wildflower walks that I'm leading. The first one is on Tuesday, June 12th. Then we have another one on July 24th. And it's a series of wildflower walks that I'm doing this summer. I'm kind of following the progression of the flowers as the summer progresses. And this year I'm trying something a little bit different. I'm using a field guide called Newcombe's Wildflower Guide, which is a very simplified key. And it's a lot, I think it's a little more elegant than just kind of flipping through a book and looking for a red flower. It's got some very simple things you can use to recognize these plants and then learn to identify them. So that's coming up, those two. Is there a wide variety of wildflowers here at the farm? There are definitely, yeah. And it's one of the reasons I wanted to do this sequence because as we move, as I was saying, you get different ones as the summer unfolds, which is kind of nice. What else? All right, let me flip to the next page here so I get all my dates correct. We have three opportunities to go out to birds of Stratton Island. Actually, let me take that back. We have two because the first one I know is sold out. On Sunday, July 1st, and then again on Sunday, July 8th, there's going to be an opportunity to go out to visit Stratton Island. It's a unique area where seabirds are breeding, a bunch of terns, egrets, great blue herons. Usually this is a location that is closed during the breeding season to people because it is a sensitive breeding habitat. But we're going to have the opportunity to go out there, see some of these birds up close, and also get to talk to the folks at National Audubon that are working out there on their efforts to monitor these birds and help protect the habitat. What kind of birds are out there? We have common terns, least terns, arctic terns, rosy terns, great blue herons, little blue herons, green herons, black crowd night herons, sore rail, oyster catchers, so there's a ton of stuff that's out there. Great photography possibility there. Definitely. I think I believe there's blinds that are set up there as well so you can get nice and close for photography. Terrific, and what's the third thing we have? Third thing we have, we have two sunset puffin' cruises. One is on July the 14th. The other is on August 5th. It's with Hardy Boat Cruises out of New Harbor. It's a sunset puffin' cruise, so we'll get to go out with, again, with another National Audubon biologist, Puffin Pete Salmonson, who's been on the project for a number of years. We'll get to go out and see puffins up close, which is a very iconic bird here in the state of Maine. Also get to be out in the water for the sunset, which can be a beautiful time. Hopefully see some other birds as well, eagles and other shorebirds and duck species and things like that. So people want more information? Do they have to register for some of these? So we're gonna get more information. Yeah, all these programs we ask that people register. All the registration is now online. You can go to www.mainaudubon.org, or you can always call for more information, 781-2330. And there's always a discount for members, right? Yes, there is. So that's a good incentive to become a member. Yes, I agree. Thanks very much, Mike. Thank you, Brian.