YOUR GUIDES
Jay
Adams began birding as part of a cub scout winter feeder watch birds badge
project. For years a causal birder, his opportunities to watch birds expanded in
1975 when he took charge of the Pliny Freeman Farm at Old Sturbridge Village,
then exploded as a result of a Maine Audubon birdathon experience in 2001.
Anything but casual now, he has been traveling to see birds ever since, is a
Christmas Count compiler, formed and "staffs" the Augusta Bird Club, and leads
walks and gives talks on a regular basis.
Jim Bright has been a commercial lobsterman for forty years. His time
on the ocean and his love of the outdoors, in general, has made him a keen
observer of Mother Nature. It was the visit of a Green-Violet-Ear Hummingbird to
his porch feeder that connected him to the world of avid birders, and the fun
has not stopped since. Trips to Arizona and Florida have been made but Jim’s
favorite birding spots are the outer islands off the coast of Maine. Jim and his
wife, Harriet, live on Mount Desert Island, but still maintain a family home on
Little Cranberry Island.
Leslie Clapp graduated from Ithaca College with a BS in Photography.
She traveled extensively and got seriously interested in birds after a trip to
East Africa in '99. In 2004, she became the president of Downeast Audubon, a
chapter of Maine Audubon, and continues in that role today. She is passionate
about creating backyard habitats for birds and teaching others how to improve
their yards as well.
Scott
Cronenweth is a freelance writer and birding guide based in South
Portland, Maine. He leads trips for Maine Audubon, Elderhostel, Paradise
Birding and other organizations. Scott also offers personalized birding
walks for individuals, families and small groups of all ages and experience
levels. He has worked on numerous bird banding, survey and research
projects, and has published detailed bird-finding articles on some of
Maine's most important birding areas. Birding or not, he’s frequently found
in the company of his dog Tashi. Please visit Scott’s website at
http://www.naturalpathwalks.com.
Bob
Duchesne became interested in birds in the first grade. Interest grew to
passion and today Bob is one of Maine’s top birding experts. He serves on
the Maine Audubon Board of Trustees and is President of Audubon’s Penobscot
Valley Chapter in the Bangor area. Bob is a frequent field trip leader and
has led trips from Atlantic Canada to the Florida Everglades. Recently, Bob
completed development of the Maine Birding Trail and has authored a
guidebook for the state, published on Down East Books. When not birding, Bob
is a member of the Maine House of Representatives, where he chairs the
Natural Resources Committee and helps direct state environmental policy.
Kirk Gentalen lives on Vinalhaven Island in Penobscot Bay where he works
as a steward for the Maine Coast Heritage Trust. Kirk has been birdwatching
for over 24 years and has spent the last 20 years working as a naturalist in
13 states and has led birding trips in Alaska, California, Georgia, &
Massachusetts. He is also the editor of the “Vinalhaven sightings report”
summary blog of natural history sightings from around the island. He also
counts Harlequin Ducks and Purple Sandpipers aboard “The Fluke”.
Michael
J. Good, MS. Biologist/naturalist, President of Down East Nature Tours
in Bar Harbor, Maine and Founder of Warblers and Wildflowers Festival
(1998-2007) and Acadia Birding Festival. He has over 25 years experience
studying the birds of North America and brings a wealth of knowledge about
Neotropical migrants and the avifauna of the Eastern United States. Michael
has traveled extensively in the US, Alaska, Europe, Australia, South America
and Cuba. He is a regional business leader promoting sound ecologically
practices in business, government and land development. As a Registered
Maine Guide, Michael has been guiding professionally for many years through
his company Down East Nature Tours focusing on avian ecology in the Gulf of
Maine bioregion. In his spare time he maintains Three Pines Bird Sanctuary
in Town Hill, Maine, studying micro-habitat of Neotropical migratory birds
on Mount Desert Island, Maine and winter ecology in various Neotropical
countries when given the opportunity.
Leda
Beth Gray has been birding for about 20 years. While living in
California she did monthly bird surveys for Stanford University's Jasper
Ridge Biological Preserve and was the conservation chair for Santa Clara
Valley Audubon Society. After moving to Maine in 2004, she turned her
attention to becoming proficient in eastern birds. She now does yearly
breeding bird surveys in Acadia National Park for Vermont Center for
Ecostudies. She is the conservation chair for Downeast Audubon Society and
does a yearly birdathon to raise money for nature education programs in
local schools.
Paul
Haertell - From the time he was quite young Paul watched his uncle,
Harold, carve decoys, waterfowl and shorebirds. Perhaps this and his dad’s
love of the outdoors led to Paul’s passions for outdoor activities and a
career with the National Park Service. His career included ranger and park
management positions within some of our best national park treasures. In
1994, he was reassigned from Alaska to Maine, as the Superintendent of
Acadia National Park and he retired in 2002. Today, he continues to
appreciate and enjoy a broad array of outdoor activities with birding and
bird study being an important part of each day’s activity.
Ed Hawkes, of Bar Harbor is a master bird carver and avid birder
watcher. He started birding at the age of twelve in Southern Maine. And
since moving to Mount Desert Island in 1977, Ed has become well-acquainted
with his 'backyard' -- Acadia National Park -- and has served for 12 years
as a volunteer ranger with the park's Peregrine Watch in the spring/summer
and Hawk Watch in the fall. After retiring from teaching, Ed has found more
time to pursue his lifetime fascination with birds. And while birding, his
thoughts quickly turn to creating his lifelike wooden sculptures, with such
fine detail you expect them to take flight. Whether birding or carving, one
passion feeds the other. Ed and his wife, Debbie, regularly lead birding
hikes for their Downeast Audubon Chapter. And leisure time means off birding
-- whether on Mount Desert Island or further afield such as recent trips to
Florida, Arizona, Southern California, Alaska, Newfoundland, and Costa Rica.
Debbie
Hawkes, of Bar Harbor works as a paralegal at Smith & Collier Law Firm
in Bar Harbor. She retired from the board of the Downeast Chapter of Maine
Audubon after serving as chapter president for eleven years. Like her
husband, Ed, Debbie is always birding -- while on her noon exercise walks,
biking the carriage trails of Acadia National Park, tending her flower
gardens, or perhaps off following a 'hot bird' report. She and Ed, regularly
lead birding hikes for their Downeast Chapter. And when Debbie takes time
off from her job, they are off birding -- on Mount Desert Island or further
afield such as recent trips to Florida, Arizona, Southern California,
Alaska, Newfoundland, and Costa Rica.
Billy
Helprin lives in Bass Harbor and works for Maine Coast Heritage Trust as
the MDI Regional Steward. He has been interested in birds and other wildlife
as long as he can remember. He has a Master of Science degree from Utah
State University and a Master of Arts in Teaching. Billy has enjoyed leading
wildlife explorations and studies in the Rocky Mountain region for Great
Plains Wildlife Institute, the Teton Science School, and Abercrombie and
Kent; and in Kenya for the School for Field Studies. He has been involved
with avian research and inventory projects in Ohio, Maine, Wyoming and
Guatemala. Whenever possible, Billy enjoys getting out with friends or on
his own to see and hear which bird species are nearby and what they are up
to.
When
Casey Hynes turned fourteen he went to work at a Wild Bird Center, and a
part-time job turned into a profession and passion almost two decades later. His
interest and knowledge of birds was cultivated at his brother's elbow, usually
much too early in the morning or much too late in the evening for his tastes.
Casey loves living in Maine because of the incredible natural beauty that can be
found everywhere around the state, and loves the diversity of bird species that
can be found in Maine's northern forest and along (and off) its coast. He was a
member of the Maine Big Day record setting team in 2010. Casey has had a
Northern Shrike in his yard TWICE, and he thinks that's pretty swell.
Eric
Hynes recently relocated to Vermont’s Champlain Valley with his wife and
young daughter and is entering into the international bird tour business as a
guide. Previously, Eric worked for four years as Maine Audubon's staff
naturalist and adult education program coordinator where he taught bird
identification workshops and led field trips locally and abroad. Other
responsibilities at Maine Audubon included being the state's Breeding Bird
Survey Coordinator and compiler of the Rare Bird Alert for the state of Maine.
Eric's life-long passion for wildlife, and in particular birds, has led to
extensive field work on raptors, migration, and neotropical migrant songbirds
from Panama to the Pribilofs. Prior to living in Maine, Eric spent a dozen years
as a seasonal biologist working across the continent with unique jobs ranging
from research associate, to owl bander, to ground squirrel rustler. Eric is in
his second term on the Maine Bird Records Committee. He is a certified
Wilderness First Responder.
Craig
Kesselheim lives with his family in Southwest Harbor, and has been birding
ever since he was hooked by a college ornithology course in 1973. He has birded
North America from the Canadian and Alaskan tundra to the Florida Everglades, to
the mountain west and desert southwest. Craig appreciates being humbled several
times a year by confusing plumages, songs or silhouettes – it is what makes
birding a lifelong learning project. Although not a competitive lister, Craig is
avid about citizen science, submitting most of his daily sightings to
www.eBird.org . Craig has birded Maine locales, on and offshore, for about 25
years. Professionally, Craig is a career educator employed by the Great Schools
Partnership in Portland, Maine.
Zack
Klyver is head naturalist of Bar Harbor Whale Watch and has been guiding
whale and seabird trips on the Gulf of Maine for twenty years. He has worked
with the Center for Marine Conservation and the research organizations Cape May
Bird Observatory and Allied Whale. Zack has also spent a season as a marine
mammal lecturer for Abercrombie and Kent guiding trips to Antarctica and during
the austral summer saw seven species of Penguin and five species of Albatross.
He has been an avid birder since he began feeding birds at the age of twelve.
Charlotte
Clews Lawther has worked with birds since her teens. She hacked peregrine
falcons in Montana, worked as a field assistant for four years with the Cornell
Lab of Ornithology and prepared skins for the Cornell Collections. She has a
B.S. in ecology from Cornell University and an M.S. in Botany from University of
Vermont. Her bird studies and work as a technical climber have taken her to some
amazing habitats (from Alaska to Costa Rica and many mountains and deserts in
between) but she was happy to return home to Maine to work as a seasonal
interpretive Park Ranger for Acadia National Park (2003 -2008) where she got
reacquainted with the dense and noisy(!) forests of Mount Desert Island. She
loves birding by ear, especially now that she has two young children that are
forever touching her binoculars with their sticky fingers. She currently lives
in Blue Hill and is the Director of Stewardship at the Blue Hill Heritage Trust.
Kristen Lindquistt is Development Director for Coastal Mountains Land
Trust, based in her hometown of Camden, and also a freelance writer and poet
with two published chapbooks. In addition to a monthly nature column for the
Herald-Gazette, her work has been published most recently in A Coastal
Companion, the Bangor Daily News, and Down East magazine. An avid birder, she
often leads bird walks in the midcoast area. She also serves on the board of
Friends of Maine Seabird Islands.
Becky
Marvil lives with her family in Yarmouth, Maine. She has a background in
Biology (Earlham College) and in Ornithology and Computer Science (University of
Colorado), and runs her own computer programming/webpage design business. She is
pleased to be the director of the Acadia Birding Festival, combining her
knowledge of webpage design, organizational skills, and love of birding. During
her free time, she can be found birding with friends in the Portland area,
helping with numerous bird surveys, and chasing after rarities. Her summers are
spent programming, birding, sailing, hiking, and biking on Mount Desert Island.
Jonathan
Mays is a lifelong naturalist born and raised in the southern Appalachians
but currently residing in central Maine with his wonderful partner Ellen. He
enjoys exploring the rivers, mountains, and coast of New England with regular
forays "back home" to the Smoky Mountains. The American Southwest and Central
America are also freqent destinations...especially during the long winters.
Jonathan works as a wildlife biologist for Maine's Department of Inland
Fisheries and Wildlife and specializes in reptiles, amphibians, and
invertebrates but is also known to have a somewhat obsessive passion for birds.
He currently serves as Chair for the Maine Bird Records Committee.
Clark “Chip” Moseley moved to Sedgwick, Maine from the Hartford, CT area
11 years ago after retiring from the practice of veterinary medicine. To be able
to live in a rural part of Maine had been a life-long fantasy because of family
vacations to discover his family roots. Birding started at age 12 when he
located a beautiful, red cardinal in southern New England at a time in which the
species was a rare vagrant species when found north of New York and the
mid-Atlantic states. He has been fortunate in the intervening years to have
knowledgeable birding mentors. Local birding, preservation of habitat, and
education surrounding these issues are one of his greatest passions.
Chad
Propst fell in love with birds after being given an old pair of binoculars
and a Peterson field guide by his great aunt and uncle and taken afield when he
was just a boy. His birding adventures have led him to forty two states and ten
different countries with no sign of slowing down now. He has spent the past
seven years working for ecotourism companies in Maine, Alaska and Pennsylvania
and is currently employed by the Bar Harbor Whale Watch Company. When not at
work searching for whales and seabirds Chad can be found on one of the many
birding trails of M.D.I. enjoying the many avian jewels that can be found right
here in his own back yard.
Sally Rooneyy has been a field biologist for the past 30 years--the last
21 with Jill Weber. The two of them have conducted ecological and botanical
inventories in some of the most beautiful sites in Maine. Most of the work has
been with State and National agencies and many Land Trusts. Sally is one of the
four authors of the recently published "Plants of Acadia National Park". She is
an active member of the Friends of the Maine Herbarium. In addition to her
botanical work and interests, she is an avid bird watcher.
Robert L. Shaw - Born and raised in Bar Harbor, Robert is proud to be an
"island native". Ask him anything about Mount Desert Island, the local
environment, or his favorite subject, fishing. He is sure to provide lots of
interesting tales. Robert received a BS in Recreation Management and Business
Administration in 1984 from the University of Maine. When he is not kayaking or
fishing, he enjoys camping, swimming, scuba diving, boating and paddling the
Florida Everglades. Robert sits on the Board of Directors of the Bar Harbor
Savings & Loan Association.
Rob Speirs' fascination with birds began through his grandmother’s kitchen
window, watching intently as they plucked and shelled seeds mere inches from his
curious young nose. Casual birding became a complimentary and natural extension
of a lifetime of outdoor pursuits, touching every corner of the state and its
coastal and off-shore waters. He kicked it up a few notches several years ago,
and hasn’t looked back. Currently, an unapologetic “twitcher” in transition, he
enjoys the hunt and loves chasing rarities. For him, birding is an evolutionary
process, moving from the initial excitement of ticking off as many birds as
possible, to developing a deeper understanding of each species. A Registered
Maine Guide, CBC participant and newly minted trip leader, Rob enjoys helping
others find a new or rare bird.
Terry Towne is a life-long amateur naturalist and USCG Licensed Captain. He
uses his outdoor enthusiasm and skills as the Regional Steward for Maine Coast
Heritage Trust to steward the islands around Mount Desert Island’s bays and
offshore on Marshall Island and Long Island Frenchboro. After learning how to
make a living in Maine more than 30 years ago by commercial fishing and
municipal government, he is a graduate of the University of Maine. He has
introduced many to the beauty and ruggedness of Maine’s islands through his
trail building and public awareness programs.
Chuck
Whitneyy
has been living and birding in Hancock County since 1978. He was Hancock
County Coordinator for Maine’s Breeding Bird Atlas project in the mid 1980’s and
has been active in local and state plant, bird and citizen science since. As a
science educator for over 20 years, he values exposing people to their natural
world as a primary teaching tool. He completed graduate school internship with
Acadia National Park, utilizing Acadia National Park as a classroom and resource
for local educators. That education has been ongoing for the last 13 summers
with visitors from all over the world as a naturalist on The Nature Cruise out
of Bar Harbor, Maine.
