Did you know that our lovely park is a birding “hot spot” on the eBird app? It’s called “Mill St.–Bellows Falls” on that app and it now has a list of 134 bird species that have been seen there, including 5 that were added this year by local birders: two ducks, shoveler and pintail, plus bank swallow, brown thrasher, and solitary sandpiper.
Some of the best areas in the park for birds are the trees along Mill St, with orioles and warbling vireos in the spring, the woods and the view of the river from the Poets Seat, and the small pond that never freezes called Cold Springs, which may have hundreds of ducks on a cold morning.
The best time to see ducks and bald eagles on the river is in winter when the ducks are feeding on freshwater mussels and the eagles are hoping to feed on the ducks. Local birder Peter Bergstrom took the attached photos of an eagle watching ducks on the river on a cold morning diving for mussels while dabbling ducks, which can’t dive to evade eagles, were crowded into Cold Springs at the same time.
Other eBird hotspots in Rockingham: Joy Wah overlook / Allbees Cove with 133 species and Herricks Cove which has the highest species count in the state outside the Champlain Valley with 238 species. Nearby in Westminster, Allen Brothers/Henwood Hill Marsh has 191 species on eBird and has the best local views of water birds.
