BANGOR DAILY NEWS • April 4, 2026
The robins were on time. The sparrows were a couple days late. More migrants will join the chorus as this month wears on. By the third week of April, I expect yellow-bellied sapsuckers to arrive and start drumming. The first pine, palm and yellow-rumped warblers will sing. So will ruby-crowned kinglets. Eastern phoebes will get obnoxiously loud the moment they arrive midmonth. Meanwhile, most of my backyard noise is coming from a really loud tufted titmouse. Since Maine’s forest transitions to mostly evergreens farther north, tufted titmice may have already hit their northern limit. Woodpeckers are abundant in my neck of the woods, so there are many potential nest holes for titmice, chickadees and nuthatches. I make it a point to leave dead trees and limbs in my yard to preserve ample breeding habitat for cavity nesters. It works. Most songbirds that eat insects are still weeks away. But backyards are getting noisier. ~ Bob Duchesne