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I would like to echo Sue Shaw’s letter printed Tuesday, Aug. 16, and add that Sears Island is not only one of the best places to find migrating spring songbirds in Maine, but can be even more spectacular in autumn. Fall migration for many birds has already begun, and with it, the potential of finding thousands on certain days.
The island is both an important breeding area for birds, and an essential stop-over for dozens of migrating species, including warblers, sparrows, scarlet tanagers, Baltimore orioles, and many others. Following the Penobscot River, these birds migrate at night, and land on the island in the dark. At early dawn, they move across the island towards the mainland to continue their journey, with many concentrating at its northern tip by the causeway. Sears Island represents a major and essential staging area for these migrants.
Yet the state risks jeopardizing this by constructing a terminal for off-shore windmills on the island, even though a suitable, already heavily altered site exists for further development at nearby Mack Point.
Let’s end the threat of development on Sears Island once and for all, and conserve the island in its entirety.
John Wyatt
Winterport