North Country Adirondacks Spring Birds, May 23-26, 2025

Date: Friday, May 23, 2025 – May 26th, 2025

Leader: Joan Collins
Transportation: This is a carpool trip. The Registrar will coordinate rides for participants without a vehicle. Drivers willing to provide rides are encouraged to attend. Riders should expect to pay a suggested carpool fee to the driver. Generally, there are enough drivers to accommodate everyone, but rides are not guaranteed as they depend on volunteer availability. Once in the Adirondacks, we will consolidate into three vehicles.
Meeting Point: After your registration is confirmed, the Registrar will share directions, the exact meeting place, and time with attendees.
Schedule: Expect four full days of birding: two days at various locations on the way to and from the Adirondacks and two full days in the Adirondacks with Joan. When birding with Joan, the days are long, starting very early (between 2 a.m. and 4 a.m.). We will monitor the weather and adjust plans if the forecast is rainy.
Relative Difficulty: This trip is somewhat demanding. Trails will be mostly flat, unpaved, and uneven, with some hills and forest hiking. At times, we will walk along the shoulder of busy trucking roads. The itinerary includes frequent driving, with quick in-and-out stops at various locations. Expect hot, humid, and buggy weather, sometimes muddy conditions. Participants need special outdoor clothing to combat black flies, ticks, and other biting insects. Indoor bathrooms are infrequent. This is an ear-birding trip, requiring total silence while searching for birds.

Trip Description: No matter the season, New York’s North Country offers extraordinary birding in a spectacular setting. Our guide, Joan Collins, will introduce us to the boreal habitat, where we can find species typical of locations much farther north in Canada.

This trip offers opportunities to see and hear many spectacular birds, including the “boreal trio”: Boreal Chickadee, Black-backed Woodpecker, and Canada Jay. We will look for the endangered Bicknell’s Thrush and the Blackpoll Warbler high on the summit of Whiteface Mountain. There are at least 19 species of nesting warblers in the Adirondacks, and we are likely to see most of them. Joan will leverage ear-birding to identify birds, and it is not uncommon to hear without seeing certain species.

The diversity of Adirondack habitats is another highlight of this region: grasslands, shrublands, deciduous and coniferous forests, mixed forests, lowland and high-elevation boreal areas, marshes, swamps, bogs, lakes, rivers, brooks, etc. Participants will visit multiple birding hotspots en route to the Adirondacks. Past trips have featured stops at Albany Pine Bush Preserve, Five Rivers EEC, and Vischer Ferry.

Space is limited to 11 people. We will spend three nights in an Adirondack hotel, with early start times between 2:15 a.m. and 4:45 a.m. The weather typically varies, being chilly in the morning and buggy and hot in the afternoon. Before the trip, participants will join a video call to learn more about the itinerary, the specific target list, what to pack, and what to expect.

Spring 2023 Trip Report

Please read The Linnaean Society of New York COVID-19 Field Trip Guidelines before registering.

Registration: Registration opens at 9 am on Monday, February 24. After that time, click here to register. Registration closes at 6 pm on Friday, March 7. Members (and those who have applied for membership) will be prioritized over non-members.

Please read the About Our Trips page, if you’re going on a field trip for the first time. It details our field trip policies, recommends what to bring on a trip, and offers other useful information, pro tips, and tricks.

If after visiting the About Our Trips page, you still have questions, feel free to contact the Registrar via email.