All About Our Loons

2016, 2017, 2018 and 2019

No loon chick this year. Most of the summer, there have been three to four loons hanging out together and no sign of pairing or nesting behavior.

2015

We lost one of the loon chicks some time around the end of July. We do not know what happened to it, although many neighbors noticed that one of the loons chicks was growing much larger than the other.

As of July 5, 2015 we have two baby loon chicks on the Lake!

Try to keep at least 100 feet away, and give the loons even more space if they start calling out or rearing up and flapping their wings.

Please share these guidelines with your family, friends and renters.

2014

December - Our juvenile loon stayed with us at the Lake until at least the first week of November. Many thanks to Sarah and Roger Doucette and David Van Houten for setting up the platform and braving the chilly water (and icebergs!) to haul the platform up out of the water for the winter. As soon as the ice is out this spring, the platform will be placed back in the Lake for the 2015 summer season.

July - It's a baby! Beginning on July 3, 2014, lake residents noticed a tiny baby loon riding on the back of one of the adults. Since that time, the baby has grown almost twice its length and is learning how to dive.

We hope everyone is able to enjoy the loon family, but - PLEASE - at a distance with binoculars!

If the loon begins to look at you as you approach, you are too close.

Although we placed the loon nesting raft again this spring (thanks, David Van Houten and Neil Lupton!) it appears that the loons again chose to build their nest elsewhere.

FALL 2013

We observed two loons still here at the lake this morning - November 6.

The loon nesting platform came out of the lake - along with the floating sign - on October 27. Many thanks to Roger Doucette, David Van Houten and Eliot Wessler for braving the chilly lake to haul them up onto the small island, where they will spend the winter. And thanks to Dan and Sharon Edgar - the owners of the small island - for letting them stay there.

Our loon chick has grown large and sleek, and - as of September 17 - seems to have escaped the clutches of our part-time-resident eagle. Many thanks to John Cooley and Wyatt Puent of the Loon Preservation Committee for helping the Forest Lake Association obtain a loon nesting platform. And thanks to Roger and Sarah Doucette and David Van Houten for braving the icy waters to actually

place the platform!

We have a loon chick! As of Saturday, July 24 we have been watching the loon learn to swim and dive. See our blog on the Home page for a picture.

From the June 5, 2013 Forest Lake Association Newsletter:

LOON NESTING PLATFORM IS HERE

There's a new loon nesting platform on the protected side of the little island. The idea of the platform is to help our loon couple produce a chick, which they haven't done for three years.

The platform floats, so it protects nests from the ups and downs of water levels. The loons may use the platform this year or they may take time -- sometimes as much as a few seasons -- to get used to it.

Meanwhile please give the loons space and quiet to do their thing! Stay at least 100 feet from the island and the platform. Give the loons more space if they start calling, flapping in the water or crouching over the nest, which means they're upset and may abandon their nest.

Thanks to the Loon Preservation Committee for furnishing the platform and to intrepid FLA volunteers for getting it in position. Find out more at www.loon.org.