On a chilly Friday morning, a male cardinal sat high in a tree above Stonington Borough. Its bright red feathers made it easy to spot, but its song is what caught the attention of Maggie Jones and her small group of birders.

“It’s such a harbinger of spring to have a male cardinal sing way at the top of a tree,” she told the group. “The days are getting longer and they’re starting to think about the breeding season.”

The cardinal was the first of many birds found in the borough that morning, the second session of a new downtown birding program sponsored by the Denison Pequotsepos Nature Center. Jones, director of the Nature Center, started the program this year to showcase the birds that can be found in backyards and other urban spaces in the winter.

Each session runs from 8 to 9 a.m. and has a flexible route so people who have to work can still participate, though most of the group stayed out until well after 9:30 watching the birds behind the Stonington Lighthouse.

Jones took the group of five down to the Stonington docks, where red-breasted mergansers dove under the water for food and a few black ducks swam on the other far side of Stonington Harbor. The group also found several loons as they walked around the perimeter of the borough, and Jones was able to use her scope to spot an eider sunning itself on Sandy Point.

Even though the borough and the docks in particular do not have a lot of thicket for backyard birds to seek shelter, several species of sparrows have started using the empty lobster pots as makeshift shrubs.

“It shows just how adaptable the house sparrows are, why they thrive around people,” Jones said. “They make use of all of our stuff.” She said the local Cooper’s hawks have figured out how to catch the birds inside the pots as well.

Backyard birds also had to seek alternate sources of food in the early 1990s when bird feeding was banned in the borough. Jones said the ban was fueled by a fear of rabies in skunks, which were attracted by birdseed. The ban has since been lifted, but she said the ornamental trees in residents’ yards provide a “gourmet selection” for robins, chickadees, cedar waxwings and other birds.

While the group found a variety of birds during the walk, the winter overall hasn’t been as good for birdwatching as previous years.

“This is a funny year because it’s been so mild, so a lot of northern birds haven’t had to come quite so far south,” Jones said. “Last year was an exceptional year in this area.”

The visit concluded with a stop at Dodge Paddock, the former site of States Pottery, which closed in 1835. Avalonia Land Conservancy has managed the land and the neighboring Beal Preserve since the early 1980s, and the Mystic Aquarium received more than $45,000 in 2014 to restore the wetlands after Superstorm Sandy.

The next Downtown Birding sessions are March 4 in Noank beginning at Carson’s General Store at 43 Main Street and March 11 in Mystic beginning at Bartleby’s at 46 West Main Street. Admission is $8.50 for members and $10 for nonmembers. More information is available at 860-536-1216 or www.dpnc.org.

a.hutchinson@theday.com

Twitter: @ahutch411