Hawk Watch Sunday November 21, 2010

The winds didn't completely switch to the East until after noon, which is when things really started to slow down. Until then, we had a decent number of migrants but good diversity. We had 2 different Peregrine Falcons carrying prey, and yet another one swoop down after a Wilson's Snipe just in front of the platform. There were two sightings of Northern Goshawk early in the morning (one was chasing a Sharp-shinned Hawk!). Unfortunately, these birds did not make it on the data sheet because they were the same birds from yesterday. In fact, the immature Golden Eagle from yesterday made another appearance today as well. This bird is easily distinguished from other goldens because the two central feathers are much longer than the other tail feathers. There was a second immature Golden Eagle later in the afternoon though that I happily counted since it was quite slow by this point.

In other news, we had 3 Tundra Swans (2 adults and 1 immature) land on Bunker Pond and managed to stay there for quite a while before the big, bad Mute Swans chased them off. It was another day of Cave Swallow sightings, although not nearly as many as yesterday. Tomorrow's South winds do not look promising for migration, but hopefully there will be some birds hanging around at least.

Cape May
Cape May Point, New Jersey, USA
Daily Raptor Counts: Nov 21, 2010
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Species            Day's Count    Month Total   Season Total
------------------ ----------- -------------- --------------
Black Vulture               11            252            428
Turkey Vulture              50           1179           2269
Osprey                       1             41           4571
Bald Eagle                   0             79            488
Northern Harrier            10            723           2354
Sharp-shinned Hawk          43           1977          19784
Cooper's Hawk                9            377           4062
Northern Goshawk             0             19             21
Red-shouldered Hawk          2            272            386
Broad-winged Hawk            1             16           1223
Red-tailed Hawk             13           1066           1648
Rough-legged Hawk            0              0              0
Golden Eagle                 1             19             27
American Kestrel             0             86           5647
Merlin                       2             71           2244
Peregrine Falcon             4             38           1407
Unknown Accipiter            0              0              0
Unknown Buteo                0              0              0
Unknown Falcon               0              1              2
Unknown Eagle                0              0              0
Unknown Raptor               0              0              0

Total:                     147           6216          46561
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Observation start time: 06:45:00 
Observation end   time: 15:30:00 
Total observation time: 8.75 hours

Official Counter:        Melissa Roach

Observers:        

Weather:
Quite windy in the morning but calming down after the first couple of
hours.  NNE winds to start with becoming East for much of the day.

Raptor Observations:
Decent movement early on, but very slow after noon.  We had nice diversity,
but not very many individuals.

Non-raptor Observations:
1 Snow Goose, 7 Tundra Swans (4 TUSW flying with Canada Geese), Cave
Swallows, 1 Field Sparrow, 1 Black-bellied Plover

Predictions:
South winds all day tomorrow; migration will be really slow.