Morning Flight Tuesday October 12, 2010

The morning flight at Higbee today was wonderful again! The total volume of passerine migrants was good but not unusual. The nuthatch flight, however, was truly jaw-dropping. A very surprising 276 Red-breasted Nuthatches flew out, but the really amazing count was 18 White-breasted Nuthatches (as far as I can tell from Sibley's Birds of Cape May and various eBird reports, this is a high count for Cape Island). I still get excited each time a White-breasted Nuthatch flies by, given how uncommon they usually are here. Additionally, a close Dickcissel flew by calling and a Connecticut Warbler did the same - both birds kindly posed briefly for flight photographs. A somewhat early Fox Sparrow, my first of the season, was kicking around the base of the dike when I left, giving its long "sweet" flight call.

Red-breasted Nuthatch. Higbee Beach (Tom Johnson).

Blackpoll Warbler. Higbee Beach (Tom Johnson).

Location: Cape Island--Higbees Beach SWA--Dike
Observation date: 10/12/10
Notes: light southwest winds this morning, mostly clear, 65-70 F
Number of species: 27

Red-bellied Woodpecker 1
Yellow-bellied Sapsucker 3
Northern Flicker 1
Red-breasted Nuthatch 276
White-breasted Nuthatch 18
Golden-crowned Kinglet 12
Ruby-crowned Kinglet 3
American Robin 580
Cedar Waxwing 15
Tennessee Warbler 3
Northern Parula 27
Yellow Warbler 1
Magnolia Warbler 1
Black-throated Blue Warbler 2
Yellow-rumped Warbler 513
Black-throated Green Warbler 2
Palm Warbler 22
Blackpoll Warbler 50
Connecticut Warbler 1
warbler sp. 143
Chipping Sparrow 2
Savannah Sparrow 6
Dark-eyed Junco 4
Indigo Bunting 5
Dickcissel 1
Bobolink 1
Eastern Meadowlark 1
Purple Finch 2

This report was generated automatically by eBird v2(http://ebird.org)