Morning Flight, Thursday, 12 October 2017

Today it rained and quite a few birds were acting madly in it-- such a good assortment of warblers, sparrows, and other migrants in such a frenetic state. There was indeed a great amount of flight activity just to the west of the dike's summit and mostly in the lee of it and the heavy northeast wind that was sweeping through. Yellow-rumps were swooping low and up to the trees' height, to the north and south, and many other species were in on the action somewhat as well. Tennessee, Nashville, Northern Parula, Black-and-white, American Redstart, Cape May, Magnolia, Blackpoll, Palm, Black-throated Green mixed into "Myrtle" Warblers while Eastern Towhee, Swamp, Song, and White-throated Sparrows called and jaunted about ceaselessly.  I really have no idea what was technically or approximately "going on" as the rain fell densely and blocked much vision. It was pretty chaotic on the part of the birds. When the rain cleared enough to brave the quick slip up to the dike's summit the boisterous gathering quieted and much fewer birds flew-- this was quite surprising to me as well! The high gusts of wind may've served to tamp things down. 

Many more birds were seen locally in the rain (no consistent count from dike conducted) than listed here: http://www.trektellen.org/count/view/1746/20171012