Wow, what a fabulous day! This has been a literally record-smashing few days as this strong cold front has ripped through in the wake of Hurricane/Tropical Storm Michael.
So first, a little prelude: there were practically no birds at the official Morning Flight count yesterday-- the winds switched to the NW too late last night, and then they were so strong throughout the morning that what had come in was hunkered down tight. Tom Reed was filling in for me that morning, and he registered a 49 mph wind gust during the count! While it was not a day for songbirds, it was an *epic* day for raptors, as Erik Bruhnke shattered the record for the single-day high count of American Kestrel with 5,406 birds! The previous record was 5,038 from September 30, 1999, and a flight of this magnitude was something many of us around here thought was no longer possible given their declines. You can read about that phenomenal day here. As the raptor flight went on yesterday, diurnal migrants like Purple Finches and Northern Flickers bounding over the State Park foreshadowed today’s morning’s flight; however, no one could have predicted exactly what would happen today.
The thin, high-pitched “tsee-tsee-tsee” of Golden-crowned Kinglets moving through the phrags kicked off migratory activity at the Higbee dike on a blustery, chilly, and cloudy mid-October morning. Not too long after, warblers began picking up in sizeable flocks all along the treeline as far as the eye could see. Spread out in a broad front, literal scores of warblers poured out of the treeline, and simply capturing the magnitude (although this was one of those days that whatever I put in was bound to be a conservative estimate no matter what). Yellow-rumped Warblers carried the morning with a conservative 2,621, as they undoubtedly comprised much of the 1,457 warbler spuh clicked today. Blackpoll Warblers also made a solid showing, especially in the first hour of the morning. We ended the morning with 250 Blackpolls, which puts us at a very respectable 1,633 northbound individuals for the fall with some room to go for more. Late-season warblers like Northern Parula and Cape May Warbler were in decent attendance as well, except for Palm Warblers, of which there were surprisingly few (only 27, but there were certainly some out in ether that escaped identification).
And of course, what would a Morning Flight in October be like without flickers? We had 550 Northern Flickers head up the Bayshore past the dike. Once again, Brett Ewald was there to be the designated "flicker clicker." Thank you so much for your help counting them! 282 northbound Cedar Waxwings was another solid total mixed in to the spectacle today.
 |
| Some challenging viewing conditions today, but these are still identifiable as Purple Finches! |
We also had our peak Purple Finch day at Morning Flight so far as well! 106 of these thick-bodied, “drip-drip” calling finches undulated their way north past the count in loose flocks, with some bold raspberry males mixed in. Although lighting conditions made it hard to tell, the majority of these birds seemed to be crisp adult birds in comparison to the scruffy juvenile birds that were the first few to move by Higbee earlier in the fall. 14 Yellow-bellied Sapsuckers and 17 Eastern Phoebe (both northbound) were also our peak counts for the fall so far. 34 northbound Red-breasted Nuthatches was a decent total given the highwinds; hopefully we’ll see many more of them and Blue Jays on tomorrow’s lighter-but-still-NW winds.
 |
| Trees beware, sapsuckers are inbound! |
The undoubted highlight of the count today was breaking the single-day high count for Golden-crowned Kinglet with 245 northbound birds (conservatively)! Bonkers! The vast majority of the Golden-crowned Kinglets were shooting through the gap, and interpretive naturalist Adehl Schwaderer did a great job clicking the majority of this flight line as I was busy clicking gobs of Yellow-rumped Warblers and other warblers! Big kudos to her for her service.
We also broke the single day high count for Yellow-billed Cuckoo with 5 northbound birds that zoomed their way along the leeward side of the dike! A bonus southbound Black-billed Cuckoo was a most welcome addition as well (the lack of rufous in the primaries and the plain tan as opposed to warm brown upperparts are good field marks in flight). As great as this was, it was but a small portion of the cuckoo flight today, which didn’t really begin until later on in the morning. There were several reports of dozens flying up the Bayshore. Once the flight had definitively died, I drove up to see the spectacle and make a brief, unofficial count. From 11:50 to 12:50, I had 60!!! in one hour, and 30!!! in the first ten minutes! While other observers surely recorded a higher count of them, I was just happy to catch part of the show. It was utterly astounding to see these ethereal beauties of interior forest winging their way over coastal dune scrub at point-blank range. Scattered individuals continued to fly all across Cape May late into the afternoon (including at the Avalon Seawatch), and practically every birder out in the field today saw at least one.
 |
| Wow. Just wow. |
This literally unprecedented spectacle made my Georgia heart swell with awe (the previous single-day/location high for CM was somewhere around 10-15), and it stands as a wonderful reminder that there are still ornithological mysteries to document and unravel, even here in Cape May with its long tradition of field study. Tomorrow should be another productive day as well, since these NW winds will continue into the morning as they peter out and switch around; they’ll be lighter tomorrow, so perhaps we’ll see another big day for species that move on light winds like flickers and nuthatches! So be sure to get out and bird, no matter where you are!
As always, you can find our official count totals on Trektellen here, and our complete eBird checklist of the day’s observations here.
Bring on the next day!
No comments:
Post a Comment