Here it is! A big wave of migrants made their way over the Northeast tonight, from Maine down through the mid-Atlantic states. Here’s the radar from just after sunset last night, through 6:00am this morning.
With the high density of birds coming in from the north I would expect good morning flights at the local migrant hotspots. Good inland locations would likely be Garret Mountain and Chimney Rock (might be a good raptor flight too!), while coastal locales such as Sandy Hook and Cape May are always good bets at this time of year.
Good Birding
4 responses to “Migration over Jersey”
Small feeding flocks of warblers included:
Magnolia (5)
N. Parula (2 – both hatch-year birds)
Black-throated Green (1)
American Redstart (1 ad. m; several fem. and hatch-year males)
Black-and-White (many – mostly fem. or hatch-year)
Common Yellowthroat (many)
Well, I dunno … Negri-Nepote grassland had 1 B-T Green from 7 – 8:15 am, no other migrants that I saw. Of course, it isn’t the biggest migrant trap around, and it was cloudy and a bit breezy (until I left, when the sun came out).
yeah…seems like they went right over us!
I’d like to know what the morning flight was like at Higbee’s.
I’m going to be banding in the forest tomorrow, using Bill Elrick’s technique (using a playback lure). We’ll see what shows up!
Tonight is looking like another push of migrants, although not as much as last night.
Among others, today the State Park held:
1 Eurasian Collared Dove
1 Mourning Warbler
half a dozen Cape May Warblers including adult males
at in the Cedars. They lingered for hours and allowed
approach of a a yard or two. They were accmpanied bu
many equally unconcerned Redstarts, Parulas, etc.
14 Prairie Warblers
There were actually a fair number of Yellow Warblers
around, all dull 1st years, and both flavors of Palm
Warblers were represented in flocks of 10s and 20s in
the Dunes.
5 E. Wood-pewees
1 Lark Sparrow- perhaps the same bird. In the exact
same spot between the first dune overpass and the
first interpretive sign at the pond.
27 Blue-winged Teal were in the lighthouse Pond, and
the number of Wigeon and Shoveler are increasing
daily.
I hear a Sandhill Crane flew over the Hawkwatch at
some point as well.
The Beanery was good for hawks in the late morning. 14
Kestrels and 4 Merlins were hanging out on the posts
of the new Vineyard. Were Dante a Dragonfly, he would
have written of just such a place for extremely nasty
dragonflies. Accipiters and Harriers were in no short
supply either.
I saw only two Black Terns today, and missed the adult
Lesser Black-backed Gull on the Beach, but was really
taken with the number of Skimmers who were actually
foraging- skimming back and forth that is, quite far
out to sea.
Cheers
CJV
Cape May, NJ