As night fell over the region, you could almost hear the sound: thousands of migration-ready birds tapping the faces of their little wristwatches and looking at the sky. “I can see a few stars”, “Dude, it has been ALMOST A WEEK that we’ve been stuck here”, and in the words of the late Paul Pena:
I’m gonna move
away from here,
you can find me if you wanna go there.
Here’s the radar from sunset last night through 5:00am this morning.
Frames are every 1/2 hour. Click on the thumbnail to view the full-sized animation.
Light and variable winds last night and, (more importantly) the fizzling of the last stubborn front offshore, made for good migration conditions over a region that has been starved of such over the last week. Couple that with northwest winds over northern New England which pushed migrants to the coast, and you have a recipe for some good birding in the mid-Atlantic this morning! Looking at the regional composite you can see moderate to heavy reflectivity across the Northeast and mid-Atlantic, especially along the coast where birds have been backed up for days. Looking at the individual radars you can see NE->SW flow over NYC and NNE->SSW flow over NJ throughout the night. Heavy returns (20+dbz) were evident on both the KDIX and KDOX radars with a strong coastal signal on both as well. This suggests that although local winds were not pushing birds to the coast- that many birds had already been there and were moving down the coast over night. This bodes well for coastal migrant traps such as Cape May this morning. The trajectory from Long Island, NY also means that Sandy Hook will be good first thing this morning. Of course, given the overall lack of directional wind, birds will be dispersed across the landscape and inland migrant traps will hold the most birds today. Chimney Rock, and sites along the Delaware River are all worth a look.
Good Birding
David
4 responses to “You can’t keep a good bird down”
Heard lots of Swainson’s Thrush migrating last night near Kennett Square, PA.
Kunkletown, PA:
Listening for nocturnal flight calls, I heard lots of Swainson’s and Gray-cheecked Thrushes. Birds were hard to find at first this morning, but then I came across a large migrant flock. Most of the warblers were Black-throated Greens, but Black-throated Blue, Nashville, Blackpoll, American Redstart, and Magnolia were present as well. There are still Red-eyed Vireos around, but their numbers have significantly decreased. The only other birds of note from this morning are a few species that are also slowly decreasing as the season progresses: Yellow-billed Cuckoo, Scarlet Tanager, Rose-breasted Grosbeak, Indigo Bunting, and Bobolink.
Riverwinds in Gloucester County, NJ. A couple miles south of Wheelabrator – also on the Delaware River. Lots of diversity, but low numbers. I specifically went looking for thrushes later in the morning, so that might have made some of the other passerine numbers lower than they actually were.
4 EASTERN PHOEBES
1 WINTER WREN
3 SWAINSON’S THRUSHES
1 GRAY-CHEEKED THRUSH
Just a few CATBIRDS and ROBINS
1 WARBLING VIREO
1 PARULA
2 YELLOW WARBLERS
1 MAGNOLIA WARBLER
1 CAPE MAY WARBLER
1 BLACK-THROATED BLUE
2 YELLOW-RUMPED WARBLERS
2 PALM WARBLERS
3 BLACKPOLLS
1 BLACK and WHITE WARBLER
2 REDSTARTS
1 NORTHERN WATERTHRUSH
3 COMMON YELLOWTHROATS
1 WILSON’S WARBLER
2 ROSE-BREASTED GROSBEAKS
not too many GOLDFINCHES either.
We did not go to Sandy Hook today but heard of some good birds that were seen by others.
A good sparrow day with Grasshopper,Lark,Clay-Colored,Savannah and Lincoln’s and White-Throated.
Good numbers of Red-Eyed Vireos. Other birds seen Swainson’s thrush,Scarlet Tanager,Baltimore Oriole, Indigo Bunting, Rose Breasted Grosbeak, Yellow-bellied FC,
Dark Eyed Junco, Pine warbler, Phoebe, Pewee and more common migrant warblers