Having missed this weekend's massive coastal flight because of a professional meeting, I was happy to take advantage of the continuing northwest winds, by arriving at Robert Moses State Park at about 7:45 this morning. I wished I could be a triumvirate, monitoring the land bird flight from one vantage point, viewing the sea from another, and searching the vegetation, for another impressive flight was underway.
I tried to estimate passing land birds from 7:50 to 8:20, and registered >1000 Yellow-rumped Warblers (a very conservative estimate), ca. 500 Pine Siskins, ca. 25 Purple Finches (mostly heard; I don't know how many were small groups rather than singletons), several hundred Red-winged Blackbirds, ca. 50 Brown-headed Cowbirds, 6 Rusty Blackbirds, 4 Eastern Meadowlarks, and modest numbers of American Goldfinches. In a short sea-watch, it took slightly more than 5 minutes to reach a count of 500 Northern Gannets.. Ken and Sue Feustel told me that they had estimated about 200 per minute about an hour earlier. Other than some flocks of Double-crested Cormorants and small numbers of distant scoters (mostly flying northeastward), there was little variety. I saw only 3 or 4 Laughing Gulls, and later a single Royal Tern. A walk to the volleyball court and along the median yielded about 300 Dark-eyed Juncos, modest numbers (ca. 50) of Song and White-throated Sparrows, a few Chipping and Field Sparrows, a single Lincoln's Sparrow, and later, a Vesper Sparrow (along the north side of Field 5, east of the entrance). Although the great flux of Yellow-rumped Warblers had largely abated by 9:30, the rate of passage of Pine Siskins had increased, if anything, to a flock of 50-150 birds every minute or so. A constant trickle of Purple Finches continued overhead. Abundant Siskins, Tree Swallows, and Red-winged Blackbirds also passed along the beach front . My impression, shared by some other birders, is that Northern Flickers are moving through in much smaller numbers than in years past; I think I saw no more than 50 or 60 during the morning. I suspect that various observers' eBird listings will provide a more detailed, comprehensive report of the morning's flight. Doug Futuyma Stony Brook, NY -- NYSbirds-L List Info: http://www.NortheastBirding.com/NYSbirdsWELCOME http://www.NortheastBirding.com/NYSbirdsRULES http://www.NortheastBirding.com/NYSbirdsSubscribeConfigurationLeave.htm ARCHIVES: 1) http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/maillist.html 2) http://www.surfbirds.com/birdingmail/Group/NYSBirds-L 3) http://birdingonthe.net/mailinglists/NYSB.html Please submit your observations to eBird: http://ebird.org/content/ebird/ --
