This morning (7 May 2019) a few parties witnessed an amazing northward movement of passerines (mostly warblers) on the west side of Point Pelee, right out of the park. Josh and Mike Bauman (JB,MB) were the first to notice this. While waiting impatiently to get through the line-up of cars at the cashier into the park, JB got out of the car and walked into the park to the Orientation parking lot at the north end of the park. Here he found an open place where he could see the northward passerine movement unobstructed overhead and from east to west. This was at 7 a.m. MB joined him shortly after. They witnessed an almost non-stop stream of passerines moving northwards through the treetops and over the treetops. Bob Curry and Glenda Slessor (BC,GS) also observed separately at the Orientation lot arriving at 7:30 and observing until 9:30.
Sarah and Bill Lamond (SL,BL) were driving into the park at 7:30 when a bathroom stop was needed and they pulled into NW Beach parking lot and parked beside the washroom. On getting out of the car, BL flushed several sparrows near the car and observed several warblers in nearby trees. Soon after BL,SL decided to watch this spectacle from the road into the NW beach parking lot as it was unobstructed overhead and had a clear view from the beach to the main road. They decided to count the warblers knowing this was a highly unusual phenomenon. BL,SL remained here until 9:00 a.m. BL,SL counted 1,697 warblers fly over in this time span (give or take a few). Many of the warblers were landing in the trees in front of them giving them a chance to make an assessment of the composition of what species were passing over of the 15 species they saw. The light conditions for viewing were exceptionally poor as it was heavy overcast and many of the birds were high up. Nonetheless, BL,SL estimated that about 61% of the warblers were Yellow-rumped Warblers based on what could be identified from the treetops. Palm and Nashville Warbler were 8% of the total, Black-and-white Warbler was 5% of the total and American Redstart, Northern Parula, Chestnut-sided Warbler and Black-throated Green Warbler were each at 2.5% of the total. Obviously an extreme variance from the true numbers is to be expected. There were brief periods when no warblers were passing overhead but usually they were counted in ones, twos, fives and occasionally groups of 20 in the sky almost simultaneously. This large number of counted warblers undoubtedly included several vireos, several Ruby-crowned Kinglets, and a few Red-breasted Nuthatches (very common in park today). Also, overhead and through the trees were large numbers of sparrows, predominantly White-throated Sparrows and White-crowned Sparrows, but several Chipping Sparrows as well. There were a few Baltimore Orioles, Indigo Buntings, Bobolinks, and Scarlet Tanagers. Of note were 57 Eastern Kingbirds counted including one flock of about 30 birds. This same flock was also noted at the Orientation parking lot. None of the observers had ever noted such a large grouping of kingbirds in a tight migratory flock. Other birds included modest numbers of Red-winged Blackbirds and Brown-headed Cowbirds. At the Orientation parking lot, BC,GS and JB,MB compared notes and estimated about 2,000 warblers had passed with an estimated count of 400 Yellow-rumped Warblers and 400 Palm Warbler and 1,200 unidentified warblers. The difference in estimation in Yellow-rumped Warbler and Palm Warbler numbers between the two locations could perhaps be explained by location. The Palm Warblers tended to migrate close to the beach (fide BC) and the Orientation parking lot was right on the beach compared to the NW beach location which was well removed from the beach. BC,GS then moved to their cottage a short distance up Pelee Drive. Here, from 9:30 to 10:30 a.m. they were able to identify many more warblers as they "hopped" from tree to tree. They could see birds diving down from a considerable height, which lead them to believe, that depending on where you were standing, the bird composition and ability to identify these, varied. When they were at the cottage, the birds were lower and they saw a much greater variety e.g. Tennessee warbler, Bay-breasted Warbler, Orchard oriole, Indigo Bunting and many more Baltimore Orioles (perhaps 120). Between the two spots (orientation parking lot and cottage) they estimated close to 2750 warblers and 5,000 total birds passing over in three hours. JB,MB remained at the Orientation parking lot until 10:00 a.m. when the northward movement slowed down considerably. It truly was an incredible diurnal northward movement of passerines at Point Pelee today. None of the observers had ever witnessed anything quite like this at Point Pelee and one observer (BC) has over 50 years of experience at the park. Other areas of the park had very large numbers of very active birds in the morning, but the north end of the park surely concentrated these birds with many of these birds actually leaving the park. Notwithstanding this fact, the park in the afternoon was very active for birds, especially in the north end. Bill Lamond _______________________________________________ ONTBIRDS is presented by the Ontario Field Ornithologists (OFO) - the provincial birding organization. Send bird reports to birdalert@ontbirds.ca For information about ONTBIRDS including how to unsubscribe visit http://www.ofo.ca/site/page/view/information.ontbirdssetup Posting guidelines can be found at http://www.ofo.ca/site/page/view/information.ontbirdsguide Visit the OFO Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/OntarioFieldOrnithologists
