The past three nights have been strangely good ones for hearing migrants pass
over in the night, despite (or because of?) the very low cloud ceiling. I
don't think the volume of migrants has been extraordinary, but their calling
has
probably been stimulated just around the Cape Charles Beach, north of the
Bayshore Concrete plant, which has kept its massive array of lights illuminated
through the nights. This not only disorients (and kills) migrating birds; it
also appears to make them call more frequently. Because the frequency of
calling makes it very difficult to estimate numbers of birds, I cannot say with
certainty how many birds I heard, and even my estimates below are probably off.
I would love to hear from Barry Truitt or others how heavy the migration was
on the NPOL (polarimetric) radar at Oyster, especially in comparison to the
night of 29/30 September. The difference between the past few nights'
movements
and that night would appear to be mostly the sky cover and the speed of winds
aloft. Anyhow, here are my guesstimates below, which cover the hours 0930
through 1030 and 0500 through 0630. For those interested in the whole matter
of
nocturnal migrants, see www.clemson.edu/birdrad (Sid Gauthreaux, Jr. gave a
scintillating talk on the subject for the Eastern Shore Birding Festival last
week, and there will soon be an Auk article linking monitoring of migrants by
radar with monitoring of nocturnal flight calls).
Green Heron 2 (one by David Turner)
Yellow-billed Cuckoo 1
Yellow-crowned Night-Heron 16 (group of ca. 6 last night at 1000 - my first
'group' here)
Black-crowned Night-Heron 7
Great Blue Heron 1
heron/bittern sp. 2
Clapper Rail 1
Dickcissel 3
Gray-cheeked Thrush 300+
Bicknell's Thrush 2-3
Hermit Thrush 25 (+/-) = some I was not sure about
Veery 1
Bobolink 10 (seems rather late for so many)
Indigo Bunting 20 (some were possibly other species; not sure what, though)
sparrow sp. 190 (again, these could have been other species - I'm shaky on
these)
warbler sp. 120+ (probably a lot of yellow-rumpeds, yellowthroats, some
Black-t Blue)
owl sp. (Barn Owl?) 1
unidentified sounds - dozens
From what I've seen in town, there are still many warbler species around and
numerous catbirds (which appear to be quiet when migrating nocturnally). I
have not seen many sparrows yet. The side yard here at the house has
Ruby-throated Hummingbirds still, and today there was an Orange-crowned Warbler
in the
thicket next to the feeders and flowers.
Ned Brinkley
Cape Charles, VA
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