Like John Gluth, I had a mini fly-in of new birds visible from my yard in the Argyle Park section of Babylon this morning. In my front yard sycamore and my neighbor's oak tree at 7:30am, I observed yellow warbler (2), black-and-white warbler (2), blue-headed vireo, warbling vireo, redstart, and the highlight (for my yard list anyway) was a male bay-breasted warbler, not singing but well seen though staying near the tree tops. Also arriving yesterday and singing today was a male Baltimore Oriole that has nested in my yard for last several years. Last years nesting was unsuccessful as a crow raided the nest after eggs hatched.
A jog without binocs thru Southard's Pond area at 8:30am yielded at least double the yellow warblers there were on monday, from 4 singing up to at least 8 now. Catbirds were in droves and seemed to have increased tenfold since Monday. Also heard a great-crested flycatcher and an early eastern wood-pewee. Yesterday afternoon I stopped at Jones Beach WE at 5pm to see if any of the fallout reported by Ken Feustel further down the beach was still apparent. Migrants songbirds were scarce, though a quick check of the sand bar by the CG station revealed a dozen red knots, as well as a few dozen dunlin, a dozen or so short-billed dows, 1 semipalmated plover and several dozen black-bellied plovers in various stage of molt from non-breeding to breeding and all phases in-between. No peeps. 3 Forster's terns were present. The prothonotary was a no show for me at noon at Bryant Park yesterday, possibly staying out of sight due to the increased noise and activity level - even for this busy place - of the occupy wall street rallies. Yellow, black-and-white, ovenbird and palm were seen, along with a blue-headed vireo, wood thrush (heard over the beating drums) and a few hermits. There were two tree sparrows on the lawn for a bit. Calling white throated sparrows and towhees were present. Finally, some monk parakeets have apparenty been nesting in Babylon Village for some time now, behind the now-closed Talbots store on 27A. I saw a total of 3 parakeets there over the weekend. Thanks, Tim Dunn Babylon NY Sent from my iPhone -- 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/nysbirds-l@cornell.edu/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/ --
