I took advantage of a day off from work to check out the beach at first light. The winds looked favorable, the radar was busy, and last night at Lido Beach there were almost constantly flight calls of migrants passing overhead. Jones experienced an initially promising, modest flight of birds at sunrise, but the activity was short-lived. By 8:30 many of the passage birds had moved through and there was little to be found on continued sweeps of the area. My previous post described the highlight of the morning, a Dickcissel seen and heard along the fisherman's road near the Coast Guard Station. After being discovered at 6:55, the bird was heard once more around 7:25. Subsequent visits by other birders failed to relocate this individual. Bobolinks were the stars of the show, with 36 tallied passing overhead mostly early in the day. Redstarts and Yellowthroats led the warbler charge, and I found singles of Black-and-white, Magnolia, Palm, Yellow, and Parula. A very drab first-year female Cape May and one Black-throated Blue of each sex rounded out the family, though many other warblers were passing overhead with the dawn flight. Red-breasted Nuthatches continue to dominate the landscape, and catbirds were also conspicuous and numerous. Other expected landbirds were present in small numbers. Around 9:45, I spotted an aerial chase apparently involving several Merlins over the turnaround, but raising my binoculars revealed that one of the three birds was actually a Common Nighthawk which continued west.
A brief stop at Hempstead Lake on the way home found it dry and mostly quiet. Ovenbird and Northern Waterthrush were added to the day list, alongside Parula, Redstart, and two more female-type Black-throated Blues. http://ebird.org/ebird/view/checklist/S31544870 Cheers! -Tim H -- 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/ --
