New York County (within N.Y. City), including Manhattan, Randall’s Island and Governors Island, and skies-above plus adjacent waters into the first week in September, 2023 -
As some have noted elsewhere, this week now concluding had featured massive migrations, especially of nocturnal migrants, totaling far more than one million birds (that number exceeded on some recent single nights), even as we’ve had the humid, hot and sultry conditions on the ground over some recent days - these mass-migrations have continued on. This includes vast numbers and diversity in passerines (as well as other groups of birds, obviously including shorebirds moving on, both by days and nights) - and with warblers, as expected, strongly featured in each night’s migrations, including vast numbers passing over N.Y. City and over Manhattan and this county as well. Going back to last Sunday and holiday-Monday (Labor Day), in N.Y. County we were still seeing up to 28+ warbler species in the county, and with a number of some of those species considered (especially by long-time observers) as more typical for later in the season - so such warblers as Myrtle [Yellow-rumped] and Palm, plus more and more Blackpoll Warblers, were all moving thru by even before last weekend, and especially so during and since then. On Monday, Labor Day, there were up to a dozen+ Blackpoll Warblers in Central Park alone (some also in other locations), with some also photo-documented well enough to remove any doubts as to identifications. We also have had good numbers of Bay-breasted Warblers, and a number of that species were being seen into Wednesday in such locations as Central Park (multiple not-for-profit bird-walks had sightings then) as well as in some of the other large and smaller parks and greenspaces of the county. Altogether into Wednesday, there were at least 23 spp. of American warblers still being found around the county (and all of those were in-addition being seen in Central Park, with its many independent watchers, as well as the not-for-profit guided birding-walks which are by now regular there as well as in other sites around the county). One additional note: in the norms of guided wallks or trips / tours led by birding-guides, it is standard usage for birds seen only by a guide (a walk-leader or trip-leader) to be designated as “Leader-Only”, sometimes initialized as L.O. or LOB, which is a standard practice across the planet with amateur and professional birding guides, and by almost all of many tour-companies that focus on birds. It is not common to designate such leader-only sightings as “Early” - on a birding day-trip or single walk, yet some few have done this. In the simplest way, this means that a bird or birds has/have not been seen nor heard by any member-participant of a group, on a guided walk or tour, it was seen or heard, then reported by only the designated leader of said walk or tour. Further, it is very uncommon to list amomgst *highlights* of a days' or length of days guided walk or tour. any “leader-only” sightings of birds unless some or one of said species is very rare or exceptional in some way. A most-typical and usual list of highlighted species will be of birds that all, or almost-all, of a group of any size was able to see. Some early mornings and pre-sunrise flights of migrants have occurred in recent days in this county (and all thru much of the eastern parts of Nortn America as well), after very strong nocturnal migrations. Such were very much so on the mornings of this past Sunday, Monday, Tuesday; it seemed that Wednesday (9/6) had rather less in our area, albeit still many migrants that were passing from Tuesday night. One location (among others) where these flights could be seen generally, and mainly only in the first hour or two of day, that is by pre-sunrise first-light on thru around 7 a.m., was in lower Manhattan including the areas near South Ferry and the Battery (the southern end of Manhattan) and a bit less-so, out on Governors Island, where access is not easy until at or after about 7 a.m., unless special access was allowed or an overnight there made. Flights on Sunday and Monday were, in particular fairly good, with up to 20 species of warblers as well as a broad variety of other migrant species, but seemingly lacking in any notable rarities. Yellow-crowned Night-Heron was seen from Governors Island, as a fly-by west to east, on Monday, however that species is at-least occasional in that area of the county - and also fairly regular at Randall’s Island with up to four of that species seen there in recent days. At Governors Island, unfortunately one of the excellent (potential) habitats for migrants is often hard to, or not available for access by birders - the so-called Urban Farm area, which is likely the single best part of that island for ON-the-deck birds of many kinds, rather than fly-overs or shorebirds, waterfowl. etc., at the margins of the island. I was able to access a part of the farm’s habitat on Labor Day, but was also refused entry to a few of the small sections where clearly many migrants were lurking and feeding. Many birders do not even get in there at all. In part, that island is placed under multi-jurisdictional control and so there are a variety of rules in place there, local, state and interstate, and federal. It is what it is, yet the potential for interesting birds is always there on that island as well as in active migration over and around there. Some of the many migrants of this past week from New York County: Canada Goose Mute Swan Wood Duck Gadwall American Black Duck Mallard Blue-winged Teal (flyovers only) Northern Shoveler Green-winged Teal Ruddy Duck Double-crested Cormorant Great Blue Heron Great Egret Snowy Egret Green Heron Black-crowned Night-Heron Yellow-crowned Night-Heron Black Vulture Turkey Vulture Osprey Bald Eagle Northern Harrier Sharp-shinned Hawk Cooper's Hawk Broad-winged Hawk Red-tailed Hawk American Kestrel Merlin Peregrine Falcon Killdeer Solitary Sandpiper Spotted Sandpiper Semipalmated Sandpiper Least Sandpiper Laughing Gull Ring-billed Gull [American] Herring Gull Great Black-backed Gull Common Tern (still being seen on the Hudson and around New York Harbor; numbers less tnan in August) ['feral'] Rock Pigeon Mourning Dove Monk Parakeet Black-billed Cuckoo Yellow-billed Cuckoo Great Horned Owl, E. Screech—Owl Common Nighthawk Chimney Swift Ruby-throated Hummingbird (multiple on migrations in recent days, also in some parks continuing at flower plantings and at wild blooms) Belted Kingfisher Red-bellied Woodpecker Yellow-bellied Sapsucker (very few, these are still likely to be individuals that had summered in Manhattan) Downy Woodpecker Hairy Woodpecker Yellow-shafted Flicker Olive-sided Flycatcher Eastern Wood-Pewee Yellow-bellied Flycatcher Empidonax []genus Flycatcher Eastern Phoebe Great Crested Flycatcher Eastern Kingbird Yellow-throated Vireo Warbling Vireo Red-eyed Vireo Blue Jay American Crow Fish Crow Common Raven Tree Swallow Northern Rough-winged Swallow Barn Swallow Cliff Swallow Black-capped Chickadee Tufted Titmouse Red-breasted Nuthatch White-breasted Nuthatch Carolina Wren House Wren Blue-gray Gnatcatcher Veery Swainson's Thrush Wood Thrush American Robin Gray Catbird Northern Mockingbird Brown Thrasher European Starling Cedar Waxwing House Sparrow Scarlet Tanager Eastern Towhee Chipping Sparrow Song Sparrow Swamp Sparrow White-throated Sparrow (mainly or solely still individuals and small flocks that had summered in Manhattan, which is typical and not at all unusual) Bobolink Red-winged Blackbird Eastern Meadowlark Rusty Blackbird Common Grackle Brown-headed Cowbird Orchard Oriole Baltimore Oriole Purple Finch House Finch White-winged Crossbill Common Redpoll Pine Siskin American Goldfinch Evening Grosbeak House Sparrow - Blue-winged Warbler Tennessee Warbler Nashville Warbler Northern Parula Yellow Warbler Chestnut-sided Warbler Magnolia Warbler Cape May Warbler Black-throated Blue Warbler Myrtle / Yellow-rumped Warbler Black-throated Green Warbler Blackburnian Warblerr Pine Warbler Prairie Warbler Palm Warbler Bay-breasted Warbler Blackpoll Warbler Black-and-white Warbler American Redstart Prothonotary Warbler (only on Sept. 1st, at Bryant Park, midtown Manhattan) Worm-eating Warbler Ovenbird Northern Waterthrush Mourning Warbler Common Yellowthroat Hooded Warbler Wilson's Warbler Canada Warbler - Northern Cardinal Rose-breasted Grosbeak Indigo Bunting and likely some additional species. - - - - There have been some special sightings of rare / uncommon butterflies in Manhattan, especially, as well as (some) on Governors Island, over the past week, including Cloudless Sulphur, White-M Hairstreak, Variegated Fritillary, Common Buckeye, Long-tailed Skipper (which is the least-common of all of these noted), Ocola Skipper, and some other species - and also Harvester which is rare in N.Y. County, albeit resident in Bronx County in select habitats, this latter in Central Park (again) in recent weeks, in more than one location there. All of these uncommon species are / were also being seen elsewhere in N.Y. City and in the region recently as well. — Thanks to the many quiet and keen observers of birds and other aspects in nature, with so many reports from all days even those featuring very-sultry (hot and humid) weather. And as always thanks to the many walk-leaders out lately for non-profit organizations such as the NYC Audubon (NYCAS, to be given an updated name at some point) and the Linnaean Society of New York, and for the American Museum of Natural History, and for other non-profit conservation and scientific organizations and institutions, as well as further groups in not-for-profit guided bird and nature walks. All the local reports made via either GroupMe bird-alerts and/or eBird, as well as via word-of-mouth and many independent photographers and birders. Good birding to all, Tom Fiore manhattan -- NYSbirds-L List Info: http://www.NortheastBirding.com/NYSbirdsWELCOME.htm http://www.NortheastBirding.com/NYSbirdsRULES.htm 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://birding.aba.org/maillist/NY01 Please submit your observations to eBird: http://ebird.org/content/ebird/ --
