[nysbirds-l] Northern Bobwhite, Sunken Meadow State Park

[Peter Reisfeld]

After a pleasant morning in Central Park with fairly good activity at 
the Point, I headed for Fuch's pond, where I entered the rare echelon of 
birders who missed the prothonotary  warbler three separate times. I 
thereupon headed to Sunken Meadow park for a stroll on the boardwalk 
with my wife. I did get some consolation, however. At the conclusion of 
our stroll, we reached the snack bar concession at the east end of the 
boardwalk.  A northern bobwhite began calling, and was initially spotted by 
others in the nearby shrubbery.  Eventually, the bird meandered to 
within 3 feet of the railing west of the concession.  See photos and a 
short video at the link below:  


Northern Bobwhite Sunken Meadow

 
   Northern Bobwhite Sunken Meadow  
View on www.flickr.com Preview by Yahoo  

Happy spring birding!

Peter

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[nysbirds-l] Northern Bobwhite, Sunken Meadow

[Peter Reisfeld]

The link to photo/video did not go through.  I'll try again. 


https://www.flickr.com/photos/50403904@N03/14018161686/



Peter

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[nysbirds-l] Doodletown Road

[Peter Reisfeld]

Despite my abysmal record of success at finding target birds this year, I 
visited Doodletown Road today hoping to get the Cerulean and Kentucky warblers 
that had eluded me thus far.   I arrived early, only to be swarmed with 
mosquitos and flies.  There was plenty of birdsong, but I had to keep moving,  
not the ideal strategy for finding treetop ceruleans, or ventriloquistic 
hoodeds.  I spend a miserable hour or two without seeing anything notable, save 
a yellow throated vireo.  Hearing a Kentucky singing on Pleasant Valley Road 
was a highlight, but the bird seemed to be deep in the woods, and I was unable 
to locate it. 

I pondered cutting my losses and leaving, but as the morning wore on and 
birders and hikers filled the park, the insects surprisingly abated.  (Perhaps 
they'd found targets other than me).  And while there was less birdsong, I was 
finally able to spot some birds.  First it was a singing blue-winged warbler on 
Doodletown road. Then I headed back for a second try at the Kentucky, and this 
time I scored.  As I sat on a rock watching it sing on a bare twig, I excitedly 
announced my finding  to  passing group.  I know, I can hear him, said the 
first  birder as he walked by without slowing, obviously less thrilled than me. 

After getting a few people on the bird, it flew, and I continued up the road 
finding a nice clearing where I sat down and had a snack.  I heard scarlet 
tanager, RB grosbeak, hooded warbler and indigo bunting singing, and was able 
to spot the first three.  As I munched, I got a quick glance at a grayish 
warbler-type bird with a wing bars  that was flitting around. I thought/hoped 
female cerulean, and then it appeared again, giving me a better look.  It was 
indeed a female cerulean, busy collecting nesting material.  I watched her 
bring it back to the nest, and then go out for several more forays. 

Well satisfied, I started heading out, but ran into Karlo and Allison Mirth, 
and I brought them back to see see the nest, giving me the additional pleasure 
of sharing.  I headed out again, and just before leaving the park  I heard a 
buzzy call up the steps at the very first historic house site near the 
beginning of the trail.  Low and behold, I was greeted by a singing male 
cerulean, not very high, and in good light.   Boy was I glad I didn't leave 
early. 

I uploaded a couple of short, slightly shaky, imperfectly exposed videos of the 
Kentucky and the Cerulean nest onto my Flicker site:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/50403904@N03/


Happy late spring birding!

Peter
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[nysbirds-l] Calverton and Connetquot

[Peter Reisfeld]

I had a very nice morning of birding today, where things just seemed to fall in 
place. (But then again, those other mornings don't usually get posted.)  I 
first headed for the EPCAL area in Calverton.  I birded both north and south of 
the corner of Grumman Ave and Line Road.  Partway through I ran into and birded 
with Steve Walter.  Birds seen there included pine and prairie warblers, 
eastern bluebird, great crested flycatcher, several meadowlarks and grasshopper 
sparrows, as well as the previously seen blue grosbeak. 

Then, after an introductory lesson on Odonata from Steve at  Sandy pond, I 
stopped at  Connetquot Park on my way home where I got excellent looks at the 
yellow throated warbler. 

Videos of the singing grosbeak and yellow-throated warbler are posted at my 
Flckr site. 

https://www.flickr.com/photos/50403904@N03/

Happy early summer birding,

Peter

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[nysbirds-l] Multiple Cape May Warblers at Garvey's Point Preserve, Glen Cove

[Peter Reisfeld]

I had pretty low expectations when I drove to Garvey's Point Preserve this 
morning. When I had been there on Thursday it had been relatively quiet.  But 
my visit to Alley Pond yesterday had left me feeling warbler-deprived, so after 
the morning rain subsided, I decided to give it another try.  When I arrived 
the sun was just peeking out in the aralia-ringed meadow behind and below the 
visitor center.  And to my pleasant surprise, there was movement in the trees.  

What I experienced was a veritable Cape May warblerfest.  It seemed as if every 
other bird was a Cape May.  I saw at least 5 individuals 2 dull and 3 bright, 
and probably several more, along with a scattering of other warblers and a rose 
breasted grosbeak.  A walk on the trails added another Cape May, a blue-headed 
vireo and a few more warblers.  By the time I returned to the meadow, there was 
only one Cape May still there. But with all those aralia berries ripe for the 
taking, I'm pretty sure they'll be back.  

Here is a link to photos of a number of these birds.  There were many more that 
escaped capture by my lens: 

https://www.flickr.com/photos/50403904@N03/15125378059/in/photostream/

Warbler List:

Cape May (TNTC)
Tennessee (in the Meadow)
Nashville (at the intersection of trails 4 and 5)
Northern Waterthrush (in the almost empty pond)
BT Green
BT Blue
Magnolia
Parula
Black and White
Common Yellowthroat
Redstart

Happy Fall Birding 

Peter
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[nysbirds-l] Multiple Cape May Warblers at Garvey's Point Preserve, Glen Cove

[Peter Reisfeld]

 had pretty low expectations when I drove to Garvey's Point Preserve this 
morning. When I had been there on Thursday it had been relatively quiet.  But 
my visit to Alley Pond yesterday had left me feeling warbler-deprived, so after 
the morning rain subsided, I decided to give it another try.  When I arrived 
the sun was just peeking out in the aralia-ringed meadow behind and below the 
visitor center.  And to my pleasant surprise, there was movement in the trees.  

What I experienced was a veritable Cape May warblerfest.  It seemed as if every 
other bird was a Cape May.  I saw at least 5 individuals 2 dull and 3 bright, 
and probably several more, along with a scattering of other warblers and a rose 
breasted grosbeak.  A walk on the trails added another Cape May, a blue-headed 
vireo and a few more warblers.  By the time I returned to the meadow, there was 
only one Cape May still there. But with all those aralia berries ripe for the 
taking, I'm pretty sure they'll be back.  

Here is a link to photos of a number of these birds.  There were many more that 
escaped capture by my lens: 

https://www.flickr.com/photos/50403904@N03/15125378059/in/photostream/

Warbler List:

Cape May (TNTC)
Tennessee (in the Meadow)
Nashville (at the intersection of trails 4 and 5)
Northern Waterthrush (in the almost empty pond)
BT Green
BT Blue
Magnolia
Parula
Black and White
Common Yellowthroat
Redstart

Happy Fall Birding 

Peter
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[nysbirds-l] Garvies Point Preserve 9/24

[Peter Reisfeld]

After missing yesterday's big push of birds into Alley Pond Park, I came early 
today hoping some of them stuck around, particularly the Connecticut warbler 
found by Eric Miller and Harry east of Decadon Pond.  I struck out on the 
Connecticut, saw nothing at the ballfields, and had few warblers elsewhere in 
the park before dejectedly leaving at about 10:30.  

On the way back to Suffolk, I stopped at Garvies, hoping to get a Cape May to 
cheer me up. There I met Barbara Garriel, Joan Parry, and new birder Shelly.  
While we did not see any of the numerous Cape Mays we had seen the day before, 
the birding was surprisingly good.  Twelve species of warbler were seen along 
with several scarlet tanagers, male and female RB grosbeaks, oriole, red-eyed 
vireo and Osprey.

The biggest surprise was a somewhat late blue-winged warbler near the 
intersection of trails 4 and 5.
The biggest disappointment was not getting more than a brief look at a baypoll 
with a rich yellowish-green unmarked breast. (Still waiting for my FOS 
unconditional bay-breasted)
The biggest highlight was seeing 3 Tennessee warblers simultaneously in the 
same shrub. (The last time that happened to me was at Little Alley Pond before 
they ruined it by removing the aralia and obscuring the meadow with new 
plantings.)

Warbler list:
Tennessee
Blue-winged
Nashville
Blackpoll
Magnolia
Palm
BT Green
BT Blue
Black and White
Parula
Common yellowthroat
Redstart

Happy Fall Birding!

Peter
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Fwd: [nysbirds-l] Coastal Fallout

[Peter Reisfeld]

There was nice correlation of last night's radar and Steve's observations at 
Jones Beach.  The density of radar reflectivity was moderate, but the overall 
migration appeared to be southeasterly, with peaks ending centered on the 
Nassau-Suffolk border.  Looks like there might be some corrective east-west 
migration on the island during the day. 

Link to loop of last night's radar follows. Most intense reflectivity, 
corresponding to bird density, is in green:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/50403904@N03/15492631781/

NEXRAD images from the National Center for Atmospheric research  
(http://weather.rap.ucar.edu/radar/).

Happy fall birding!

Peter

Begin forwarded message:

 From: Steve Walter swalte...@verizon.net
 Subject: [nysbirds-l] Coastal Fallout
 Date: October 10, 2014 8:42:05 AM EDT
 To: nysbirds-l@cornell.edu nysbirds-l@cornell.edu
 Reply-To: Steve Walter swalte...@verizon.net
 
 Just want to get the word out that Jones Beach and the coast are loaded with 
 birds this morning. Good variety.
 
 Steve Walter
 
 
 Sent from my Verizon Wireless 4G LTE smartphone
 
 
  Original message 
 From: Shaibal Mitra
 Date:10/09/2014 1:09 PM (GMT-05:00)
 To: nysbirds-l@cornell.edu
 Subject: RE: [nysbirds-l] BLACK-HEADED GROSBEAK - Heckscher SP, East Islip, 
 Suffolk Co.
 
 Sean Sime and I searched without success late this morning, and Sean is still 
 on site.
 
 I heard third hand through Pat of a possible re-sighting earlier this 
 morning, in the same area as Phil's last night and of Pat's yesterday 
 morning, but I don't have any details about how well this last bird was seen.
 
 For those considering trying for this bird, I would caution that there is a 
 prodigious amount of fruiting tupelo in the area, attracting hordes of 
 Robins, Waxwings, Starlings, and other birds. Although this enhances the 
 likelihood that the Black-headed Grosbeak might have remained in the area, it 
 also means that it would be natural to expect Rose-breasts to be present also.
 
 Sean had a Red-headed Woodpecker and a Bay-breasted Warbler before I joined 
 him, while I had two Red-headed Woodpeckers at Robert Moses SP, on the beach, 
 earlier in the morning (in addition to large flocks, some 100, of Pine 
 Siskins, many Purple Finches, more than a dozen Rusty Blackbirds, etc.).
 
 Shai Mitra
 Bay Shore
 
 From: bounce-118156826-3714...@list.cornell.edu 
 [bounce-118156826-3714...@list.cornell.edu] on behalf of 
 pjlind...@optonline.net [pjlind...@optonline.net]
 Sent: Wednesday, October 08, 2014 10:08 AM
 To: nysbirds-l@cornell.edu
 Subject: [nysbirds-l] BLACK-HEADED GROSBEAK - Heckscher SP, East Islip, 
 Suffolk Co.
 
 Seen around 8:35 AM from along the bike/exercise trail in the
 southwest corner of the parking lot at Field 1. The call, lower and less
 squeaky than Rose-breasted, reminiscent of a short Downy Woodpecker
 note, got
 my attention and I made a concerted effort to locate it. I had decent
 views of
 the bird for several minutes high in a tree, showing fine streaking on
 the
 sides of the buffy upper breast, and noted the dark upper mandible
 though I did
 not remember the significance of this field mark at the time. The bird
 flew
 across the bike trail towards the north and I lost sight of it behind
 the
 treetops; I did not see the underwings. Very late for work, I had to
 abandon
 the area. Shai Mitra is searching now.
 
 I apologize for not posting sooner--a busy morning at work delayed me.
 
 Patricia Lindsay
 Bay Shore
 
 
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 Celebrate Italian Heritage with a Special Broadway Benefit Concert by the 
 World’s Longest Running Phantom in support of the CSI Italian Studies 
 programhttp://csitoday.com/events/franc-dambrosios-broadway-the-phantom-unmasked/
 
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Re: [nysbirds-l] Brooklyn songbird raptor flight

[Peter Reisfeld]

It was interesting to hear about the large movement at Floyd Bennet Field this 
morning, and that the birds were heading west northwest, not south.  The radar 
last night showed a very high bird density moving southeast, ending centered on 
mid Long Island.  The density dissipated by 6 AM (1000 UTC) as the birds 
descended.   I wonder if this mass of birds having been blown too far eastward, 
might have hit the coastline and turned back west, veering up at sites of 
favorable habitat along their way. 

I saved the radar loop at:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/50403904@N03/14958138434/

Happy fall birding,

Peter
On Oct 19, 2014, at 8:22 PM, Rob Jett citybir...@earthlink.net wrote:

 Just a quick note about today's bird flight from the perspective of Floyd 
 Bennett Field. It was one of the birdiest days at this location that I can 
 remember in a very, very long time.
 
 I led a trip for the Linnaean Society and it was clear from very early that 
 the overnight winds brought in a huge number of passerines. In addition, 
 there seemed to be a near constant stream of raptors with accipiters topping 
 the list for abundance. It was interesting to note that, for whatever 
 reasons, most appeared to be moving WNW not south. 
 
 During the early morning there were hundreds of birds (mainly yellow-rumps 
 and robins) passing overhead or dropping into the community gardens or North 
 40. Yellow-rumped Warblers were ubiquitous, with my best guesstimate being 
 easily a couple of thousand seen or heard. Sparrow numbers were noticeably 
 way up from last weekend, the highlights being a Vesper Sparrow and 
 Clay-colored Sparrow. Both were seen along the berm at the east side of the 
 field opposite Aviator Sports and the soccer fields.
 
 Hurrah for cold fronts!
 
 Good birding,
 
 Rob
 
 **
 
 Floyd Bennett Field, Kings, US-NY
 Oct 19, 2014 8:00 AM - 2:00 PM
 Protocol: Traveling
 6.0 mile(s)
 Comments: Linnaean Society trip led by me. Strong NW winds overnight 
 followed by strong WNW to N winds gusting to 20 mph. Mostly just birded 
 gardens, Ecology Village and North 40.
 62 species
 
 Brant  X Huge number of migrating flocks.
 Canada Goose  X
 Double-crested Cormorant  X
 Osprey  1
 Northern Harrier  8 Huge raptor flight most of the day.
 Sharp-shinned Hawk  X Approx. 20 - 25
 Cooper's Hawk  X Approx. 15 - 20
 Red-shouldered Hawk  1
 Broad-winged Hawk  1 Immature, flying over North 40 and grassland.
 Red-tailed Hawk  3
 Killdeer  4 Flying off field on north side of community gardens.
 American Woodcock  1 North 40 trail.
 Laughing Gull  X
 Ring-billed Gull  X
 Herring Gull  X
 Great Black-backed Gull  X
 Rock Pigeon (Feral Pigeon)  X
 Mourning Dove  X
 Yellow-bellied Sapsucker  2
 Downy Woodpecker  X
 Northern Flicker  X
 American Kestrel  6 Huge raptor flight most of the day.
 Merlin  2
 Peregrine Falcon  2
 Eastern Phoebe  X Approx. 15.
 Blue Jay  5
 American Crow  X
 Tree Swallow  2
 Red-breasted Nuthatch  1
 Brown Creeper  2
 Winter Wren  1 Heard in community garden.
 Carolina Wren  3
 Golden-crowned Kinglet  X
 Ruby-crowned Kinglet  X Abundant.
 Hermit Thrush  4
 American Robin  X
 Gray Catbird  X
 Northern Mockingbird  X
 European Starling  X
 Cedar Waxwing  X
 Common Yellowthroat  3
 Black-throated Blue Warbler  1
 Palm Warbler  30
 Yellow-rumped Warbler  X Abundant, best estimate is approximately 2,000 
 individuals.
 Chipping Sparrow  X
 Clay-colored Sparrow  1 Field opposite Aviator Sports and soccer fields. 
 Photo to follow.
 Field Sparrow  2
 Vesper Sparrow  1
 Savannah Sparrow  X
 Song Sparrow  X
 Swamp Sparrow  X
 White-throated Sparrow  X
 White-crowned Sparrow  5
 Dark-eyed Junco  X
 Northern Cardinal  X
 Indigo Bunting  1
 Red-winged Blackbird  X
 Brown-headed Cowbird  X
 House Finch  X
 Pine Siskin  6 2 flyovers, 4 perched in tree near Return-a-Gift Pond.
 American Goldfinch  X
 House Sparrow  X
 
 View this checklist online at 
 http://ebird.org/ebird/view/checklist?subID=S20280990
 
 This report was generated automatically by eBird v3 (http://ebird.org)
 
 http://citybirder.blogspot.com
 @thecitybirder
 
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Re: [nysbirds-l] Possible Re-sighting of Little Egret and Laughing Gull RFI

[Peter Reisfeld]

While the compilation of data from observation may be useful in studying the 
behavior of birders, the very behavior being studied may be a consequence of 
the ways in which data is used.  The shift toward chasing rarities may not 
relate to changes in human motivation or culture.  Rather, I suspect it is a 
direct result of better access to data, namely the rapid reporting and 
retrieval of birding information due to the proliferation of smart phones and 
use of list serves.  

On a personal note, I have always been appreciative of the welcoming nature of 
the birding community and its generosity in sharing information and advice.  In 
fact, both Shai and Andrew have been amongst the most giving in this regard, 
for which the community is certainly grateful. Nevertheless, while I can 
understand how frustration can evoke negative feelings, a public broadcasting 
of disappointment with the behavior of a generous community is more apt to 
elicit resentment than a positive result.  Public encouragement works better 
than criticism, for family members, fellow birders, and possibly even for 
photographers.  (Though perhaps not for cat lovers.) 

Happy summer birding, 

Peter 


 On Saturday, August 1, 2015 7:52 AM, Shaibal Mitra 
shaibal.mi...@csi.cuny.edu wrote:
   

 Thanks to everyone who shared information about the appearance of juv Laughing 
Gulls along the LI shore this summer. It sounds as though they appeared 
relatively late but, as is sometimes the case, simultaneously in widely 
scattered places. Confirmation of a new breeding site on the island will 
probably have to wait until another year (I believe all the confirmed blocks 
east of Jamaica Bay in the Atlas represent flying juvs).

It's interesting to me that almost all the info about Laughing Gulls, which is 
what I asked for in my post, was offered privately, whereas it was my rather 
secondary--and mild--expression of disappointment about community effort 
patterns that garnered public discussion.  In giving serious thought to the 
various points that were raised, including my own, the only general theme I can 
discern that is worth pursuing is the question of whether or not birding itself 
can be studied, in a manner similar to how we study egrets and Laughing Gulls. 
I believe that it can, and I've scrupulously recorded data regarding the 
birders I've encountered in the field over the past 35 years in an effort to 
document their patterns of abundance, distribution, and behavior--and to look 
for changes or trends in these things.

And what's wrong with that? It's very likely that Andrew could marshall data to 
support his hypothesis about a shift toward alerts-oriented effort; Dave could 
well be drawing on a deep body of background knowledge when he criticizes my 
inability to identify egrets and report them in a satisfactory manner; and Arie 
might be right that his birding and reporting practices, including his chase 
and followup of the Little Egret, have been meritorious. My statement that the 
overall egret-chasing effort collapsed prematurely back on 22 May is not a 
personal attack on any particular person; it is a conclusion based on a large 
body of observations.

It's the information age--the data are out there!

Shai Mitra
Bay Shore


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[nysbirds-l] Long Island sparrows

[Peter Reisfeld]

Went looking for sparrows today.  There were good numbers of grasshopper 
sparrows at EPCAL in Calverton, perhaps due to a number of juveniles trying out 
their wings.  I was also happy to see that the Lark sparrow was still present 
near the volleyball courts east of the Field 2 parking lot at Robert Moses mid 
morning today.  Here's a link to a photo (will upload a video later tonight):

https://m.flickr.com/#/photos/50403904@N03/19759272440/

Happy summer birding,

Peter
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[nysbirds-l] Red Phalarope Continues

[Peter Reisfeld]

After hanging around for 2 hours and missing the bird yesterday morning, I 
deserted my wife for breakfast today to try again.  This time it paid off, as 
the bird was there  and was close to the edge of the pond west of the bird 
blind.  Attached is a link to a video.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/50403904@N03/19475312928/in/dateposted-public/

Happy summer birding, 

Peter
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[nysbirds-l] Sunken Meadow Park

[Peter Reisfeld]

There were only modest densities of birds on radar last night over NYC and Long 
Island, but the range was broad and the velocities were low, suggesting that 
flyover and continuing morning migration might be reduced. To get a sampling of 
birds reaching northern LI I visited the dump area of Sunken Meadow park 
northwest of Field 2.  There was a surprising amount of activity, with lots of 
yellow rumps, song and white throated sparrows, along with swamp sparrows, 
juncos, carolina wren, goldfinch and a couple flocks of house finch.  The most 
numerous bird, however, was cedar waxwing.  There must have been a couple 
hundred birds populating just about every tree along the western edge of the 
lot.  Notable were a pair of bookends; my FOS purple finch, and what will 
undoubtedly be my LOS red-eyed vireo.

Happy end of fall birding,

Peter
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[nysbirds-l] Dickcissel Southward's Pond Park

[Peter Reisfeld]

The very cooperative Dickcissel found yesterday by John Gluth was present this 
morning behind the Park Avenue tennis courts of Southward’s Pond Park.  Shortly 
after 9 he flew way out toward the western horizon, but returned 15 minutes 
later.  Just as I was leaving he plopped down on the lawn 10 feet in front of 
me and posed for this video.  

https://flic.kr/p/CL7GXc

Happy winter birding!

Peter
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[nysbirds-l] Fwd: [ebirdsnyc] Flushing Meadow sparrows

[Peter Reisfeld]

Sorry, the link does not allow scrolling to the other videos.  A link to the 
lark + photobomb video is attached:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/50403904@N03/23601704459/in/dateposted-public/ 
<https://www.flickr.com/photos/50403904@N03/23601704459/in/dateposted-public/>

Happy winter birding, 

Peter

> Begin forwarded message:
> 
> From: "Peter Reisfeld drpi...@yahoo.com [ebirdsnyc]" 
> <ebirdsnyc-nore...@yahoogroups.com>
> Subject: [ebirdsnyc] Flushing Meadow sparrows
> Date: December 25, 2015 at 4:07:00 PM EST
> To: NYSbirds-L@cornell.edu, Ebirds <ebirds...@yahoogroups.com>
> Reply-To: Peter Reisfeld <drpi...@yahoo.com>
> 
> I chased the celebrity sparrow duo along with Andrew for a while this 
> morning, as they moved with the junco flock, along with pine warblers, brown 
> creeper, and white breasted nuthatch. Listening for the nuthatch can provide 
> a clue to the flock location.  
> 
> I’ve uploaded a few videos, hoping to give big brother lark sparrow some 
> screen time. But in the last one, the clay colored couldn’t help but try to 
> steal the spotlight with a photobombing cameo (watch carefully just past 
> midway). 
> 
> https://www.flickr.com/photos/50403904@N03/23969998295/in/dateposted-public/ 
> <https://www.flickr.com/photos/50403904@N03/23969998295/in/dateposted-public/>
> 
> Happy winter birding, 
> 
> Peter 
> 
> __._,_.___
> Posted by: Peter Reisfeld <drpi...@yahoo.com <mailto:drpi...@yahoo.com>> 
> Reply via web post 
> <https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/ebirdsnyc/conversations/messages/15721;_ylc=X3oDMTJyMTNkb3Q3BF9TAzk3MzU5NzE0BGdycElkAzEzMzM2MzUwBGdycHNwSWQDMTcwNTA2NTc4NwRtc2dJZAMxNTcyMQRzZWMDZnRyBHNsawNycGx5BHN0aW1lAzE0NTEwNzc2MjU-?act=reply=15721>
>   •   Reply to sender  
> <mailto:drpi...@yahoo.com?subject=Re%3A%20Flushing%20Meadow%20sparrows>   
>  •   Reply to group  
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>  (1)
> ebirdsnyc: bird sightings from the NYC area 
> VISIT YOUR GROUP 
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[nysbirds-l] EPCAL, Calverton 6/11

[Peter Reisfeld]

I visited EPCAL in Calverton in hoping to see the resident blue grosbeak.  
While I struck out with the grosbeak, I had a very pleasant morning at this 
lovely property, viewing grasshopper and field sparrows, good numbers of pine 
and prairie warblers, orchard orioles, flycatchers, and a yellow-billed cuckoo 
who, withstanding the traffic on Grumman Blvd and my phone alarm, remarkably 
continued c-c-c-c-c-c-c-kowlping for almost 3 minutes, all while being 
serenaded by oriole and prairie warbler song. 

Here is a link to a video if this, along with a puffy little grasshopper 
sparrow, and an eastern kingbird regurgitating a pellet:

https://www.flickr.com/gp/50403904@N03/s64e9Q

Happy summer birding,

Peter 
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[nysbirds-l] Kentucky warbler, Muttontown preserve continues

[Peter Reisfeld]

Heard off of an asphalt east-west path, just north of trial 7 and east of the 
Walled garden.  Coordinates are 40.826833,-73.534751.   The bird was singing 
intermittently at 9AM in this location and then headed further south into an 
area further from pathways. 

Happy birding, 

Peter
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[nysbirds-l] Fwd: Kentucky warbler, Muttontown preserve continues

[Peter Reisfeld]

Ooops. East-west path is just SOUTH of trail 7. 

> Begin forwarded message:
> 
> From: Peter Reisfeld <drpi...@yahoo.com>
> Subject: Kentucky warbler, Muttontown preserve continues
> Date: May 30, 2016 at 10:45:07 AM EDT
> To: "NYSbirds-L@cornell.edu" <NYSbirds-L@cornell.edu>
> 
> Heard off of an asphalt east-west path, just north of trial 7 and east of the 
> Walled garden.  Coordinates are 40.826833,-73.534751.   The bird was singing 
> intermittently at 9AM in this location and then headed further south into an 
> area further from pathways. 
> 
> Happy birding, 
> 
> Peter


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[nysbirds-l] Red headed woodpecker Connetquot park Oakdale

[Peter Reisfeld]

There is a gorgeous redheaded woodpecker frequenting the feeders south of the 
paddock between the blue barn and the main houses at Connetquot. Here is a link 
to a video

https://flic.kr/p/HxcCcP

Happy late spring birding

Peter

Sent from who knows where
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[nysbirds-l] Swainson's warbler

[Peter Reisfeld]

Video of the Central Park star
https://flic.kr/p/GzajmK

Happy spring birding

Peter

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Re: [nysbirds-l] Radar

[Peter Reisfeld]

For looking at specific radar stations I like the NCAR site. It is pretty 
basic, but one can conveniently vary the loop interval to go back to sunset and 
get the takeoff and evolution of the densities.  Also in single image mode, a 
click on the screen changes it to velocity mode useful to see exactly which 
direction and how fast the birds are flying. The link is:

http://weather.rap.ucar.edu/radar/ 

Peter

 
> On May 15, 2016, at 6:05 PM, Jim Osterlund  wrote:
> 
> I can’t say what’s “best”.  I check weather at NWS - National Mosaic Enhanced 
> Radar Image: Full Resolution Loop 
>  anyway, so an occasional bird 
> event is just a plus.
> --
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Re: [nysbirds-l] Radar

[Peter Reisfeld]

For looking at specific radar stations I like the NCAR site. It is pretty 
basic, but one can conveniently vary the loop interval to go back to sunset and 
get the takeoff and evolution of the densities.  Also in single image mode, a 
click on the screen changes it to velocity mode useful to see exactly which 
direction and how fast the birds are flying. The link is:

http://weather.rap.ucar.edu/radar/ 

Peter

> On May 15, 2016, at 4:20 PM, Ben Mirin  wrote:
> 
> Hi all, what's your favorite/the best resource for monitoring radar online? 
> 
> Many thanks,
> Ben
> 
> On Sunday, May 15, 2016, Jim Osterlund  > wrote:
> Then I’ll add;
> 
> Sagtikos / Sunken Meadow Parkway, LIE Exit 53.
> --
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> 
> --
> 
> 
> 
> -- 
> Sent from my iPhone. I wish it could spell.
> Benjamin Mirin
> 
> Ben on National Geographic
> Ben on National Public Radio
> Ben's TED talk
> Ben's YouTube Channel
> 
> Mobile (USA): (978) 509-5404
> Twitter: @benmirin
> 
> 
> 
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[nysbirds-l] Doodletown Road 5/12

[Peter Reisfeld]

I made my annual pilgrimage to Doodletown Road today in the pleasant company of 
Bob and Collen Veltri.  We saw good numbers of ceruleans, including females on 
nest.  Hoodeds were everywhere, often singing alternate songs, one of which was 
a spitting image of a yellow throated warbler. When we finally saw the bird who 
was singing, it was the first time in my life I was disappointed to see a 
hooded warbler.  

Our main target , however, was the Kentucky. We were encouraged when we ran 
into Tom Burke and Gail Benson at the intersection of Doodletown and Pleasant 
Valley road who had just seen the bird further up Doodletown.  The bird had 
been seen just past the bridge as well as further up the hill, but we struck 
out at both sites.  We returned after birding Pleasant Valley to reports that 
the bird was again singing just past the bridge. We hurried up the road only to 
run into a road block.  There was a group of hikers that decided to do their 
business right where the bird was singing, and their mates asked us to wait to 
respect their privacy. It seemed like forever, but the bird was still singing 
when we were finally allowed entry.  That’s when one of the hikers blew her 
whistle to alert all their members they were leaving.  With my hearing aids 
turned all the way up, it almost pierced my ear drums. Needless to say, after 
that the bird was gone. 

We licked our wounds and headed further up the hill to the alternate location.  
But before long we were rewarded with ground level views, as the Kentucky was 
attracted by a termite hatch in a fallen log.

Here’s a link to videos of the Kentucky, a male and female cerulean on nest, 
and a female cerulean building her nest. 

https://flic.kr/s/aHskA1GEim

Just another reminder for those thinking of coming up on Sunday, that  Rt 9 
will be closed on May 15 until 1PM for to a bicycle race. 

Happy spring birding!

Peter

https://flic.kr/s/aHskA1GEim
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Re: [nysbirds-l] Kings County Cerulean, Yellow-throated Warbler + Radar/Wind discussion

[Peter Reisfeld]

I have also noticed that there have been a number of days this season in which 
there was good migration reported on the ground, but relatively low densities 
seen on radar.  While the variation of wind direction at different altitudes 
may offer a path for birds to migrate on nights that the predominant winds are 
not favorable, It still doesn’t explain why more birds are not showing up on 
radar.  Are they migrating so low that they fly “under the radar”?  Do they 
have some sort of natural “stealth” mechanism to avoid showing up as 
reflectance?  Or are the numbers still relatively modest but local weather 
circumstances are just concentrating them in certain of our parks? 

 It will be interesting to see what we see on the ground when the densities 
pick up a bit.

Peter.
 On May 2, 2016, at 3:57 PM, Sean Sime  wrote:
> 
> I was fortunate enough to see the male Cerulean Warbler in Prospect Park this 
> morning and equally fortunate to be standing near Karen Ohearn when she said, 
> "I've got a Yellow-throated Warbler!" 
> Both birds were near the southern terminus of the Lullwater adjacent to the 
> winter bird feeding station. A checklist with ID quality photos can be seen 
> here.
> 
> http://ebird.org/ebird/view/checklist?subID=S29356904 
> 
> 
> For those on the list that watch radar and wind maps, last night offered a 
> true 'teachable moment." The surface winds were from the NE and SE overnight. 
> There was no visible lift off north of Virginia on radar maps as of 10:30pm 
> and no measurable drop out this morning at 5:30am.
> 
> I use this radar link:
> http://radar.weather.gov/Conus/northeast_loop.php 
> 
> 
> And this wind map:
> http://earth.nullschool.net/#current/wind/isobaric/1000hPa/orthographic=-76.16,41.82,2048/loc=-73.010,40.993
>  
> 
> 
> Given what was visible (to me) I decided to not be out first thing. As tweets 
> from Prospect Park starting coming in it was clear birds moved last night. So 
> curiosity prompted some conversation. What Shane Blodgett was kind enough to 
> point out was on the wind map I use one can search by elevation. By clicking 
> the "earth" icon in the lower left corner of the wind map you can change the 
> height for the wind readings. I have more research to do, but by changing the 
> height to 850 (this is a pressure reading, but correlates with the altitudes 
> birds migrate at) I could immediately see the mid-level winds were from the 
> SW overnight and provided an explanation for the influx of birds in the park 
> and along the coast this morning.
> 
> If other list members have more/other sites they find useful in this regard 
> please share. The technology and information accessible at our fingertips is 
> exciting!
> 
> Good birding!
> 
> Sean Sime
> Brooklyn, NY
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> --
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Re: [nysbirds-l] Heavy Nocturnal Flight Binghamton Airport Last Night

[Peter Reisfeld]

This observation by David  may help explain the migration/radar paradox we have 
been observing. Perhaps when birds migrate under cloudy conditions, they are 
more likely to fly low and therefore escape detection by radar. 

Peter
Sent from who knows where

> On May 5, 2016, at 7:34 AM, David Nicosia  wrote:
> 
> I got finished by with work at 11 pm last evening and
> in the parking lot before I got into my car I heard a
> "stream" of chips, zips, zeets and zeeps! I listened for about
> 5 minutes and it was constant. There were at least 3 SOLITARY
> SANDPIPERS that flew by. Additionally, I was surprised to hear
> a BARN SWALLOW and right before I left
> an early SWAINSON'S THRUSH!! The birds were very low
> as cloud ceilings has dropped to a few hundred feet
> and there was a heavy drizzle falling. 
> 
> When I arrived at home which is at 1300 feet a few hundred
> feet lower than the airport I still could hear the chips, zips
> and zeeps etc but they were higher up. I listened for
> several more minutes and heard one more SOLITARY
> SANDPIPER but nothing else than I could ID. The radar
> shows modest echoes at this time.
> 
> Dave Nicosia
> 
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[nysbirds-l] Connecticut warbler Alley pond

[Peter Reisfeld]

A Connecticut warbler was found this AM by Eric Miller on the paved path to 
Little Alley Pond as reached from the stairway going down from Vanderbilt 
Parkway

Great birds here today

Peter

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[nysbirds-l] Alley Pond Park 8/27 AM including Lawrence's hybrid

[Peter Reisfeld]

While not exactly hopping, there were clearly more migrants at Alley Pond park 
today than on my 2 previous jaunts this fall season. I saw 8 species of warbler 
including Canada, BT green and a remarkable 7 chestnut-sided warblers in 
various locations within the park.  But the highlight was a male Lawrence’s 
hybrid warbler in a poorly accessible area at the southern end of the Acadaian 
kettle.  Documenting photos are on my ebird list: 

http://ebird.org/ebird/view/checklist/S31270784
  
For those who wish to try, from Vanderbilt motor parkway take the short 3 or 4 
step stairway (with the Caution sign at the top) up to the asphalt path that 
parallels the parkway just north of it.  There you can look down into a deep 
kettle hole with a stand of Aralia at the bottom. The bird (along with a couple 
of chestnut-sideds) was in this area. 

Good luck and good birding,

Peter
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[nysbirds-l] City Hall Park Videos

[Peter Reisfeld]

While I was able to get nice video from the cooperative Chat 
(https://vimeo.com/193100449) , the Tanager just kept moving, mostly up high in 
bad light.  The only decent shot was a snippet of the bird pooping.  So for 
those interested, enjoy:

https://vimeo.com/193100508

Happy vagrant birding,

Peter
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[nysbirds-l] Western tanager City hall park

[Peter Reisfeld]

Present this AM spotted by Paul Bordon in trees above eastern portion of east 
west path

Peter

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[nysbirds-l] Kissena Park 10/30

[Peter Reisfeld]

I birded Kissena Park for a couple hours this AM with Jeff Ritter and Bob and 
Collen Veltri.  A bit of stuff must have come in under the radar during the 
past few days, because it was surprisingly birdy.  Most numerous were robins 
and song sparrows,many of whom were singing on this warm fall morning, but 
there were more interesting birds as well.  

We started at the ballfields.  With multiple football games going on, field 9 
was the only quiet one.  Things were quite active there, with white-crowned, 
field and Savannah sparrows seen.  But the highlight was a trio of vesper 
sparrows first noted on the chain link backstop, and later on the field where 
they were joined by an American Pippit. (Of note, when I returned later in the 
morning the vespers had moved to field 6.).  

We then headed for the orchard, east of the velodrome, were we saw swamp and 
song sparrows, a few ruby crowned kinglets, and a brown thrasher. The orchard’s 
highlight, however, was a delicate, orange-crowned warbler, flitting around the 
cottony flower seeds.  On the way out, we looked into the middle of the 
velodrome were we saw a bright yellow Eastern Meadowlark amongst all the 
robins.  (It may have been the one Cesar Castillo had found earlier in the 
week.)  What a beauty. 

Lastly, we headed over to the corridor for a quick once around.  In addition to 
phoebes, hermit thrushes, and blue headed vireos, we finally saw good numbers 
of finches, including gold, house, and and at least 2 female purple finches. 

Here is a link to some photos of these birds, and to a video of the meadowlark:

https://flic.kr/s/aHskKz9yRt
https://vimeo.com/189529619

Happy late fall birding,

Peter
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[nysbirds-l] Sparrows at Jones Beach 10/15

[Peter Reisfeld]

I birded Jones Beach this morning with Bob Veltri and Jeff Ritter, hoping to 
see some migrating sparrows.  Bob’s intuition to pick Jones was a good one, and 
was confirmed by the moderate levels of reflectivity on radar dispersing over 
mid long island this morning.  

While initially things were slow, presumably due to a combination of cold and 
numerous raptors (including merlins, sharp-shinned and Coopers hawks, peregrine 
falcon, and northern harrier), the activity picked up later in the morning.  
Amongst all the yellow rumps and golden-crowned kinglets, we were able to find 
11 species of sparrow including lark, clay-colored, white-crowned, field, 
savannah, chipping, swamp, song, white-throated, junco and towee.   I had to 
leave early and missed the lark (originally found by Ken Feustel).  Jeff had 
located the clay-colored for our group at the far west turnaround, and I 
returned in the late afternoon, to see if I could absorb this subtly beautiful 
bird.  It was still there at sunset, if you’d like to try tomorrow.  Here is a 
link to a video:

https://vimeo.com/187499936

Happy fall birding, 

Peter
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Fwd: [nysbirds-l] New Empidonax identification tip

[Peter Reisfeld]

While I do not profess expertise in this matter, I just wanted to comment on 
the study by Baumann et. al in the Journal of Field Ornithology on 
distinguishing Western and yellow bellied flycatchers.  While precise 
separation of these species required in-the-hand measurement of wing and buffy 
fringe lengths, as others have noted, the space between the proximal edge of 
the buffy fringing on the secondaries and lower wing bar was judged to be a 
good field mark, with a larger space favoring yellow-bellied. 

Some have suggested that this article supports categorizing the Inwood 
flycatcher as yellow-bellied. Yet in the photo on page 395 used to illustrate 
this, the band between the lower wing bar and the top edge of the fringe is 
about 1/3 of the length of the visible secondaries on the yellow-bellied, while 
not more than 1/4 of this length on the western.  Looking at some of the photos 
of the Inwood bird, the band is much closer to 1/4 than 1/3.  While there may 
well be some variability in this feature in the field, if the photo from the 
article is an accurate representation of the validity of this field mark, it 
would suggest that the Inwood bird is more likely western than yellow-bellied, 
not the reverse.

Peter

(This message was resent as I could not find my first response on the list. 
Pardon any duplication.) 

> Begin forwarded message:
> 
> From: Anders Peltomaa 
> Subject: Re: FW: [nysbirds-l] New Empidonax identification tip
> Date: December 9, 2016 at 11:01:36 AM EST
> To: Shaibal Mitra 
> Cc: "NYSBIRDS (NYSBIRDS-L@cornell.edu)" 
> Reply-To: Anders Peltomaa 
> 
> Thanks for the reminder Shai,
> 
> Here is a link to a PDF of the article that Joe referenced.
> 
> https://biology.unm.edu/Witt/pub_files/Baumann-etal-2014-JFO-yellow-Empid-ID-jofo12078.pdf
> 
> good birding,
> 
> Anders Peltomaa
> Manhattan
> 
> On Fri, Dec 9, 2016 at 9:12 AM, Shaibal Mitra 
> wrote:
> 
>> In a really nice example of how this list serves as institutional memory
>> for our community, Dave Klauber just reminded me of this very relevant post
>> from Joe DiCostanzo, from December 2014. It details the foundation of the
>> wing pattern feature mentioned in the Whatbird discussions, and I would
>> agree that this feature also favors Yellow-bellied Flycatcher.
>> 
>> It's not fun to admit this, but the things I learn nowadays don't stick
>> with me to nearly the same degree as the things I learned before, say 2000!
>> So n.b. to those whose brains are still limber: don't put off learning
>> until later, front-load the data hoarding as much as possible!
>> 
>> From: bounce-118614530-3714...@list.cornell.edu > list.cornell.edu> on behalf of Joe DiCostanzo 
>> Sent: Wednesday, December 10, 2014 7:24 PM
>> To: NYSBirds
>> Subject: [nysbirds-l] New Empidonax identification tip
>> 
>> 
>> Just got the current issue of the Journal of Field Ornithology (vol. 85,
>> no. 4, December 2014). I figure this is not a journal that most birders
>> check for ID articles so I thought I would draw attention to an article in
>> it: “Simple technique for distinguishing Yellow-bellied Flycatchers from
>> Cordilleran and Pacific-slope flycatchers by M. J. Baumann, S. C. Galen, N.
>> D. Pederson and C. C. Witt. Pp. 391-396. Anyone interested should read the
>> article for all the details, many of which involve measurements that can
>> only be done in the hand, but there is one character that can be used to
>> distinguish Yellow-bellied Flycatcher from “Western Flycatcher” (the
>> complex composed of Cordilleran and Pacific-slope flys.). It involves the
>> space on the folded wing between the lower wing bar and the start of the
>> pale fringes on the secondaries. This space is much larger in the
>> Yellow-bellied than in the “Western”. I pulled out a few field guides from
>> my bookshelf to see if it was distinguishable in published illustrations. I
>> found it was apparent in the photos in Kenn Kaufman’s Birds of North
>> America (at least in the first edition that I have). It was also obvious in
>> Dave Sibley’s paintings of these species in his Second Edition of the
>> Sibley Guide to Birds (I didn’t check the first edition). The authors of
>> the Journal of Field Ornithology article tested their technique on 113
>> museum specimens that had been identified based on locality. They found
>> their technique correctly place 112 of the specimens. One specimen labeled
>> as a Yellow-bellied Flycatcher that had been collected in Illinois was
>> identified as a “Western Flycatcher” by their technique. Amazingly, when
>> the mtDNA of this specimen was examined, the specimen proved to be a
>> “Western Flycatcher”, the first for the complex for Illinois!
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> Distinguishing a Yellow-bellied Fly from a “Western Fly” has not 

Re: [nysbirds-l] New Empidonax identification tip

[Peter Reisfeld]

While I do not profess expertise in this matter, I just wanted to comment on 
the study by Baumann et. al in the Journal of Field Ornithology on 
distinguishing Western and yellow bellied flycatcher. While precise separation 
required in the hand measurement of wing and buffy fringe lengths, as others 
have noted the space space between the proximal edge of the buffy fringing on 
the secondaries and lower wing bar was judged to be a good field mark. 

On the photo used to illustrate this, the band between the lower wing bar and 
the top edge of the fringe is about 1/3 of the length of the visible 
secondaries on the yellow-bellied, while not more than 1/4 of this length on 
the western.  Looking at several of the photos of the Inwood bird, the band is 
much closer to 1/4 than 1/3.  I think this would support western, rather than 
yellow, as some have previously commented.

Peter
> On Dec 9, 2016, at 11:01 AM, Anders Peltomaa  
> wrote:
> 
> Thanks for the reminder Shai,
> 
> Here is a link to a PDF of the article that Joe referenced.
> 
> https://biology.unm.edu/Witt/pub_files/Baumann-etal-2014-JFO-yellow-Empid-ID-jofo12078.pdf
> 
> good birding,
> 
> Anders Peltomaa
> Manhattan
> 
> On Fri, Dec 9, 2016 at 9:12 AM, Shaibal Mitra 
> wrote:
> 
>> In a really nice example of how this list serves as institutional memory
>> for our community, Dave Klauber just reminded me of this very relevant post
>> from Joe DiCostanzo, from December 2014. It details the foundation of the
>> wing pattern feature mentioned in the Whatbird discussions, and I would
>> agree that this feature also favors Yellow-bellied Flycatcher.
>> 
>> It's not fun to admit this, but the things I learn nowadays don't stick
>> with me to nearly the same degree as the things I learned before, say 2000!
>> So n.b. to those whose brains are still limber: don't put off learning
>> until later, front-load the data hoarding as much as possible!
>> 
>> From: bounce-118614530-3714...@list.cornell.edu > list.cornell.edu> on behalf of Joe DiCostanzo 
>> Sent: Wednesday, December 10, 2014 7:24 PM
>> To: NYSBirds
>> Subject: [nysbirds-l] New Empidonax identification tip
>> 
>> 
>> Just got the current issue of the Journal of Field Ornithology (vol. 85,
>> no. 4, December 2014). I figure this is not a journal that most birders
>> check for ID articles so I thought I would draw attention to an article in
>> it: “Simple technique for distinguishing Yellow-bellied Flycatchers from
>> Cordilleran and Pacific-slope flycatchers by M. J. Baumann, S. C. Galen, N.
>> D. Pederson and C. C. Witt. Pp. 391-396. Anyone interested should read the
>> article for all the details, many of which involve measurements that can
>> only be done in the hand, but there is one character that can be used to
>> distinguish Yellow-bellied Flycatcher from “Western Flycatcher” (the
>> complex composed of Cordilleran and Pacific-slope flys.). It involves the
>> space on the folded wing between the lower wing bar and the start of the
>> pale fringes on the secondaries. This space is much larger in the
>> Yellow-bellied than in the “Western”. I pulled out a few field guides from
>> my bookshelf to see if it was distinguishable in published illustrations. I
>> found it was apparent in the photos in Kenn Kaufman’s Birds of North
>> America (at least in the first edition that I have). It was also obvious in
>> Dave Sibley’s paintings of these species in his Second Edition of the
>> Sibley Guide to Birds (I didn’t check the first edition). The authors of
>> the Journal of Field Ornithology article tested their technique on 113
>> museum specimens that had been identified based on locality. They found
>> their technique correctly place 112 of the specimens. One specimen labeled
>> as a Yellow-bellied Flycatcher that had been collected in Illinois was
>> identified as a “Western Flycatcher” by their technique. Amazingly, when
>> the mtDNA of this specimen was examined, the specimen proved to be a
>> “Western Flycatcher”, the first for the complex for Illinois!
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> Distinguishing a Yellow-bellied Fly from a “Western Fly” has not come up
>> yet in New York, but hey, you never know.
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> Joe DiCostanzo
>> 
>> www.greatgullisland.org
>> 
>> www.inwoodbirder.blogspot.com
>> 
>> [http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-zlSALCVoYnM/U0SFqj6uWfI/
>> AWQ/xYjr3pf15r0/s80/Joe.jpg]>> 
>> 
>> Inwood Birder
>> www.inwoodbirder.blogspot.com
>> A very pretty morning in the Ramble for my Thursday morning AMNH bird walk
>> group. It would have been an even prettier morning if there had been more
>> birds around!
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> --
>> NYSbirds-L List Info:
>> Welcome and 

[nysbirds-l] Townsend Solitaire Southold

[Peter Reisfeld]

For the benefit of birding procrastinators everywhere the Townsend Solitaire 
was again present at about 8:05 on the cedar between 1725 and 1625 North Sea 
Drive in Southold.  He then erratically flew into various bare deciduous trees 
south of the road.  Dull video on ebird checklist for couch birders and those 
having a slow day. http://ebird.org/ebird/view/checklist/S33580421

Good winter birding, 

Peter
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[nysbirds-l] Continuing birds at Kissena and Plandome

[Peter Reisfeld]

Having done the Christmas bird count with Jeff Ritter last week, I decided to 
revisit the Kissena Park on Christmas day to see what was still around.  While 
numbers were down a bit from last week, the Red-headed woodpecker continues to 
be an active presence, and can heard loudly rattling on the western side of the 
hill south of the lake.  

While looking for the winter wren seen last week at Eric Miller’s secret 
warbler spot north of the golf course, I was surprised to find a house wren, a 
pretty rare bird for late December. (And one which would have been a nice 
addition to the count last week.  Oh well...)  

Then on my way home I stopped at the parking area north of the Plandome train 
station looking for the yellow-breasted chat.  Having dipped on Thursday and 
not heard any further reports, I didn’t expect much. But when I arrived, he was 
sitting on top of a brush pile on the left of the path near the 5 door garage.  
And in typical chat fashion, he disappeared before I could take a photo.  

Good winter birding to all, 

Peter
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[nysbirds-l] Eared Grebe Oak Beach

[Peter Reisfeld]

Third time was a charm.  This morning around 10 AM the eared grebe finally 
graciously cooperated by appearing relatively close to shore, and then by 
joining with his horned cousin for prolonged looks.  Seen far west of the 
entrance approaching the Sore Thumb peninsula.  Here’s a link to a video. (It 
was windy so you may want to turn down the volume.):

https://vimeo.com/210827442

Happy spring birding,

Peter
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[nysbirds-l] Woodcocks in Massapequa

[Peter Reisfeld]

Timberdoodlemania is not just confined to New York City. Around 1PM today as I 
was searching (unsuccessfully) for the Northern Goshawk at the Massapequa 
Preserve I surprised 3 American woodcocks just west of the Pittsburgh Avenue 
lake. Also seen in the park were killdeer and an overwintering catbird. Looks 
to be an interesting migration this year. 

Good birding, 

Peter
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[nysbirds-l] Dueling Prothonotaries

[Peter Reisfeld]

The curse has been broken.  After dipping on my last 8 attempts in 3 states, 
today I got not only one, but TWO prothonotary warblers!  Many thanks to the 
wonderful birding community, to Gabriel Willow for finding the Marine Park 
bird, to Eric Miller for valiantly rescuing it from the clutches of a mussel a 
couple days ago, and to Jeff Ritter for relocating it today for Bobby Veltri 
and I.  And thanks as well to Sam Jannazzo for finding the Lido bird (along 
with an orange-crowned warbler!).  This one was possibly even cuter.  You 
decide.  

Here are links to videos of both prothonotaries. 

Marine Park:  https://vimeo.com/213370132

Lido Preserve:  https://vimeo.com/213370448

(Notice how I deftly took a snapshot of the Lido bird precisely after it had 
just flown.) 

As a bonus, we had clapper rail and marsh wren at Marine park.  Here’s a video 
(of it clapping??):  https://vimeo.com/213370919

Happy spring migration birding,

Peter


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[nysbirds-l] Kentucky warbler. Alley pond park, Queens.

[Peter Reisfeld]

 blockquote, div.yahoo_quoted { margin-left: 0 !important; border-left:1px 
#715FFA solid !important; padding-left:1ex !important; background-color:white 
!important; } 
Birding with Jeff Ritter and the Veltris north of Decadon pond.   Hooded and 
blue-winged found earlier by the Veltris in an area reached by taking the trail 
east of the pond north and past an intersecting trail.  Continue north for 
about 100 yards. Kentucky was seen on the left in area of singing blue wing.  
Kentucky was not vocalizing.  Responded one time to spishing.  




Good birding




Peter


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Re: [nysbirds-l] nysbirds-l digest: May 26, 2017

[Peter Reisfeld]

That’s ridiculous.  Mastodons don’t congregate in colonies.  It’s obviously 
pseudomonas mendocina. 

Peter
> On May 26, 2017, at 7:35 AM, Rick  wrote:
> 
> Pleistocene Mastodon? 
>  
> From: bounce-121561409-3714...@list.cornell.edu 
> [mailto:bounce-121561409-3714...@list.cornell.edu] On Behalf Of Jay D
> Sent: Friday, May 26, 2017 5:47 AM
> To: & [NYSBIRDS] 
> Subject: Re:[nysbirds-l] nysbirds-l digest: May 26, 2017
>  
> "Raven attacking PM colony"
> What does "PM" mean?
>  
> On Fri, May 26, 2017 at 12:09 AM, & [NYSBIRDS] digest 
> > wrote:
>> NYSBIRDS-L Digest for Friday, May 26, 2017.
>> 
>> 1. Swainson's Warbler yes. Prospect Park
>> 2. Raven in Shelter Island
>> 3. Re: Henslow's Sparrow
>> 4. Swainson's Warbler Prospect Park
>> 5. Red necked Phalarope on Staten Island
>> 6. Swainson's Warbler persists in Prospect Park Mid Wood area circa 3PM 
>> Thursday
>> 7. Raven attacking PM colony
>> 8. Prospect park Swainson's warbler kings
>> 9. RBA Buffalo Bird Report 25 May 2017
>> 10. eBird.org: Recent Additions to County Checklists
>> 11. Franklin's Gull, shorebirds - Niagara and Orleans Counties
>> 
>> --
>> 
>> Subject: Swainson's Warbler yes. Prospect Park
>> From: Rob Bate >
>> Date: Thu, 25 May 2017 07:24:48 -0400
>> X-Message-Number: 1
>> 
>> Tom Stephenson reports the Swainson's Warbler is still present in the 
>> Midwood area of Prospect Park. Same area as yesterday.
>> 
>> Rob Bate
>> Brooklyn
>> --
>> 
>> Subject: Raven in Shelter Island
>> From: Orhan Birol >
>> Date: Thu, 25 May 2017 10:19:51 -0400
>> X-Message-Number: 2
>> 
>> Not sure reportable any more but there was a Raven soaring and calling over
>> my house yesterday evening.
>> Orhan Birol
>> Shelter Island
>> 
>> --
>> 
>> Subject: Re: Henslow's Sparrow
>> From: Anders Peltomaa > >
>> Date: Thu, 25 May 2017 10:41:53 -0400
>> X-Message-Number: 3
>> 
>> Brilliant photos of the Henslow's Sparrow at Shawangunk posted by Felipe
>> Pimentel to New York Birders Facebook page.
>> The photo album is public so it should be viewable on the web, without
>> Facebook account.
>> 
>> https://www.facebook.com/felipe.pimentel1 
>> 
>> 
>> good birding,
>> 
>> Anders Peltomaa
>> Manhattan
>> 
>> On Wed, May 24, 2017 at 4:59 PM, syschiff > > wrote:
>> 
>> > Henslow's Sparrow update
>> >
>> > This species was long a resident on the grass lands of the Saratoga
>> > Battlefields. The staff found that the birds needed to have the grass
>> > burned or cut for the habitat to be maintained and for them to continue to
>> > breed in the area.  So they cut the grass at the proper time of year all
>> > over. And the sparrows disappeared.  What subsequent research discovered
>> > was, the Henslow's Sparrows breed in second and third year growth. You
>> > can't cut the grass every year. You have to rotate your cutting.
>> >
>> > Attempts to reintroduce this species anywhere has been mostly a total
>> > failure. Hence, the sighting of a singing bird in the Shawangunk Grassland
>> >   is an *extraordinary event.*  They are doing every thing right.  It's a
>> > great place to visit and it's a paradise for birders looking for grassland
>> > birds. They have parking, viewing platforms and blinds.
>> >
>> > The bird song is unique. They sing loudly from a clump top but are can be
>> > hard to see. Lets not go playing songs and chasing the bird. Be patient and
>> > look. This is a new breeding area and we need them to be successful now and
>> > for the future.
>> >
>> > Sy Schiff
>> >
>> > --
>> > *NYSbirds-L List Info:*
>> > Welcome and Basics > > >
>> > Rules and Information > > >
>> > Subscribe, Configuration and Leave
>> > > > >
>> > *Archives:*
>> > The Mail Archive
>> > > > >
>> > Surfbirds > > >
>> > ABA > > >
>> > *Please 

[nysbirds-l] Summer tanager Forest park

[Peter Reisfeld]

 blockquote, div.yahoo_quoted { margin-left: 0 !important; border-left:1px 
#715FFA solid !important; padding-left:1ex !important; background-color:white 
!important; } ON Park Lane South at waterhole entrance along w Cape May and 
indigo bunting. Found by Mike Veder. 


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Re: [nysbirds-l] Hooded Warblers and the Slingshot

[Peter Reisfeld]

Great article (evidencing a ton of hard work) by Shai and Pat proposing a 
slingshot event to describe the migration of early 2005, and which showed the 
same pattern as our current April migration.  

There is corroborating evidence on radar to suggest a weather related boost for 
the most recent migration wave.  Looking at the radar loops at Paul Hurtado’s 
radar site: http://www.pauljhurtado.com/US_Composite_Radar/ , you can see that 
on the nights of April 24 and 25 there was storm activity from the southeast 
which reached landfall along a broad area in of the mid-Atlantic coastline. 
This was followed by a pattern of fairly heavy migration starting from Delaware 
and Maryland on the 26, and fully reaching our area over the night of the 27th. 
 This corresponds well to the most recent surge of “southern” migrants with 
ebird and listserv reports  starting 4/28 of summer tanager, blue grosbeak,  
and kentucky warbler, along with smaller numbers of prothonotary warbler and 
yellow throated warbler.

In light of this phenomenon, this might be a good time to get out and check 
some of our underbirded parks. Who knows? There might be a Swainson’s out there 
somewhere waiting to be discovered. 

Good spring birding

Peter 
> On Apr 29, 2017, at 8:47 PM, Shaibal Mitra  wrote:
> 
> An unusual number of Hooded Warblers were found on Long Island and vicinity 
> today, in conjunction with Blue Grosbeaks and Summer Tanagers--and also 
> seasonally early examples of female Indigo Buntings and Rose-breasted 
> Grosbeaks. In contrast, the migrant species typically most abundant at this 
> date--Myrtle & Palm Warblers, Savannah & White-throated Sparrows, etc.--were 
> present in at best modest numbers at Long Island's migrant traps today. This 
> disparity is the signature of a slingshot event, set in motion days ago and 
> hundreds of miles away, with the displacement of trans-Gulf migrants over the 
> Atlantic.
> 
> Please be sure to report or eBird all Hooded Warblers seen in coastal New 
> York, so that an accurate total can be tabulated.
> 
> Whereas most rare-scarce warblers in southeastern NYS tend to occur during 
> the biggest spring flights of common warblers, Hooded and Prothonotary tend 
> to occur here in association with grosbeaks and tanagers, on otherwise slow 
> days. For a discussion of slingshots and different kinds of spring flights, 
> see:
> 
> http://www.nybirds.org/KBsearch/y2005v55n3/y2005v55n3p213-227mitra.pdf#
> 
> Shai Mitra
> Bay Shore
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[nysbirds-l] prothonotary Strack pond Forest park

[Peter Reisfeld]

 blockquote, div.yahoo_quoted { margin-left: 0 !important; border-left:1px 
#715FFA solid !important; padding-left:1ex !important; background-color:white 
!important; } Photo of a beauty. Thanks Corey and Ceasar. Prothonotary Strack 
pond 
  
|  
|   
|   
|   ||

   |

  |
|  
|   |  
Prothonotary Strack pond
 
Explore warblerwave's photos on Flickr. warblerwave has uploaded 253 photos to 
Flickr.
  |   |

  |

  |

 



Sent from Yahoo Mail for iPhone

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[nysbirds-l] Connecticut warbler at Alley Pond Park

[Peter Reisfeld]

Off trail bordering the Grand Central Parkway where it meets the Cross Island 
Expressway. Found by (who else?) Eric Miller. 

Sent from who knows where
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[nysbirds-l] Western Tanager continues, Alley pond restoration area, Queens county

[Peter Reisfeld]

Seen adjacent to the marsh along the entrance trail, about 50 yards before it 
turns east and heads towards the artificial pond. 

Good birding

Peter

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[nysbirds-l] Western tanager, East Alley creek

[Peter Reisfeld]

Sorry to tempt people into jeopardizing family relationships on Thanksgiving, 
but I just happened upon the Western Tanager originally found by Eric Miller in 
East Alley Creek a couple weeks ago. It was seen along a tractor path west of 
the original sighting which takes its origin at two orange cones near the 
artificial lake at the north end of the property. Also seen were 2 Orange 
crowned warblers, 8 fox sparrows and a rusty blackbird. I'm sure it will it 
will still be around tomorrow, so enjoy your Thanksgiving dinners. 

Good November birding

Peter

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[nysbirds-l] crake video

[Peter Reisfeld]

While I saw a lot of photos posted on ebirds, I didn’t see any video.  So if 
anyone is interested, here is a video of the newest Long Island avian 
celebrity. Kudos to the Feustels for the discovery. 

https://vimeo.com/241949564

Wishing you good birds, 

Peter
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[nysbirds-l] Western Tanager, Crocheron Park, Queens County

[Peter Reisfeld]

The Western Tanager found by Eric Miller yesterday ranged a bit today, from the 
willow at the pond to the shrubby area south and even to the vegetation on the 
north side of 35th avenue (where the Wilson’s was foraging). While not always 
easy to find, when present, she put on quite a show.  Here’s a link to a video: 

https://vimeo.com/246339824

Wishing you good birds, 

Peter
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Re:[nysbirds-l] [ebirdsnyc] Kissena Park Queens

[Peter Reisfeld]

I meant warbler 

Sent from who knows where

> On Oct 21, 2017, at 12:57 PM, Peter Reisfeld drpi...@yahoo.com [ebirdsnyc] 
> <ebirdsnyc-nore...@yahoogroups.com> wrote:
> 
> Good birds near velodrome. Vesper sparrow around ballfield 6 west of drone.. 
> Orange crowned sparrow in orchard east of it. 
> 
> Good birding
> 
> Peter
> 
> Sent from who knows where
> __._,_.___
> Posted by: Peter Reisfeld <drpi...@yahoo.com>
> Reply via web post•   Reply to sender •   Reply to group  •   
> Start a New Topic   •   Messages in this topic (1)
> 
> Have you tried the highest rated email app?
> With 4.5 stars in iTunes, the Yahoo Mail app is the highest rated email app 
> on the market. What are you waiting for? Now you can access all your inboxes 
> (Gmail, Outlook, AOL and more) in one place. Never delete an email again with 
> 1000GB of free cloud storage.
>  
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> .
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[nysbirds-l] Kissena Park Queens

[Peter Reisfeld]

Good birds near velodrome. Vesper sparrow around ballfield 6 west of drone.  
Orange crowned sparrow in orchard east of it.  

Good birding

Peter

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Re: [nysbirds-l] Interesting radar observation

[Peter Reisfeld]

I don’t have an explanation for it. The activity over water near the shoreline 
most likely indicates shorebird migration and would not explain high density of 
songbirds birds over our parks.  If you look at the landing density on both 
mornings of your maps, it concentrates fairly symmetrically at sites of radar 
stations in NY and NJ.  This is expected as when birds, start to land, their 
altitudes drop so that the birds in areas further from the radar no longer 
reflect as they are “under the radar”.  If the concentration is very asymmetric 
it could suggest birds concentrating in one or more geographic areas, but here 
(except for the shoreline migration) it looks pretty even. 

The best I could say is that the migration was pretty diffuse and covered a 
wide swath. But if you look at paul hurtado’s map for night before last it 
looks even denser.  

http://www.pauljhurtado.com/US_Composite_Radar/2018-5-9/ 


So it would be hard for me to explain Chris Cooper’s tweet of a dozen Cape Mays 
in one tree at Central just based on that landing pattern. Perhaps the 
shorebird migration is a clue that densities of birds were greater than they 
appeared to be based on reflectivities.  But I’m not an expert, just a 
dedicated amateur.  Any other comments are welcomed. 

Good birding to all,

Peter

> On May 11, 2018, at 3:44 PM, Gus Keri  wrote:
> 
> Hi every one,
> 
> I would like to share this observation with all of you and I like to know 
> what you think of it, especially those who know radar well.
> 
> Look at this radar map: (go to the minute 4:41 am CT and zoom to NYC area.)
> http://www.pauljhurtado.com/US_Composite_Radar/2018-5-10/ 
> 
> 
> You will see some radar activities (blue color) in the water between NYC and 
> Long Island and New Jersey. All the activities on water with no activities on 
> the surrounding land.
> This morning was the best birding day in the whole city this season.
> 
> I remembered that I saw the same activities last year and saved a photo of it 
> in my record.
> Watch this map: (and again go to minute 4:41 am CT and zoom to NYC)
> http://www.pauljhurtado.com/US_Composite_Radar/2017-5-15/ 
> 
> 
> You will see the same pattern. A lot of activities (blue color) in the water 
> between NYC and LI and NJ with no activities on land.
> That day also was the best birding day in NYC that season.
> 
> I am trying to explain this phenomenon.
> It only happened once last year but it correlated with a huge number of birds.
> Any one has any explanation?
> 
> Gus
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Sent using Zoho Mail 
> 
> 
> --
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[nysbirds-l] Doodletown Road, Bear Mountain

[Peter Reisfeld]

Today I made my annual pilgimmage to Doodletown Road.  By the time I had 
climbed up Gray’s hill I had most of my target birds, with singing ceruleans, 
yellow-throated vireos, indigo buntings, a yellow billed cuckoo, a singing 
Louisiana waterthrush,  a blue winged warbler, a worm-eating warbler, and 
hooded in the background.  But when I ran into a bunch of Queens and Long 
Island birding buddies leaving the First June cemetery things really kicked up 
a notch. 

After a stop at the other June cemetery, we headed up Doodletown road to see if 
the Kentucky warbler was in it’s usual spot.  On the way Eric Miller found a 
female Cape may warbler in a thin, bittersweet-covered tree.  Then we saw an 
olive-sided flycatcher in a bare tree a bit further up the road.  I had to take 
a personal call and missed the pileated in the woods past the stream.  When I 
headed up the hill to see if I could catch up with it, the I got the surprise 
of the day.  Eric called out  that he has found a golden winged warbler in a 
meadow south of the road.  It was a first at Doodletown for pretty much 
everyone there.  

We missed the Kentucky, but got scattering of other birds including multiple 
worm-eatings, ceruleans, cuckoos, a few more warblers found by Eric including 
magnolia, BT green, and canada, another olive sided flycatcher, and even a 
timber rattlesnake along Pleasant Valley road.  When we were all done I had 
seen or heard 16 species of warbler for a great day of birding. 
Wishing you good birding days as well, 

Peter





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[nysbirds-l] Radar musings

[Peter Reisfeld]

The radar pattern tonight is similar to what it was last night.  High 
reflectivity and high velocity in a NW direction.  Does this mean tomorrow will 
be birdy or quiet? I can’t say for sure but I’d like to share some thoughts 
about it.  

Steve brings up the issue of promising radar reports but poor showings on the 
ground.  The mediocre showing today despite high reflectivity on radar is a 
phenomenon I have seen a number of times before. It has been my impression that 
this occurs more frequently on nights when migration velocity is high.  I have 
never seen an explanation for it, but thinking about it today, a theory 
occurred to me.  

To illustrate the theory, I’d like to use the analogy of rain on a windshield.  
Whenever I am driving on the highway in the rain, the faster I drive, the 
harder it seems to rain.  While driving fast does not increase the density of 
raindrops falling from the sky, it does cause many more drops to hit the 
windshield per second as you drive into a steadily falling stream.

Perhaps it is the same with bird radar.  When birds are flying particularly 
rapidly, more of them may intersect with the radar beam per second.  This 
produces an increase in reflectivity, without an increase in density of birds.  
Since we generally assume that high reflectivity is due to high bird density, 
the spurious increased reflectivity would make it seem that more birds were up 
there than really were. Hence a disapointing showing on the ground the next 
morning. This scenario could explain what happened last night. 

While I have not heard of this theory before, I doubt I am the first to think 
of it.  I emailed Cape May radar-maven David La Puma about it today. If he gets 
back to me, I’ll let you know what he thinks.
So what about tomorrow?  I would just say this.  Birds are up there and 
migrating rapidly.  It's just that the numbers MAY NOT be as high as it appears 
based on reflectivities.  


In any case, good luck out there, 


Peter

 

On Wednesday, May 2, 2018, 7:17:58 PM EDT, Shaibal Mitra 
 wrote:  
 
 Hi Steve and all,

At Robert Moses SP, to the east of Jones beach, I didn't see any Red-headed 
Woodpeckers this morning, but I did see 14 Red-bellied Woodpeckers--all 
migrating east to west. Those familiar with the barrier beaches, and the usual 
absence of most forest "resident" species there, will understand that this was 
a remarkable sight. Stephane Perrault has some interesting ideas on the 
relationship between these irruptive flights and inter-year variations in the 
regional population density. 

Southwest winds tonight?--let's get some more Melanerpes data!

Shai Mitra
Bay Shore

From: bounce-122535933-11143...@list.cornell.edu 
[bounce-122535933-11143...@list.cornell.edu] on behalf of Steve Walter 
[swalte...@verizon.net]
Sent: Wednesday, May 2, 2018 7:09 PM
To: NYSBIRDS
Subject: [nysbirds-l] Red-headed Woodpeckers at Jones Beach

I had two adult Red-headed Woodpeckers at Jones Beach West End this morning, 
essentially as fly-bys. The first flew by me while I was in the median and 
turned east on the blind side of the tree line. The second, about a minute 
later, made brief stops in the higher trees before also moving east and out of 
sight. Also, one or two Red-bellied Woodpeckers were around. So it was 
Melanerpes Moving Day.

I hadn’t planned on going down to the beach, but an early assessment of the 
Queens parks suggested the much anticipated and overdue first big wave had not 
materialized – at least not here. I’ve gotten into the radar watching, like 
others have.  I can’t say that I feel comfortable with what I see – but. The 
other day, someone mentioned the radar showing birds. Looking at the referenced 
radar image, it didn’t look that way to me. But I do appreciate people looking 
at that and offering alerts or opinions. We might figure this out. What I 
looked at on radar this morning suggested there was movement along the coast. 
So I figured why not change plans and check that out. I can’t say that what I 
saw on the ground should have lit up the radar, but there were a variety of 
migrants at Jones. Not much unusual other than the woodpeckers, but 5 Baltimore 
Orioles in one tree was a sight to see. Maybe the most interesting bird I came 
across was an immature Great Cormorant on a piling outside the boat basin. It 
doesn’t look like a record late date, but close as far I can see.

So what happened with the migration? It’s May 2, there was no flight of note 
recently, and winds last night were SW to WSW. There should have been migrants 
everywhere. One thing I had been noting and saying to people is that the trees 
have barely begun to leaf out – which would also limit insect hatches. Arboreal 
birds don’t want to be in that. Would that retard the migration? Wouldn’t they 
actually have to get here to know what the situation is here? Well, SW again 
tonight. It can only get 

[nysbirds-l] Radar musings

[Peter Reisfeld]

Being resubmitted as it did not appear in 30 minutes.

Gus makes an excellent point that you can sometimes get valuable information on 
landing radar that you would not have predicted when making a report the night 
before (see Stephane Perrault's report from Hempstead Lake yesterday).  But I 
have still found significant discrepancies.  I can't tell you how many times I 
have headed for the final spot of high landing density on radar only to find it 
dead.  

David, there is no doubt that large birds reflect more than small birds.  So in 
that case you would argue that the reason there are days when the reflectivity 
is high but the ground is quiet is due to the fact that that night mostly large 
birds migrated.  This could be a factor, but I have not noted it on the ground. 
 I will try to be more aware of the possibility in the future though.  On the 
other hand, there is some reason to think that when birds are mostly small, 
e.g. a predominantly warbler migration, that any effects of velocity to 
spuriously increase reflectivity will be exaggerated rather than reduced.

The analogy again would be cars in the rain. The cars are birds and the rain is 
radar. If the windshields are almost vertical, there's little surface to hit 
the windshield.  These are warbler windshields. If they are almost horizontal 
they are flickers. If you make the horizontal windshields flatter and flatter 
corresponding to bigger and bigger birds, eventually it doesn't matter how fast 
the car is driving, the rain hitting it will approach that of a flat non-moving 
surface and speed will no longer increase reflectivity. 

That being said, after thinking about it a bit more and an off-line discussion 
with meteorologist John Kent, I have come to the conclusion that my theory is 
flawed.  The reason is that it did not take into account the relative speed of 
radar and birds.  Using the car analogy again, while doubling speed of a car 
from 30 to 60mph would have a have a significant effect on the rate of rain 
hitting your windshield over baseline, increasing from 1mph to 2mph would not 
likely produce a perceptible increase. Given the fact that radar travels at the 
speed of light, the speed of the radar is so much faster than the bird velocity 
it would be as if the birds were standing (flying?) still, so that increasing 
migration speed from 20 to 60 knots would not likely have an effect. 

John did note that some nights with high reflectivity but low turnout could be 
due to birds that are not new or notable which could be lead to an 
underinterpretation of the true migration.  

Theories about the discrepancy from David La Puma include:

1. The radar is sensitive, and even low densities of migrants can show up as 
strong signatures on the radar.
2. Birds concentrated at a particular altitude can also produce a stronger 
signal, which appears to be heavier migration when it’s actually fewer birds 
concentrated at a particular altitude. I see this a lot with strong upper level 
winds, or when conditions are less favorable at upper levels, and birds are 
concentrated closer to the ground.
3. Heavy migration but low concentration. Migration is heavy, but conditions 
are such that birds are spread out, and therefore not concentrated when they 
land. We see this in the spring when we have heavy migration but no westerly 
component to the wind, so no forcing of birds to Cape May.
4. It’s not all birds. Bats and insects can contaminate the imagery, and if 
there are birds involved, they can mask any lower velocity of insects (although 
insects can have significant positive velocities especially when the tailwind 
is favorable to the direction of migration)

So ultimately we have a number of theories for why radar is often not reliable 
for predicting birds on the ground, but I'm not sure we have the answer.  But 
imperfect as it is, though, it's fun to watch the reflectivities bloom, 
imagining hordes of birds up there in the sky headed our way.  Because 
anticipation of birds is half of the enjoyment (or, almost half), and when we 
actually do see what we anticipate, I think we enjoy it more.  So that in 
itself may be a reason for you, Steve, to keep on looking at that radar.  
Because one day soon, Forest Park will be filled with birds.  And if you are 
chomping at the bit when you enter the park , when you hear that birdsong, you 
will enjoy it even more.

Good birding to all,

Peter


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Re: [nysbirds-l] Radar musings

[Peter Reisfeld]

 Gus makes an excellent point that you can sometimes get valuable information 
on landing radar that you would not have predicted when making a report the 
night before (see Stephane Perrault's report from Hempstead Lake yesterday).  
But I have still found significant discrepancies.  I can't tell you how many 
times I have headed for the final spot of high landing density on radar only to 
find it dead.  

David, there is no doubt that large birds reflect more than small birds.  So in 
that case you would argue that the reason there are days when the reflectivity 
is high but the ground is quiet is due to the fact that that night mostly large 
birds migrated.  This could be a factor, but I have not noted it on the ground. 
 I will try to be more aware of the possibility in the future though.  On the 
other hand, there is some reason to think that when birds are mostly small, 
e.g. a predominantly warbler migration, that any effects of velocity to 
spuriously increase reflectivity will be exaggerated rather than reduced.

The analogy again would be cars in the rain. The cars are birds and the rain is 
radar. If the windshields are almost vertical, there's little surface to hit 
the windshield.  These are warbler windshields. If they are almost horizontal 
they are flickers. If you make the horizontal windshields flatter and flatter 
corresponding to bigger and bigger birds, eventually it doesn't matter how fast 
the car is driving, the rain hitting it will approach that of a flat non-moving 
surface and speed will no longer increase reflectivity. 

That being said, after thinking about it a bit more and an off-line discussion 
with meteorologist John Kent, I have come to the conclusion that my theory is 
flawed.  The reason is that it did not take into account the relative speed of 
radar and birds.  Using the car analogy again, while doubling speed of a car 
from 30 to 60mph would have a have a significant effect on the rate of rain 
hitting your windshield over baseline, increasing from 1mph to 2mph would not 
likely produce a perceptible increase. Given the fact that radar travels at the 
speed of light, the speed of the radar is so much faster than the bird velocity 
it would be as if the birds were standing (flying?) still, so that increasing 
migration speed from 20 to 60 knots would not likely have an effect. 

John did note that some nights with high reflectivity but low turnout could be 
due to birds that are not new or notable which could be lead to an 
underinterpretation of the true migration.  

Theories about the discrepancy from David La Puma include:

1. The radar is sensitive, and even low densities of migrants can show up as 
strong signatures on the radar.
2. Birds concentrated at a particular altitude can also produce a stronger 
signal, which appears to be heavier migration when it’s actually fewer birds 
concentrated at a particular altitude. I see this a lot with strong upper level 
winds, or when conditions are less favorable at upper levels, and birds are 
concentrated closer to the ground.
3. Heavy migration but low concentration. Migration is heavy, but conditions 
are such that birds are spread out, and therefore not concentrated when they 
land. We see this in the spring when we have heavy migration but no westerly 
component to the wind, so no forcing of birds to Cape May.
4. It’s not all birds. Bats and insects can contaminate the imagery, and if 
there are birds involved, they can mask any lower velocity of insects (although 
insects can have significant positive velocities especially when the tailwind 
is favorable to the direction of migration)

So ultimately we have a number of theories for why radar is often not reliable 
for predicting birds on the ground, but I'm not sure we have the answer.  But 
imperfect as it is, though, it's fun to watch the reflectivities bloom, 
imagining hordes of birds up there in the sky headed our way.  Because 
anticipation of birds is half of the enjoyment (or, almost half), and when we 
actually do see what we anticipate, I think we enjoy it more.  So that in 
itself may be a reason for you, Steve, to keep on looking at that radar.  
Because one day soon, Forest Park will be filled with birds.  And if you are 
chomping at the bit when you enter the park , when you hear that birdsong, you 
will enjoy it even more.

Good birding to all,

Peter

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[nysbirds-l] Ammodrammus sparrow Turtle cove Pelham bay near metal bridge

[Peter Reisfeld]

White medial crown stripe
Minimal chest striping. No grey in nape.  Photo link
https://flic.kr/p/ZQbYDu

Possible Le Conte's ?

Sent from who knows where
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[nysbirds-l] King Eider continues at Point Lookout

[Peter Reisfeld]

The male King Eider was present again today at Point Lookout near the second 
westernmost jetty.   Though the temperatures were mild, the waters were pretty 
choppy, making spotting challenging at times.  So I considered myself lucky to 
get some passable video of the bird.  

When reviewing my footage, I noted an interesting eider-like bird.  I suspect 
it was an immature common eider, as it had a black cap and some white on the 
back. But its bill seemed on the small side (particularly compared to a nearby 
eider), in some frames it seemed to have a bit of a yellow to orangish hue, and 
it had an “uncommon” smile-like facial pattern.  I wondered if it might be a 
common-king hybrid.  I linked a photo and video of the bird, as well as a video 
of the king eider to my ebird post:  
http://ebird.org/ebird/view/checklist/S42101440

 Wishing you good birds, 


Peter
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[nysbirds-l] Immature King Eider continues at Point Lookout

[Peter Reisfeld]

There were plenty of birds at Point Lookout today including 28 purple 
sandpipers, 4 harlequin ducks and a continuing first winter male King Eider.  
The eider was off the second easternmost pile of rocks (just trying to keep 
safe on terminology).  That guy sure could hold his breath because he 
dissapeared  for over 25 minutes before resurfacing (though I might have missed 
it if he briefly resurfaced just behind the rocks).  Video at this link:

vimeo.com/254211651

Wishing you good birds, 


Peter
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[nysbirds-l] Restoration Pond Douglaston

[Peter Reisfeld]

In another sighting by Eric Miller yesterday multiple pines, including the pale 
billed one, and the snipe were relocated along with an orange crowned warbler.  

But has anyone sighted Eric Miller?

Good spring birding, 

Peter
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[nysbirds-l] Summer tanager Hempstead lake

[Peter Reisfeld]

Presumably continuing bird.  Adult male flitting around SE Schodack pond. 
Fairly birds here. 

Good birding

Peter

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[nysbirds-l] Metro NYC radar

[Peter Reisfeld]

For the second night in a row, despite unfavorable winds, there is moderately 
high reflectivity on radar, indicating a fairly good density of migrating 
birds.  But while yesterday things petered out (no pun intended) in NJ, tonight 
it looks like they will be reaching the NYC metro area.  Though the numbers 
aren’t huge, and I have been know to have radar hallucinations in the past, it 
looks promising for a decent little influx tomorrow. 

Wishing you good birds, 

Peter
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[nysbirds-l] Hempstead Lake State Park

[Peter Reisfeld]

Arriving at Hempstead Lake in late morning seemed to have been the right time, 
as there was a moderate break from the rain.  It was surprisingly birdy around 
Schodack pond with lots of yellow rumps, good numbers of palm and pine 
warblers, rublets, gnatcatchers and both waterthrushes, which at one point 
seemed to be singing to one another. But the highlight was the summer tanager, 
initially found by Bill Belford on Tuesday, still making the rounds of the 
southeast section.  Here’s a link to a video:

https://vimeo.com/265635157

Wishing you good birds, 

Peter
Sent from who knows where
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[nysbirds-l] radar

[Peter Reisfeld]

The storm on radar last night headed north and never quite reached the metro 
area, and landing densities this AM were on the weak side.  There still may be 
a few new birds, though more in western sites over NJ than here. 

Good early spring birding,

Peter



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[nysbirds-l] radar

[Peter Reisfeld]

The storm on radar last night headed north and never quite reached the metro 
area, and landing densities this AM were on the weak side.  There still may be 
a few new birds, though more in western sites over NJ than here. 

Good early spring birding,

Peter

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[nysbirds-l] Restoration pond warbler

[Peter Reisfeld]

As we are in a slowdown waiting for migration to pick up I thought it may be a 
good time to start thinking about warblers.  I had an interesting one on Sunday 
at the Restoration pond in Alley Pond park.  It was most likely a dull first 
year pine warbler, but was interesting in that it had a very pale bill, and 
almost no white eye arcs or spectacles, both a bit unusual for pines.  Photos 
are on my ebird list (not the photos labelled as pines, but of the one listed 
as “warbler species”.  Any comments from those with experience in these matters 
are welcomed. 

https://ebird.org/view/checklist/S44160049

Good spring birding, 

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[nysbirds-l] radar

[Peter Reisfeld]

For the first night this year there is movement on radar in the NY metro area, 
and with a surprisingly moderate level of reflectivity. The velocity image 
shows movement at a rapid clip of perhaps 50-60 knots in a northwest direction. 
 And while this might ordinarily favor flyover, there is a stormy weather 
pattern  rapidly approaching from  the west in the next hour so that could 
bring our little feathered friends down for a visit.  While not a firm 
prediction, if the weather is decent tomorrow, it might pay to check out your 
local birding patch for early migrants.

Wishing you good birds, 

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[nysbirds-l] Dark downy

[Peter Reisfeld]

Today I saw a woodpecker at my backyard suet feeder for the second time in the 
past few weeks.  It appears to be a downy woodpecker but with very dark 
coloring on the face and underside.  I know that Pacific downies can be 
somewhat buffy in these areas, but none of the photos I have seen are nearly as 
dark as this bird. I assume it is a mutant variant, but thought I would post it 
to see if there were any other ideas. Link to a photo is here:

https://flic.kr/p/QhhchV 

Wishing you good birds, 

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[nysbirds-l] Kissena Park, Queens Orange Crowneds, Nashville, and Lincoln

[Peter Reisfeld]

Jeff Ritter and I birded Kissena this cold but sunny morning to scope it out 
for next week's Queens CBC.  It was relatively quiet but we saw some nice 
birds.  At Kissena proper we started by flushing a couple of great horned owls 
at an undisclosed location. We  found a winter wren kip, kipping along the 
eastern bridle path, ran into a flock of rusty blackbirds near the lake outflow 
with a purple finch nestled amongst them.  After finding a pair of late eastern 
towhees,  we discovered an orange crowned warbler on our way back to the 
velodrome lot.  Here's a photo of him taking a dive off the top of a vine 
behind the ballfields:
Orange crowned diving off a vine at Kissena Park

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Orange crowned diving off a vine at Kissena Park

Explore warblerwave's photos on Flickr. warblerwave has uploaded 351 photos to 
Flickr.
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 |




Next we headed to the Kissena corridor.  We had not birded there for a while, 
what with the eastern section terribly overgrown.  Even without leaves today it 
was still pretty poor habitat.  However in the westen section we were rewarded 
with a birding trifecta, a second orange crowned, a nashville warbler and a 
Lincoln sparrow (clearly a manifestation of Jeff's Lincoln magnetism).  

Finally we hit the secret warbler spot near the golf course where we finished 
up with a trio of hermit thrushes.  All in all a very nice morning of winter 
birding.   (Though this really puts the pressure on for next week's CBC.  Oh 
well. What will be, will be).
Wishing you good birds, 


Peter

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[nysbirds-l] Kissena photo

[Peter Reisfeld]

Looks like this state list and Yahoo mail have issues communicating Flicker 
addresses, so I’ll try again with this photo of the diving orange crowned. 

https://flic.kr/p/2dn2L4f
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Re: Re: [nysbirds-l] Diurnal Migration on This Morning's Radar

[Peter Reisfeld]

Looking at the loop from last night, the reflectivities just about petered out 
at 6 AM, but then picked up again.  That would seem to favor diurnal migration 
rather than a continuation of that from overnight. 

Peter
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[nysbirds-l] Adult Northern Goshawk, Kissena Park, Queens

[Peter Reisfeld]

On the western park of the hill overlooking the lake. 

Wishing you good birds

Peter

Sent from who knows where

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[nysbirds-l] Doodletown Road, Bear Mountain

[Peter Reisfeld]

Today I made my annual pilgimmage to Doodletown Road.  By the time I had 
climbed up Gray’s hill I had most of my target birds, with singing ceruleans, 
yellow-throated vireos, indigo buntings, a yellow billed cuckoo, a singing 
Louisiana waterthrush,  a blue winged warbler, a worm-eating warbler, and 
hooded in the background.  But when I ran into a bunch of Queens and Long 
Island birding buddies leaving the First June cemetery things really kicked up 
a notch. 

After a stop at the other June cemetery, we headed up Doodletown road to see if 
the Kentucky warbler was in it’s usual spot.  On the way Eric Miller found a 
female Cape may warbler in a thin, bittersweet-covered tree.  Then we saw an 
olive-sided flycatcher in a bare tree a bit further up the road.  I had to take 
a personal call and missed the pileated in the woods past the stream.  When I 
headed up the hill to see if I could catch up with it, the I got the surprise 
of the day.  Eric called out  that he has found a golden winged warbler in a 
meadow south of the road.  It was a first at Doodletown for pretty much 
everyone there.  

We missed the Kentucky, but got scattering of other birds including multiple 
worm-eatings, ceruleans, cuckoos, a few more warblers found by Eric including 
magnolia, BT green, and canada, another olive sided flycatcher, and even a 
timber rattlesnake along Pleasant Valley road.  When we were all done I had 
seen or heard 16 species of warbler for a great day of birding. 
Wishing you good birding days as well, 

Peter





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[nysbirds-l] Kissena Park, Queens Orange Crowneds, Nashville, and Lincoln

[Peter Reisfeld]

Jeff Ritter and I birded Kissena this cold but sunny morning to scope it out 
for next week's Queens CBC.  It was relatively quiet but we saw some nice 
birds.  At Kissena proper we started by flushing a couple of great horned owls 
at an undisclosed location. We  found a winter wren kip, kipping along the 
eastern bridle path, ran into a flock of rusty blackbirds near the lake outflow 
with a purple finch nestled amongst them.  After finding a pair of late eastern 
towhees,  we discovered an orange crowned warbler on our way back to the 
velodrome lot.  Here's a photo of him taking a dive off the top of a vine 
behind the ballfields:
Orange crowned diving off a vine at Kissena Park

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Orange crowned diving off a vine at Kissena Park

Explore warblerwave's photos on Flickr. warblerwave has uploaded 351 photos to 
Flickr.
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Next we headed to the Kissena corridor.  We had not birded there for a while, 
what with the eastern section terribly overgrown.  Even without leaves today it 
was still pretty poor habitat.  However in the westen section we were rewarded 
with a birding trifecta, a second orange crowned, a nashville warbler and a 
Lincoln sparrow (clearly a manifestation of Jeff's Lincoln magnetism).  

Finally we hit the secret warbler spot near the golf course where we finished 
up with a trio of hermit thrushes.  All in all a very nice morning of winter 
birding.   (Though this really puts the pressure on for next week's CBC.  Oh 
well. What will be, will be).
Wishing you good birds, 


Peter

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[nysbirds-l] Kissena photo

[Peter Reisfeld]

Looks like this state list and Yahoo mail have issues communicating Flicker 
addresses, so I’ll try again with this photo of the diving orange crowned. 

https://flic.kr/p/2dn2L4f
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[nysbirds-l] Dark downy

[Peter Reisfeld]

Today I saw a woodpecker at my backyard suet feeder for the second time in the 
past few weeks.  It appears to be a downy woodpecker but with very dark 
coloring on the face and underside.  I know that Pacific downies can be 
somewhat buffy in these areas, but none of the photos I have seen are nearly as 
dark as this bird. I assume it is a mutant variant, but thought I would post it 
to see if there were any other ideas. Link to a photo is here:

https://flic.kr/p/QhhchV 

Wishing you good birds, 

Peter
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Re: Re: [nysbirds-l] Diurnal Migration on This Morning's Radar

[Peter Reisfeld]

Looking at the loop from last night, the reflectivities just about petered out 
at 6 AM, but then picked up again.  That would seem to favor diurnal migration 
rather than a continuation of that from overnight. 

Peter
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[nysbirds-l] Adult Northern Goshawk, Kissena Park, Queens

[Peter Reisfeld]

On the western park of the hill overlooking the lake. 

Wishing you good birds

Peter

Sent from who knows where

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[nysbirds-l] Swainson's warbler

[Peter Reisfeld]

Video of the Central Park star
https://flic.kr/p/GzajmK

Happy spring birding

Peter

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Re: [nysbirds-l] Kings County Cerulean, Yellow-throated Warbler + Radar/Wind discussion

[Peter Reisfeld]

I have also noticed that there have been a number of days this season in which 
there was good migration reported on the ground, but relatively low densities 
seen on radar.  While the variation of wind direction at different altitudes 
may offer a path for birds to migrate on nights that the predominant winds are 
not favorable, It still doesn’t explain why more birds are not showing up on 
radar.  Are they migrating so low that they fly “under the radar”?  Do they 
have some sort of natural “stealth” mechanism to avoid showing up as 
reflectance?  Or are the numbers still relatively modest but local weather 
circumstances are just concentrating them in certain of our parks? 

 It will be interesting to see what we see on the ground when the densities 
pick up a bit.

Peter.
 On May 2, 2016, at 3:57 PM, Sean Sime  wrote:
> 
> I was fortunate enough to see the male Cerulean Warbler in Prospect Park this 
> morning and equally fortunate to be standing near Karen Ohearn when she said, 
> "I've got a Yellow-throated Warbler!" 
> Both birds were near the southern terminus of the Lullwater adjacent to the 
> winter bird feeding station. A checklist with ID quality photos can be seen 
> here.
> 
> http://ebird.org/ebird/view/checklist?subID=S29356904 
> 
> 
> For those on the list that watch radar and wind maps, last night offered a 
> true 'teachable moment." The surface winds were from the NE and SE overnight. 
> There was no visible lift off north of Virginia on radar maps as of 10:30pm 
> and no measurable drop out this morning at 5:30am.
> 
> I use this radar link:
> http://radar.weather.gov/Conus/northeast_loop.php 
> 
> 
> And this wind map:
> http://earth.nullschool.net/#current/wind/isobaric/1000hPa/orthographic=-76.16,41.82,2048/loc=-73.010,40.993
>  
> 
> 
> Given what was visible (to me) I decided to not be out first thing. As tweets 
> from Prospect Park starting coming in it was clear birds moved last night. So 
> curiosity prompted some conversation. What Shane Blodgett was kind enough to 
> point out was on the wind map I use one can search by elevation. By clicking 
> the "earth" icon in the lower left corner of the wind map you can change the 
> height for the wind readings. I have more research to do, but by changing the 
> height to 850 (this is a pressure reading, but correlates with the altitudes 
> birds migrate at) I could immediately see the mid-level winds were from the 
> SW overnight and provided an explanation for the influx of birds in the park 
> and along the coast this morning.
> 
> If other list members have more/other sites they find useful in this regard 
> please share. The technology and information accessible at our fingertips is 
> exciting!
> 
> Good birding!
> 
> Sean Sime
> Brooklyn, NY
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
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Re: [nysbirds-l] Heavy Nocturnal Flight Binghamton Airport Last Night

[Peter Reisfeld]

This observation by David  may help explain the migration/radar paradox we have 
been observing. Perhaps when birds migrate under cloudy conditions, they are 
more likely to fly low and therefore escape detection by radar. 

Peter
Sent from who knows where

> On May 5, 2016, at 7:34 AM, David Nicosia  wrote:
> 
> I got finished by with work at 11 pm last evening and
> in the parking lot before I got into my car I heard a
> "stream" of chips, zips, zeets and zeeps! I listened for about
> 5 minutes and it was constant. There were at least 3 SOLITARY
> SANDPIPERS that flew by. Additionally, I was surprised to hear
> a BARN SWALLOW and right before I left
> an early SWAINSON'S THRUSH!! The birds were very low
> as cloud ceilings has dropped to a few hundred feet
> and there was a heavy drizzle falling. 
> 
> When I arrived at home which is at 1300 feet a few hundred
> feet lower than the airport I still could hear the chips, zips
> and zeeps etc but they were higher up. I listened for
> several more minutes and heard one more SOLITARY
> SANDPIPER but nothing else than I could ID. The radar
> shows modest echoes at this time.
> 
> Dave Nicosia
> 
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Re: [nysbirds-l] Heavy Nocturnal Flight Binghamton Airport Last Night

[Peter Reisfeld]

This observation by David  may help explain the migration/radar disconnect we 
have been observing. Perhaps when birds migrate under cloudy conditions, they 
are more likely to fly low and therefore escape detection by radar. 

Happy spring birding

Peter
> On May 5, 2016, at 7:34 AM, David Nicosia  wrote:
> 
> I got finished by with work at 11 pm last evening and
> in the parking lot before I got into my car I heard a
> "stream" of chips, zips, zeets and zeeps! I listened for about
> 5 minutes and it was constant. There were at least 3 SOLITARY
> SANDPIPERS that flew by. Additionally, I was surprised to hear
> a BARN SWALLOW and right before I left
> an early SWAINSON'S THRUSH!! The birds were very low
> as cloud ceilings has dropped to a few hundred feet
> and there was a heavy drizzle falling.
> 
> When I arrived at home which is at 1300 feet a few hundred
> feet lower than the airport I still could hear the chips, zips
> and zeeps etc but they were higher up. I listened for
> several more minutes and heard one more SOLITARY
> SANDPIPER but nothing else than I could ID. The radar
> shows modest echoes at this time.
> 
> Dave Nicosia
> 
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[nysbirds-l] Doodletown Road 5/12

[Peter Reisfeld]

I made my annual pilgrimage to Doodletown Road today in the pleasant company of 
Bob and Collen Veltri.  We saw good numbers of ceruleans, including females on 
nest.  Hoodeds were everywhere, often singing alternate songs, one of which was 
a spitting image of a yellow throated warbler. When we finally saw the bird who 
was singing, it was the first time in my life I was disappointed to see a 
hooded warbler.  

Our main target , however, was the Kentucky. We were encouraged when we ran 
into Tom Burke and Gail Benson at the intersection of Doodletown and Pleasant 
Valley road who had just seen the bird further up Doodletown.  The bird had 
been seen just past the bridge as well as further up the hill, but we struck 
out at both sites.  We returned after birding Pleasant Valley to reports that 
the bird was again singing just past the bridge. We hurried up the road only to 
run into a road block.  There was a group of hikers that decided to do their 
business right where the bird was singing, and their mates asked us to wait to 
respect their privacy. It seemed like forever, but the bird was still singing 
when we were finally allowed entry.  That’s when one of the hikers blew her 
whistle to alert all their members they were leaving.  With my hearing aids 
turned all the way up, it almost pierced my ear drums. Needless to say, after 
that the bird was gone. 

We licked our wounds and headed further up the hill to the alternate location.  
But before long we were rewarded with ground level views, as the Kentucky was 
attracted by a termite hatch in a fallen log.

Here’s a link to videos of the Kentucky, a male and female cerulean on nest, 
and a female cerulean building her nest. 

https://flic.kr/s/aHskA1GEim

Just another reminder for those thinking of coming up on Sunday, that  Rt 9 
will be closed on May 15 until 1PM for to a bicycle race. 

Happy spring birding!

Peter

https://flic.kr/s/aHskA1GEim
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Re: [nysbirds-l] Radar

[Peter Reisfeld]

For looking at specific radar stations I like the NCAR site. It is pretty 
basic, but one can conveniently vary the loop interval to go back to sunset and 
get the takeoff and evolution of the densities.  Also in single image mode, a 
click on the screen changes it to velocity mode useful to see exactly which 
direction and how fast the birds are flying. The link is:

http://weather.rap.ucar.edu/radar/ 

Peter

 
> On May 15, 2016, at 6:05 PM, Jim Osterlund  wrote:
> 
> I can’t say what’s “best”.  I check weather at NWS - National Mosaic Enhanced 
> Radar Image: Full Resolution Loop 
>  anyway, so an occasional bird 
> event is just a plus.
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Re: [nysbirds-l] Radar

[Peter Reisfeld]

For looking at specific radar stations I like the NCAR site. It is pretty 
basic, but one can conveniently vary the loop interval to go back to sunset and 
get the takeoff and evolution of the densities.  Also in single image mode, a 
click on the screen changes it to velocity mode useful to see exactly which 
direction and how fast the birds are flying. The link is:

http://weather.rap.ucar.edu/radar/ 

Peter

> On May 15, 2016, at 4:20 PM, Ben Mirin  wrote:
> 
> Hi all, what's your favorite/the best resource for monitoring radar online? 
> 
> Many thanks,
> Ben
> 
> On Sunday, May 15, 2016, Jim Osterlund  > wrote:
> Then I’ll add;
> 
> Sagtikos / Sunken Meadow Parkway, LIE Exit 53.
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> 
> 
> -- 
> Sent from my iPhone. I wish it could spell.
> Benjamin Mirin
> 
> Ben on National Geographic
> Ben on National Public Radio
> Ben's TED talk
> Ben's YouTube Channel
> 
> Mobile (USA): (978) 509-5404
> Twitter: @benmirin
> 
> 
> 
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[nysbirds-l] Red headed woodpecker Connetquot park Oakdale

[Peter Reisfeld]

There is a gorgeous redheaded woodpecker frequenting the feeders south of the 
paddock between the blue barn and the main houses at Connetquot. Here is a link 
to a video

https://flic.kr/p/HxcCcP

Happy late spring birding

Peter

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[nysbirds-l] Kentucky warbler, Muttontown preserve continues

[Peter Reisfeld]

Heard off of an asphalt east-west path, just north of trial 7 and east of the 
Walled garden.  Coordinates are 40.826833,-73.534751.   The bird was singing 
intermittently at 9AM in this location and then headed further south into an 
area further from pathways. 

Happy birding, 

Peter
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[nysbirds-l] Fwd: Kentucky warbler, Muttontown preserve continues

[Peter Reisfeld]

Ooops. East-west path is just SOUTH of trail 7. 

> Begin forwarded message:
> 
> From: Peter Reisfeld 
> Subject: Kentucky warbler, Muttontown preserve continues
> Date: May 30, 2016 at 10:45:07 AM EDT
> To: "NYSbirds-L@cornell.edu" 
> 
> Heard off of an asphalt east-west path, just north of trial 7 and east of the 
> Walled garden.  Coordinates are 40.826833,-73.534751.   The bird was singing 
> intermittently at 9AM in this location and then headed further south into an 
> area further from pathways. 
> 
> Happy birding, 
> 
> Peter


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[nysbirds-l] EPCAL, Calverton 6/11

[Peter Reisfeld]

I visited EPCAL in Calverton in hoping to see the resident blue grosbeak.  
While I struck out with the grosbeak, I had a very pleasant morning at this 
lovely property, viewing grasshopper and field sparrows, good numbers of pine 
and prairie warblers, orchard orioles, flycatchers, and a yellow-billed cuckoo 
who, withstanding the traffic on Grumman Blvd and my phone alarm, remarkably 
continued c-c-c-c-c-c-c-kowlping for almost 3 minutes, all while being 
serenaded by oriole and prairie warbler song. 

Here is a link to a video if this, along with a puffy little grasshopper 
sparrow, and an eastern kingbird regurgitating a pellet:

https://www.flickr.com/gp/50403904@N03/s64e9Q

Happy summer birding,

Peter 
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[nysbirds-l] Alley Pond Park 8/27 AM including Lawrence's hybrid

[Peter Reisfeld]

While not exactly hopping, there were clearly more migrants at Alley Pond park 
today than on my 2 previous jaunts this fall season. I saw 8 species of warbler 
including Canada, BT green and a remarkable 7 chestnut-sided warblers in 
various locations within the park.  But the highlight was a male Lawrence’s 
hybrid warbler in a poorly accessible area at the southern end of the Acadaian 
kettle.  Documenting photos are on my ebird list: 

http://ebird.org/ebird/view/checklist/S31270784
  
For those who wish to try, from Vanderbilt motor parkway take the short 3 or 4 
step stairway (with the Caution sign at the top) up to the asphalt path that 
parallels the parkway just north of it.  There you can look down into a deep 
kettle hole with a stand of Aralia at the bottom. The bird (along with a couple 
of chestnut-sideds) was in this area. 

Good luck and good birding,

Peter
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[nysbirds-l] Connecticut warbler Alley pond

[Peter Reisfeld]

A Connecticut warbler was found this AM by Eric Miller on the paved path to 
Little Alley Pond as reached from the stairway going down from Vanderbilt 
Parkway

Great birds here today

Peter

Sent from who knows where
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[nysbirds-l] Sparrows at Jones Beach 10/15

[Peter Reisfeld]

I birded Jones Beach this morning with Bob Veltri and Jeff Ritter, hoping to 
see some migrating sparrows.  Bob’s intuition to pick Jones was a good one, and 
was confirmed by the moderate levels of reflectivity on radar dispersing over 
mid long island this morning.  

While initially things were slow, presumably due to a combination of cold and 
numerous raptors (including merlins, sharp-shinned and Coopers hawks, peregrine 
falcon, and northern harrier), the activity picked up later in the morning.  
Amongst all the yellow rumps and golden-crowned kinglets, we were able to find 
11 species of sparrow including lark, clay-colored, white-crowned, field, 
savannah, chipping, swamp, song, white-throated, junco and towee.   I had to 
leave early and missed the lark (originally found by Ken Feustel).  Jeff had 
located the clay-colored for our group at the far west turnaround, and I 
returned in the late afternoon, to see if I could absorb this subtly beautiful 
bird.  It was still there at sunset, if you’d like to try tomorrow.  Here is a 
link to a video:

https://vimeo.com/187499936

Happy fall birding, 

Peter
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[nysbirds-l] Kissena Park 10/30

[Peter Reisfeld]

I birded Kissena Park for a couple hours this AM with Jeff Ritter and Bob and 
Collen Veltri.  A bit of stuff must have come in under the radar during the 
past few days, because it was surprisingly birdy.  Most numerous were robins 
and song sparrows,many of whom were singing on this warm fall morning, but 
there were more interesting birds as well.  

We started at the ballfields.  With multiple football games going on, field 9 
was the only quiet one.  Things were quite active there, with white-crowned, 
field and Savannah sparrows seen.  But the highlight was a trio of vesper 
sparrows first noted on the chain link backstop, and later on the field where 
they were joined by an American Pippit. (Of note, when I returned later in the 
morning the vespers had moved to field 6.).  

We then headed for the orchard, east of the velodrome, were we saw swamp and 
song sparrows, a few ruby crowned kinglets, and a brown thrasher. The orchard’s 
highlight, however, was a delicate, orange-crowned warbler, flitting around the 
cottony flower seeds.  On the way out, we looked into the middle of the 
velodrome were we saw a bright yellow Eastern Meadowlark amongst all the 
robins.  (It may have been the one Cesar Castillo had found earlier in the 
week.)  What a beauty. 

Lastly, we headed over to the corridor for a quick once around.  In addition to 
phoebes, hermit thrushes, and blue headed vireos, we finally saw good numbers 
of finches, including gold, house, and and at least 2 female purple finches. 

Here is a link to some photos of these birds, and to a video of the meadowlark:

https://flic.kr/s/aHskKz9yRt
https://vimeo.com/189529619

Happy late fall birding,

Peter
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[nysbirds-l] Western tanager City hall park

[Peter Reisfeld]

Present this AM spotted by Paul Bordon in trees above eastern portion of east 
west path

Peter

Sent from who knows where
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[nysbirds-l] City Hall Park Videos

[Peter Reisfeld]

While I was able to get nice video from the cooperative Chat 
(https://vimeo.com/193100449) , the Tanager just kept moving, mostly up high in 
bad light.  The only decent shot was a snippet of the bird pooping.  So for 
those interested, enjoy:

https://vimeo.com/193100508

Happy vagrant birding,

Peter
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Re: [nysbirds-l] New Empidonax identification tip

[Peter Reisfeld]

While I do not profess expertise in this matter, I just wanted to comment on 
the study by Baumann et. al in the Journal of Field Ornithology on 
distinguishing Western and yellow bellied flycatcher. While precise separation 
required in the hand measurement of wing and buffy fringe lengths, as others 
have noted the space space between the proximal edge of the buffy fringing on 
the secondaries and lower wing bar was judged to be a good field mark. 

On the photo used to illustrate this, the band between the lower wing bar and 
the top edge of the fringe is about 1/3 of the length of the visible 
secondaries on the yellow-bellied, while not more than 1/4 of this length on 
the western.  Looking at several of the photos of the Inwood bird, the band is 
much closer to 1/4 than 1/3.  I think this would support western, rather than 
yellow, as some have previously commented.

Peter
> On Dec 9, 2016, at 11:01 AM, Anders Peltomaa  
> wrote:
> 
> Thanks for the reminder Shai,
> 
> Here is a link to a PDF of the article that Joe referenced.
> 
> https://biology.unm.edu/Witt/pub_files/Baumann-etal-2014-JFO-yellow-Empid-ID-jofo12078.pdf
> 
> good birding,
> 
> Anders Peltomaa
> Manhattan
> 
> On Fri, Dec 9, 2016 at 9:12 AM, Shaibal Mitra 
> wrote:
> 
>> In a really nice example of how this list serves as institutional memory
>> for our community, Dave Klauber just reminded me of this very relevant post
>> from Joe DiCostanzo, from December 2014. It details the foundation of the
>> wing pattern feature mentioned in the Whatbird discussions, and I would
>> agree that this feature also favors Yellow-bellied Flycatcher.
>> 
>> It's not fun to admit this, but the things I learn nowadays don't stick
>> with me to nearly the same degree as the things I learned before, say 2000!
>> So n.b. to those whose brains are still limber: don't put off learning
>> until later, front-load the data hoarding as much as possible!
>> 
>> From: bounce-118614530-3714...@list.cornell.edu > list.cornell.edu> on behalf of Joe DiCostanzo 
>> Sent: Wednesday, December 10, 2014 7:24 PM
>> To: NYSBirds
>> Subject: [nysbirds-l] New Empidonax identification tip
>> 
>> 
>> Just got the current issue of the Journal of Field Ornithology (vol. 85,
>> no. 4, December 2014). I figure this is not a journal that most birders
>> check for ID articles so I thought I would draw attention to an article in
>> it: “Simple technique for distinguishing Yellow-bellied Flycatchers from
>> Cordilleran and Pacific-slope flycatchers by M. J. Baumann, S. C. Galen, N.
>> D. Pederson and C. C. Witt. Pp. 391-396. Anyone interested should read the
>> article for all the details, many of which involve measurements that can
>> only be done in the hand, but there is one character that can be used to
>> distinguish Yellow-bellied Flycatcher from “Western Flycatcher” (the
>> complex composed of Cordilleran and Pacific-slope flys.). It involves the
>> space on the folded wing between the lower wing bar and the start of the
>> pale fringes on the secondaries. This space is much larger in the
>> Yellow-bellied than in the “Western”. I pulled out a few field guides from
>> my bookshelf to see if it was distinguishable in published illustrations. I
>> found it was apparent in the photos in Kenn Kaufman’s Birds of North
>> America (at least in the first edition that I have). It was also obvious in
>> Dave Sibley’s paintings of these species in his Second Edition of the
>> Sibley Guide to Birds (I didn’t check the first edition). The authors of
>> the Journal of Field Ornithology article tested their technique on 113
>> museum specimens that had been identified based on locality. They found
>> their technique correctly place 112 of the specimens. One specimen labeled
>> as a Yellow-bellied Flycatcher that had been collected in Illinois was
>> identified as a “Western Flycatcher” by their technique. Amazingly, when
>> the mtDNA of this specimen was examined, the specimen proved to be a
>> “Western Flycatcher”, the first for the complex for Illinois!
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> Distinguishing a Yellow-bellied Fly from a “Western Fly” has not come up
>> yet in New York, but hey, you never know.
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> Joe DiCostanzo
>> 
>> www.greatgullisland.org
>> 
>> www.inwoodbirder.blogspot.com
>> 
>> [http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-zlSALCVoYnM/U0SFqj6uWfI/
>> AWQ/xYjr3pf15r0/s80/Joe.jpg]>> 
>> 
>> Inwood Birder
>> www.inwoodbirder.blogspot.com
>> A very pretty morning in the Ramble for my Thursday morning AMNH bird walk
>> group. It would have been an even prettier morning if there had been more
>> birds around!
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> --
>> NYSbirds-L List Info:
>> Welcome and Basics
>> Rules and Information
>> Subscribe, 

Fwd: [nysbirds-l] New Empidonax identification tip

[Peter Reisfeld]

While I do not profess expertise in this matter, I just wanted to comment on 
the study by Baumann et. al in the Journal of Field Ornithology on 
distinguishing Western and yellow bellied flycatchers.  While precise 
separation of these species required in-the-hand measurement of wing and buffy 
fringe lengths, as others have noted, the space between the proximal edge of 
the buffy fringing on the secondaries and lower wing bar was judged to be a 
good field mark, with a larger space favoring yellow-bellied. 

Some have suggested that this article supports categorizing the Inwood 
flycatcher as yellow-bellied. Yet in the photo on page 395 used to illustrate 
this, the band between the lower wing bar and the top edge of the fringe is 
about 1/3 of the length of the visible secondaries on the yellow-bellied, while 
not more than 1/4 of this length on the western.  Looking at some of the photos 
of the Inwood bird, the band is much closer to 1/4 than 1/3.  While there may 
well be some variability in this feature in the field, if the photo from the 
article is an accurate representation of the validity of this field mark, it 
would suggest that the Inwood bird is more likely western than yellow-bellied, 
not the reverse.

Peter

(This message was resent as I could not find my first response on the list. 
Pardon any duplication.) 

> Begin forwarded message:
> 
> From: Anders Peltomaa 
> Subject: Re: FW: [nysbirds-l] New Empidonax identification tip
> Date: December 9, 2016 at 11:01:36 AM EST
> To: Shaibal Mitra 
> Cc: "NYSBIRDS (NYSBIRDS-L@cornell.edu)" 
> Reply-To: Anders Peltomaa 
> 
> Thanks for the reminder Shai,
> 
> Here is a link to a PDF of the article that Joe referenced.
> 
> https://biology.unm.edu/Witt/pub_files/Baumann-etal-2014-JFO-yellow-Empid-ID-jofo12078.pdf
> 
> good birding,
> 
> Anders Peltomaa
> Manhattan
> 
> On Fri, Dec 9, 2016 at 9:12 AM, Shaibal Mitra 
> wrote:
> 
>> In a really nice example of how this list serves as institutional memory
>> for our community, Dave Klauber just reminded me of this very relevant post
>> from Joe DiCostanzo, from December 2014. It details the foundation of the
>> wing pattern feature mentioned in the Whatbird discussions, and I would
>> agree that this feature also favors Yellow-bellied Flycatcher.
>> 
>> It's not fun to admit this, but the things I learn nowadays don't stick
>> with me to nearly the same degree as the things I learned before, say 2000!
>> So n.b. to those whose brains are still limber: don't put off learning
>> until later, front-load the data hoarding as much as possible!
>> 
>> From: bounce-118614530-3714...@list.cornell.edu > list.cornell.edu> on behalf of Joe DiCostanzo 
>> Sent: Wednesday, December 10, 2014 7:24 PM
>> To: NYSBirds
>> Subject: [nysbirds-l] New Empidonax identification tip
>> 
>> 
>> Just got the current issue of the Journal of Field Ornithology (vol. 85,
>> no. 4, December 2014). I figure this is not a journal that most birders
>> check for ID articles so I thought I would draw attention to an article in
>> it: “Simple technique for distinguishing Yellow-bellied Flycatchers from
>> Cordilleran and Pacific-slope flycatchers by M. J. Baumann, S. C. Galen, N.
>> D. Pederson and C. C. Witt. Pp. 391-396. Anyone interested should read the
>> article for all the details, many of which involve measurements that can
>> only be done in the hand, but there is one character that can be used to
>> distinguish Yellow-bellied Flycatcher from “Western Flycatcher” (the
>> complex composed of Cordilleran and Pacific-slope flys.). It involves the
>> space on the folded wing between the lower wing bar and the start of the
>> pale fringes on the secondaries. This space is much larger in the
>> Yellow-bellied than in the “Western”. I pulled out a few field guides from
>> my bookshelf to see if it was distinguishable in published illustrations. I
>> found it was apparent in the photos in Kenn Kaufman’s Birds of North
>> America (at least in the first edition that I have). It was also obvious in
>> Dave Sibley’s paintings of these species in his Second Edition of the
>> Sibley Guide to Birds (I didn’t check the first edition). The authors of
>> the Journal of Field Ornithology article tested their technique on 113
>> museum specimens that had been identified based on locality. They found
>> their technique correctly place 112 of the specimens. One specimen labeled
>> as a Yellow-bellied Flycatcher that had been collected in Illinois was
>> identified as a “Western Flycatcher” by their technique. Amazingly, when
>> the mtDNA of this specimen was examined, the specimen proved to be a
>> “Western Flycatcher”, the first for the complex for Illinois!
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> Distinguishing a Yellow-bellied Fly from a “Western Fly” has not come up
>> yet in New York, but hey, you never know.
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> Joe DiCostanzo
>> 
>> www.greatgullisland.org
>> 
>> 

[nysbirds-l] Continuing birds at Kissena and Plandome

[Peter Reisfeld]

Having done the Christmas bird count with Jeff Ritter last week, I decided to 
revisit the Kissena Park on Christmas day to see what was still around.  While 
numbers were down a bit from last week, the Red-headed woodpecker continues to 
be an active presence, and can heard loudly rattling on the western side of the 
hill south of the lake.  

While looking for the winter wren seen last week at Eric Miller’s secret 
warbler spot north of the golf course, I was surprised to find a house wren, a 
pretty rare bird for late December. (And one which would have been a nice 
addition to the count last week.  Oh well...)  

Then on my way home I stopped at the parking area north of the Plandome train 
station looking for the yellow-breasted chat.  Having dipped on Thursday and 
not heard any further reports, I didn’t expect much. But when I arrived, he was 
sitting on top of a brush pile on the left of the path near the 5 door garage.  
And in typical chat fashion, he disappeared before I could take a photo.  

Good winter birding to all, 

Peter
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[nysbirds-l] Townsend Solitaire Southold

[Peter Reisfeld]

For the benefit of birding procrastinators everywhere the Townsend Solitaire 
was again present at about 8:05 on the cedar between 1725 and 1625 North Sea 
Drive in Southold.  He then erratically flew into various bare deciduous trees 
south of the road.  Dull video on ebird checklist for couch birders and those 
having a slow day. http://ebird.org/ebird/view/checklist/S33580421

Good winter birding, 

Peter
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[nysbirds-l] Woodcocks in Massapequa

[Peter Reisfeld]

Timberdoodlemania is not just confined to New York City. Around 1PM today as I 
was searching (unsuccessfully) for the Northern Goshawk at the Massapequa 
Preserve I surprised 3 American woodcocks just west of the Pittsburgh Avenue 
lake. Also seen in the park were killdeer and an overwintering catbird. Looks 
to be an interesting migration this year. 

Good birding, 

Peter
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[nysbirds-l] Eared Grebe Oak Beach

[Peter Reisfeld]

Third time was a charm.  This morning around 10 AM the eared grebe finally 
graciously cooperated by appearing relatively close to shore, and then by 
joining with his horned cousin for prolonged looks.  Seen far west of the 
entrance approaching the Sore Thumb peninsula.  Here’s a link to a video. (It 
was windy so you may want to turn down the volume.):

https://vimeo.com/210827442

Happy spring birding,

Peter
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