With another spring gone by here in Carver County, this year proved that a warm spring does not necessarily equal early migration. While the much warmer than normal February weather led to several personal earliest arrival dates for me (Tundra Swan, Greater White-fronted Goose, Wood Duck, Gadwall, American Wigeon, Northern Pintail, Northern Shoveler, Green-winged Teal, Redhead, Ring-necked Duck, Lesser Scaup, Hooded Merganser, Killdeer, Ring-billed Gull, Red-winged Blackbird, Rusty Blackbird, and Common Grackle) with almost all arriving in February, a 2 week cold snap lasting into mid-March returned the pace of migration back to normal. Warmth lasting through much of April had me once again thinking birds would arrive early this year, but a strong cold front that moved through the area during the overnight hours of April 25-26 put an end to those expectations. Though even before those dates here, weather to the south of Minnesota in the southern central Midwest was not conducive to early migration. On April 26 there were many arriving birds that morning including personal earliest arriving Least Flycatcher and Ovenbird. But following the passage of that cold front, weather was not cooperative for a mass arrival of birds until May 9. From April 27 to May 8 there were expected arrivals, but birds were arriving in more of a trickle rather than a large wave. Beginning May 9 and lasting through May 27 species diversity was great. Bird numbers ranged generally from average to good. For the most part though, I don't consider numbers of most species this spring to be exceptional. There were a few outliers though that turned up in outstanding numbers including Ruby-crowned Kinglet, Magnolia Warbler, Palm Warbler, and Yellow-rumped Warbler. Vireo and Thrush numbers were average. Once again excluding White-throated Sparrow, I found migrant sparrow numbers to be generally poor even Fox. Apparently my preferred walking routes are not preferred by the sparrow. But I didn't spend any time behind the Rapids Lake visitor center during daylight hours and spent no time at the nature center at Carver Park, and that is where I used to have more luck with migrant sparrow species. I expected migration to drop off significantly after May 27 and did not spend any time out after that, but there were very likely some migrants that I missed through the end of May and possibly into early June. I hit my hiking wall by May 27 after about 110 miles of walking and just under 82 hours in the field during the month of May(94 miles excluding miles walked doubling back as I try to minimize that now). While there have been springs with better migrant totals in the past, I will gladly take the spring of 2017 over the two prior springs of 2015/16. Also of note this year was that despite the warm winter there were no overwintering Yellow-rumped Warbler or Golden-crowned Kinglet, but the Cedar seed crop last fall seemed much poorer than the previous year. Also, habitat managers at both Rapids Lake and Carver Park seem to have a dislike for Cedar trees, and a significant number of the trees were removed last year at Carver Park and this January at Rapids Lake as part of habitat restoration. While I understand the reasons for their removal in terms of the habitat that the managers want to create, it does remove a good amount of winter food crop for birds as well as cover and potential nesting habitat for certain species. In the long term it doesn't make a big difference, though I do question the frequency of burns that are prescribed. All in all it was a solid and enjoyable spring. The only unusual bird that I saw was a vagrant Common Raven at Carver Park in mid-April.
Warbler species seen each day followed by cumulative migrant warbler count with my 2008-2016 average spring count in parenthesis April 16 3 April 19 4 April 21 3 April 22 2 April 23 3 April 26 6 April 28 3 April 29 5 May 3 3 May 4 5 May 6 6 May 7 7 May 8 8 May 9 18 May 10 16 May 11 18 May 12 16 May 13 20 May 14 23 May 16 16 May 17 20 May 19 19 May 20 7 May 21 20 May 22 18 May 23 9 May 24 21 May 27 14 Ovenbird 33 (30) Northern Waterthrush 49 (28) Golden-winged Warbler 16 (11) Blue-winged Warbler 64 (48) Golden-winged x Blue-winged Warbler 2 Black-and-white Warbler 39 (39) Prothonotary Warbler 13 (8) Tennessee Warbler 216 (194) Orange-crowned Warbler 24 (12) Nashville Warbler 88 (67) Connecticut Warbler 7 (2) Mourning Warbler 22 (6) Common Yellowthroat 170 American Redstart 210 Cape May Warbler 3 (5) Northern Parula 13 (9) Magnolia Warbler 74 (31) Bay-breasted Warbler 5 (5) Blackburnian Warbler 15 (19) Yellow Warbler 293 Chestnut-sided Warbler 30 (25) Blackpoll Warbler 35 (48) Palm Warbler 170 (67) Pine Warbler 2 (2) Yellow-rumped Warbler 1389 (427) Black-throated Green Warbler 11 (12) Canada Warbler 16 (10) Wilson's Warbler 39 (30) Warbler totals by location Rapids Lake MVNWR 2078 of 27 species Carver Park Reserve 839 of 25 species Minnesota Landscape Arboretum 106 of 21 species Northern Chaska city trail 16 of 8 species Other species cumulative counts Olive-sided Flycatcher 2 Yellow-bellied Flycatcher 2 Alder Flycatcher 15 Willow Flycatcher 13 Least Flycatcher 94 Blue-headed Vireo 9 Philadelphia Vireo 7 Winter Wren 5 Golden-crowned Kinglet 59 Ruby-crowned Kinglet 323 Veery 3 Gray-cheeked Thrush 13 Swainson's Thrush 33 Hermit Thrush 30 Wood Thrush 8 White-crowned Sparrow 1 Harris's Sparrow 1 Lincoln's Sparrow 7 John Cyrus ---- Join or Leave mou-net: http://lists.umn.edu/cgi-bin/wa?SUBED1=mou-net Archives: http://lists.umn.edu/archives/mou-net.html
