On Sunday, the good warbler birding continued in Forest Park Queens NY. In all a total of 20 species of Warblers were recorded in the Park. Noticeably, the volume of birds were down significantly from Friday when the bird songs overwhelmed the woods but the variety remained good.
Although, you had to work harder to get the variety of birds, I and a few other birders were quite impressed with the number of Cape May Warblers that were around. Many birders spoke of seeing or nearing double digits of this species with 10-12 being the high count reported by a few birders who covered quite a bit of ground in the park. There were also multiple sightings of Bay Breasted with a high of 4-5 seen by a few birders. One puzzling occurrence for many of the long time Forest Park birders was the lack of activity in the late afternoon at the famous "waterhole". Several birders shared with me that the MO used to be Jamaica Bay in the morning and Forest Park water hole in the afternoon where a 20 warbler species count was easy on a good day at that location. I am fascinated at the changes taking place with the pattern of birds using the waterhole and wonder what has affected the change the long time birders of the park have noticed. One theory one birder cited was that the birds are not staying as long as they used to and seem to be long gone by the end of the day. Another was that there are less birds around. If you wish to share any of your insight on why birds are not staying longer in the midst of migration through places like Forest Park or why the change in the lack of activity at the waterhole, please drop me a note offline. Thanks Andrew Baksh Queens, NY www.birdingdude.blogspot.com -- NYSbirds-L List Info: http://www.NortheastBirding.com/NYSbirdsWELCOME http://www.NortheastBirding.com/NYSbirdsRULES http://www.NortheastBirding.com/NYSbirdsSubscribeConfigurationLeave.htm ARCHIVES: 1) http://www.mail-archive.com/nysbirds-l@cornell.edu/maillist.html 2) http://www.surfbirds.com/birdingmail/Group/NYSBirds-L 3) http://birdingonthe.net/mailinglists/NYSB.html Please submit your observations to eBird: http://ebird.org/content/ebird/ --
