Hawk Cliff Hawkwatch
Port Stanley, Ontario, Canada
Daily Raptor Counts: Oct 28, 2023
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Species Day's Count Month Total Season Total
------------------ ----------- -------------- --------------
Black Vulture 0 0 0
Turkey Vulture 1580 12530 12751
Osprey 0 3 61
Bald Eagle 16 113 247
Northern Harrier 44 227 590
Sharp-shinned Hawk 330 2070 5411
Cooper's Hawk 25 152 199
American Goshawk 0 4 4
Red-shouldered Hawk 92 182 182
Broad-winged Hawk 1 29 32328
Red-tailed Hawk 533 1005 1056
Rough-legged Hawk 3 13 14
Golden Eagle 9 24 24
American Kestrel 27 686 1982
Merlin 1 33 84
Peregrine Falcon 0 28 54
Unknown Accipiter 0 0 0
Unknown Buteo 0 0 0
Unknown Falcon 0 0 0
Unknown Eagle 0 0 0
Unknown Raptor 0 0 0
Total: 2661 17099 54987
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Observation start time: 07:00:00
Observation end time: 16:30:00
Total observation time: 9.5 hours
Official Counter: Tom Bolohan
Observers: Dave Brown, Ernie Gribble, Ken Wootton, Mac McAlpine,
Mark Cunningham, Matt Oswald, Ronnie Goodhand, Tom Stewart
Visitors:
Quite a few visitors today and too many to list out. Thanks to the usual
crew Tom B, Matt, Tom S, Ronnie, Ernie, Mark and Ken... and to Brett F and
Barb for helping with a lot of IDs.
Weather:
Not quite the weather that was forecast today with much heavier cloud cover
but the winds were as predicted moderate from the NW and N for the entire
day. With all of the cloud cover spotting the birds was easier and I think
helped keep the birds a bit lower for better viewing. Temp got to a high of
12C today and the pressure was rising fairly rapidly for the day.
Raptor Observations:
Very similar flight today as compared to the good flight we had last
weekend with today's tally being 2,661 birds. The bulk of the flight was
TVs (1,580) but some good numbers of Redtails (533) and Sharpies (330).
There were Rough-legged Hawks (3) today all light morph birds, and a decent
number of Red-shoulders (92) and a pretty late in the season Broadwing.
Highlights today were the Golden Eagles (9) with 4 coming through quite low
in the last full hour of the day as we enjoyed a bit of a down-flight. We
also had a very dark Redtail that came through and was well photographed
and may have been a Harlan's... we'll have to see what a review of the
photos gives us on the ID.
Non-raptor Observations:
There were a TON of non-raptors on the move past the hawk watch today with
black birds numbering in the 1000s and lots of flocks of other species as
well including...a flock of Eastern Bluebirds that totaled at least 35 or
more, a good sized flock of Long-tailed Ducks, another flock of about a
dozen White-winged Scoter and a smaller flock of Red-breasted Mergansers.
I've submitted an eBird checklist that you can have a look at for all of
the species seen today.
https://ebird.org/checklist/S153291104
Predictions:
Looks like a pretty wet Sunday tomorrow with rain forecast all day BUT if
the rain clears out very early Monday in the am then the forecast for NW
winds Monday could bring another good flight past Hawk Cliff.
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Report submitted by Dave Brown ([email protected])
Hawk Cliff Hawkwatch information may be found at:
http://www.ezlink.ca/~thebrowns/HawkCliff/index.htm
More site information at hawkcount.org:
https://hawkcount.org/siteinfo.php?rsite=392
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