Tuesday, 19 April, 2011 - Central Park, Manhattan, N.Y. City The female Varied Thrush was still present in Central Park, Manhattan, N.Y. City Tues. afternoon, seen in the trees & shrubs just north of the East 79 Street transverse road, somewhat south of the south/SW wall of the Metropolitan Museum of Art (not more than 150 yards or so from Fifth Ave.) and moving towards the East Drive of the park (a short way farther west) after good views at the first location noted. It's going to be interesting seeing just how long this bird lingers, since it's initial report at nearly the end of November - going on five months!
The Red-headed Woodpecker also continued Tues, again near the southeast corner of Sheep Meadow, not more than 50 yards or so west of that "corner" and in trees on the south side of the path there, also going to trees a bit closer to the north side of the 66 St. transverse road, with the Carousel (merry-go-round) building visible below & to the immediate south of the transverse. The woodpecker now has a virtually complete red hood, while there is still some evidence of its first-year plumage in the wings. This individual seems to be rather non-vocal. A walk thru almost all of the park Tuesday suggested that the north woods was the busier migrant area, as compared to Monday, when the park's Ramble seemed to have more of a concentration of migrants. Tues. birds also were quite active, and it seemed that a fair number may have continued on through the misty conditions. On Monday, diversity also seemed slightly higher while it's possible that numbers of some species were a bit higher Tuesday. A breeding-plumaged Common Loon continued on the reservoir, still present later Tuesday and seeming to favor the east & NE sections. The reservoir also still held a fair number of ducks, including Buffleheads, Ruddys, and especially, N. Shovelers. The Meer (in the park's NE corner) was again a place for swallows, with the 3 most-often seen species present: Barn (mainly), Tree, and N. Rough-winged Swallows, and also seen there & at the lake were a very few Chimney Swifts, that species first noted on Monday by Jacob Drucker & others. At least one Pine Siskin was reportedly still around the 2 nyjer seed feeders still hanging in the Ramble; mainly American Goldfinch are chowing down that seed lately. Red-breasted Nuthatch was in the Ramble as well. A number of folks saw Spotted Sandpiper Tuesday. The north end had mainly the expected warbler species, dominated by "yellow" Palm, & Myrtle [Yellow-rumped] Warblers, plus a few Black-and-white, at least one Common Yellowthroat, and a nice duo of both Northern & Louisiana Waterthrushes at the Loch. Other species again in fair to good numbers included Hermit Thrushes, and Swamp and Chipping Sparrows - a good number of the Chippers put up in trees, by free-running dogs (the "norm" in Central most of the time) as well as for foraging opportunities in the various trees budding, flowering and "unfurling". A modest number of Blue-headed Vireos, Blue-gray Gnatcatchers, & House Wrens were also around. A much less-often spring sighting was a single female Eastern Bluebird, along the west side of the Great Lawn Tues. afternoon, and an Ovenbird was noted, in the Ramble, via Anders P. & Lee S. Good Black-capped Chickadee movement recently, thru Tuesday. Accompanying for much of Tuesday was Brenda Inskeep; additional n. end observations were from Malcolm Morris, Tom Perlman, & Jarad Harary. There were likely many more birders out & about in the park thru the morning as well. - - - - At Staten Island's Great Kills park (Crooke's Pt. section) in N.Y. City, the first-of-year Hooded Warbler (male) was reported by Catherine Barron & Marie King on Monday. The Yellow-throated Warbler in Clove Lakes Park, Staten Island was not re-found later in the day on Monday, nor on Tuesday, but it could well be lingering there, a fairly extensive area to search. The reports are on the SI NaturaList. - - - - At Prospect Park, Brooklyn, the first-of-year report of Worm-eating Warbler, also Monday 18 April, with a minimum of 8 warbler species noted including the Yellow-throated Warbler seen there Mon., and for Tuesday at Prospect, a Brewster's-type hybrid, along with various other warbler species & other migrants, were reported, as so often, via Peter Dorosh's birding blog. - - - - [Brewster's and even Lawrence's types of hybrid warblers seem to be more & more regular each year, with the ongoing "mixing" of breeding zones of the two actual species that give rise to these hybrid forms (Blue-winged and Golden-winged Warblers). I believe there are some who see many of these two spp. as ultimately sharing much of each others genetic makeup and perhaps many, or even most as being hybrids in some definable way. I wonder where the hybrid forms tend to overwinter, as I've seen each of the species on their separate wintering grounds, but not seen obvious hybrids there, in relatively 'casual' observations, however.] Both of the species are reportedly fairly common in winter in Nicaragua (a Central American country I've not visited) and perhaps the hybrid forms would be most readily found there as well. A "google-docs" archived article from the ABA's "Birding" magazine on these 2 species and their 2 named hybrid forms, written by Leo Shapiro, with photos by Jim Zipp, is found in PDF file format at: http://www.aba.org/birding/v37n3p278.pdf (however this article does not detail the wintering grounds of these.) Mentioning Central America, if anyone is seeking a highly energetic and enthusiastic birding guide capable of getting birders to about anywhere and to any birds found in Costa Rica, I can recommend one who lives there. He is the son of the author of the most recent field guide to that country's birds and his dad also can arrange tours. Also, we have a highly experienced native Costa Rican birder who leads tours living much of the time in Brooklyn, NYC! Interesting to read reports of Whip-poor-wills heard, in at least two states east of NY. Good birding, Tom Fiore, Manhattan -- NYSbirds-L List Info: http://www.NortheastBirding.com/NYSbirdsWELCOME http://www.NortheastBirding.com/NYSbirdsRULES ARCHIVES: 1) http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/maillist.html 2) http://birdingonthe.net/mailinglists/NYSB.html 3) http://www.surfbirds.com/birdingmail/Group/NYSBirds-L Please submit your observations to eBird: http://ebird.org/content/ebird/ --
