Central Park, Manhattan, N.Y. City - Friday, 28 August 2015 (& prior
days)
The past week featured some slack earlier, in land bird migration, but
then an obvious uptick again by Wed. 8/26, when (at least) 18 warbler
species were recorded in Central, as well as Olive-sided Flycatcher.
Since at least Sunday there have been a few Common Nighthawks drifting
thru, most seen in late-day/dusk hours, with at least a couple in very
early morning, as well. It is getting into the thick of typical peak
time for them, & it's possible a lot more could be moving, esp. in
select locations. With very favorable wind & weather, a lot of
migrants have also sailed right on past, to points well south, and so
the numbers of most birds have been fairly modest on their stopover
visits.
That recent push became a bit more robust Thursday, 8/27, a further
enrichment of warblers included a couple of Cape May, with an adult
male in the n. woods (early at the Blockhouse), another around
Strawberry Fields, plus a good selection of the more-regular spp.,
with more Magnolia, N. Parula, Chestnut-sided, Ovenbird, & some others
having increased. The majority of warblers by far are still American
Redstart, for now. This morning, it was still plenty busy in patches,
and numbers of some more-common migrants have again increased a bit,
warblers & flycachers & vireos, along with Baltimore Orioles. At least
5 Bobolinks came thru early Thurs. & likely more were moving each day.
Tanagers also are beginning to swell a little, Scarlet still the
default & only sp. thus far noted. Of vireos, the n. end produced a
nice look at a Philadelphia Vireo on Wed., allowing comparison with
nearby Warbling & Red-eyed, always helpful & welcome when it happens
that way; there are a couple more sightings reported, one just this
morning. The majority of vireos continue to be the latter 2 commoner
spp. A hint of later-in-fall migrants was given by a single Ruby-
crowned Kinglet in the n. end on Thurs. (a little on the early side).
Also noted Wed. at the confluence of wildflower meadow & Loch path,
was an adult-plumaged Hooded Warbler with the full 'hoodie' -other
Hoodeds had been seen lately in other areas of Central, in addition.
And Worm-eating Warbler also was found Wed., as well as Tennessee on 3
days in a row - Wed. thru to today.
At least 1 Yellow-billed Cuckoo was in the n. end Thurs., and a fair
mix of flycatchers featuring E. Wood-Pewees, Great Cresteds, and a
number of Empidonax, with Least, and Yellow-bellied, & possibly a few
of the other expected species in various views - and mostly, all
silent. Thrushes are still hard to come by, with local Wood seemingly
moved-out, & the very modest flurry of Veery & (early) Swainson's
Thrush having come & gone, but some Veery do continue, & the other
thrushes, except Hermit, may begin to appear as Sept. rolls in, or
rather as serious "cold" (or at least cold-somewhere-in-Canada fronts
come along too...
Also found to be active was a bit of diurnal (daytime) migration on
the fresh NW winds of Thurs., with hummingbirds (all apparent Ruby-
throated) at the rate of 3-4 per hour in the early a.m., then again
later in the day; a nice movement of swallows, esp. Barn, and a modest
few batches of E. Kingbirds with intermittent observation of the sky,
at least 25[+] moving south thru a.m. & p.m. hours Wed. - the a.m., at
least, also featured a passage of Snowy Egret (also Great, but Snowy
dominant) on the east-west flyover route that's well-observed over the
n. end of Central Park; I stopped counting after 60, in 3 hrs.
There was also a nice mix of passerine movement in very early morning,
mostly moving south at & over tree-top level, but some headed "wrong-
way" due north at first light & for 1/2 hr. to sunrise, as well as
some additional such movement even in late morning; some were clearly
warblers or vireos, but there were others in that mix as well. Of
course Chimney Swifts have also been a part of daily movements & today
the numbers seemed to get a bit larger in terms of clear migrators,
moving obviously s.w. in batches. Oh, and it can be mentioned that a
few Bald Eagles were moving, too on Thurs., as the clouds that
appeared offered decent viewing... Osprey, as well.
All of the central dike is now exposed at the reservoir in Central,
the chance for a few shorebirds stopping in there may continue, albeit
a low chance for much.
As an aside, anyone who got to be at Cape May, N.J. &/or the bayshore,
Thurs. morning, might have been treated to a spectacle of tens of
thousands of dawn passerine (& other) migrants, going towards
Delaware, ultimately headed to where many spend 7-8 months of each
year in the Caribbean, Central & S. America.
good end-of-August birding,
Tom Fiore,
Manhattan
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