Manhattan, N.Y. City - Sunday, 6/20 thru Wed., 6/23 - A hen & drake (pair of) Blue-winged Teal showed well at the Central Park reservoir for dozens of observers on Wed. 6/23, thanks to M.B. Kooper for the find; uncommon anytime in N.Y. County & the more so this early in summer, despite the species being regular at other local sites such as Jamaica Bay refuge. In addition to the teal pair, ongoing at Central Park have been at least 2 drake Wood Ducks, & both dealing with some molt for parts of late spring into summer. The 2 teal ranged together all around the reservoir when being seen thru the afternoon & evening on Wednesday.
Even with the start of calendar summer, there are some very late / lingering warblers showing in Manhattan, with at least 2 late Blackpoll Warblers, both singing males, at Riverside Park in separate areas more than one mile apart on 6/23, as well as the singing N. Waterthrush at Battery Park on 6/20 (T. Olson, & others later), also the ongoing singing Northern Parula in the Central Park Ramble area, & the Ovenbird (lately seen & not heard) ongoing at Central Park’s n. end, plus the more-expected Yellow Warblers & Common Yellowthroats (which are also present at N.Y. County’s Governors Island and Randall’s Island), the latter 2 spp. potentially nesting st some sites. There’ve been visits by Osprey around the county recently, and sightings of Common Ravens have been ongoing (if more-sparsely reported now), and for some other lingerers, there are White-throated Sparrows in multiple locations (non-breeders) in the county, with my own high count at one site of (at least) 8 of them at Bryant Park this week, a site that typically features some. In this season of nesting & fledging, a good variety of species have been found with n. Manhattan & the outlying islands noted above having some of the diversity in nesting species. Some of these many perhaps to be detailed further in a future report. ... A wide variety of insects have been showing as should be expected now; I at last (for this season) photo’d one of the American Snout butterflies in Central Park, a species that’s occasionally not uncommon in the area, & of which there have been at least small numbers around already, with a chance they may increase locally. Also (and another Hackberry - Celtis - tree feeder, in terms of the larval food plant) being seen lately are Hackberry Emperor, with a few around n. Manhattan, at least & also very possible in other areas, particularly where the tree is present, although that is not wholly determinative of the species presence in this area. Diversity in many many other groups of insects has picked up in recent weeks as one would expect. good summer birds & birding to all, Tom Fiore manhattan -- NYSbirds-L List Info: http://www.NortheastBirding.com/NYSbirdsWELCOME.htm http://www.NortheastBirding.com/NYSbirdsRULES.htm 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://birding.aba.org/maillist/NY01 Please submit your observations to eBird: http://ebird.org/content/ebird/ --
