White M Hairstreak

This White M Hairstreak, very rare in Virginia and exquisitely beautiful, was at the Williamsburg Botanical Garden today. The Observatory is a Garden partner and helps maintain the butterfly garden section.

Brian Taber

Red Phalarope

Very rare in Virginia, especially in summer, this adult Red Phalarope, molting into basic plumage, was at Craney Island, Portsmouth today. We watched as a low-flying helicopter flushed it somewhere into the nearby James River.

Brian Taber

Ridiculous Legs!

This Black-necked Stilt was at Craney Island, Portsmouth today.

Brian Taber

Purple Martin Youngsters

These young Purple Martins were trying out their new wings at Craney Island, Portsmouth today.

Brian Taber

Prothonotary Warbler Update

Guest Blogger Shirley Devan back with an update on the nest boxes at Northwest River Park in Chesapeake, VA.

Prothonotary Warblers (PROW) typically have two clutches each season. The PROWs at Northwest River Park in Chesapeake are now well into their second clutches and females are still laying eggs as of June 14. Fifty-seven eggs are being incubated as of June 14. Nest boxes that have not been occupied all season now have their first nests.

Since the end of April, Stephen Living and I have banded 59 PROW nestlings, and 18 adults – 3 males and 15 females. A male PROW and newly banded nestling (complete with fecal sac) shown in above photos.

We have “recaptured” 12 individual birds, meaning that they already had bands on them when we captured them. Several have been captured more than once this spring. All are females and were banded in 2009 or 2010 at Northwest River.

Rare Shorebirds

This week, a Red Knot was a bit tardy at Grandview Beach in Hampton and Black-necked Stilts were found nesting at Craney Island, Portsmouth, which is closed to the public.
Brian Taber

College Creek Hawkwatch Season Ends

Thanks to other volunteers Tom Armour, Fred Blystone, Bill Williams and Dean Shostak, we were able to set a new season total of 1811, surpassing the previous high of 1666 set in 2007. The hawkwatch operated from February 9th through May 24th. Our 177 hours were the most in our 15 years and our 85 days were also the most, surpassing the 82 in 2007. We had our best February, 2nd best March, 5th best April and 6th best May. The early season boosted our totals, despite much wind, rain and and cool temperatures and the second half of the season mostly saw very small flights, despite seemingly fine weather for migrating. Our biggest day was the 3rd best ever for the site, 146 on April 3rd.

We recorded 14 species and set new season highs for Turkey Vultures and Ospreys. Northern Harrier was 2nd highest. The single Broad-winged Hawk was the lowest, except for 1998 when none were seen and coverage was less than half of this year.

Totals

Black Vulture 65

Turkey Vulture 1189

Osprey 289

Mississippi Kite 1

Bald Eagle 82

Northern Harrier 41

Sharp-shinned Hawk 49

Cooper's Hawk 10

Red-shouldered Hawk 9

Broad-winged Hawk 1

Red-tailed Hawk 38

American Kestrel 29

Merlin 5

Peregrine 1

Rarities at the site included Glaucous Gull, Lesser Black-backed Gull, Least Bittern, Sandhill Crane on 2 occasions and White-winged Dove.

We see many variations on immature Bald Eagles, including the quite unusual and striking one pictured above.

It's always a pleasure watching birds cross the James River at this site during late winter and spring. If anyone wants further details, please contact me.

Brian Taber

Sandhill Cranes and White-winged Dove at College Creek

Two rarities appeared at the hawkwatch recently....on April 26th, we watched 2 Sandhill Cranes as they circled over Hog island and landed there and today, a White-winged Dove flew past, for one of very few spring records in Virginia.
Brian Taber

New Season Record at College Creek Hawkwatch

Today, Tom Armour, Bill Williams, Fred Blystone and I were on hand as the previous season high total of 1666 (set in 2007) was surpassed. We have been ahead of pace all season, though the last 3 weeks of April saw a very slow migration at the site.
Brian Taber

Prothonotary Warblers at Northwest River

Guest Blogger Shirley Devan back with an update on the nest boxes at Northwest River Park in Chesapeake. April 25 Brian Taber [President of CVWO and boat driver in above photo], Jan Lockwood [Williamsburg Bird Club member wearing the WBC hat], and I checked 58 nest boxes by motorized canoe – 39 boxes that have been in place for three years and 19 new boxes installed in mid-March.

Carolina Chickadees are early breeders and we found 9 CACH nests, most with eggs and two boxes with nestlings. April 25 was the birthday for one clutch of 5 and the other box had 4 nestlings 4 days old.

Twenty-four of the older boxes showed evidence of Prothonotary Warbler nest building – everything from 1” of moss to a complete nest with three eggs! Another nest had one egg. The eggs are creamy white with dark brown speckles. The nests are a combination of moss and cypress twigs, usually 2-3 inches of each with the cypress twigs on the top layer. We observed one PROW female approach a box with nesting material and another flew out of a box as we approached. Incidentally we observed a good size watersnake curled up on a limb nearby!

New boxes installed in mid-March are not seeing much activity – except from wasps. We did hear PROW singing near these boxes, but not in the quantity we observed in the area of the established boxes where we heard or saw a PROW near almost every box. We’ll see what happens to these new boxes as the nesting season progresses.

Prothonotary Warbler box update at Northwest River Pk

Guest blogger: Shirley Devan, reporting from the Prothonotary Warbler nest box trail at Northwest River Park in Chesapeake, VA.

The Prothonotary Warbler boxes at Northwest River Park in Chesapeake are open and ready for birds to move in. And a few have taken us up on the offer.

April 13 and 14, Steve Living and I along with three volunteers, Les Lawrence, Janet Lockwood, and Geoff Giles, checked over 80 boxes by motorized canoe and discovered 9 Carolina Chickadee nests (no nestlings yet), one Prothonotary Warbler nest, and quite a few wasp nests. Male Prothonotary Warblers are definitely back in Virginia – seen and heard everywhere along the box trail.

This citizen science project is supervised by Dr. Bob Reilly, Master Bander and VP of CVWO and Professor in the Center for Environmental Studies at VCU, with assistance from Steve Living, Wildlife Biologist with VA DGIF and Shirley Devan, Williamsburg Bird Club and Historic Rivers Chapter, VA Master Naturalist.

Above is a photo of the Prothonotary Warbler nest found April 14, constructed with cypress twigs. Also, a photo of Steve Living driving the boat and "happy" Les Lawrence installing “false fronts” on the boxes to help us capture male Prothonotary Warblers later in the season as they feed the nestlings.

Big Day at College Creek Hawkwatch

Today, Fred Blystone, Bill Williams, Shirley Devan and I were on hand for the 3rd best day in the 15 years of the hawkwatch. We saw 146 birds of 10 species and set a new daily high for Northern Harriers at 10. The photo is one of today's closer birds, an immature Bald Eagle. We also saw 2 Purple Martins, a few Barn Swallows, 2 Dunlin, 6 Lesser Yellowlegs and 2 very high Common Loons. The wind was light west and southwest...strong sun and temperatures 50-60 F. Tomorrow is expected to be an unseasonably warm 80+ degrees with strong winds and severe storms at the end of the day. Despite very poor migration conditions during the last 10 days in March...cold temperatures, strong north winds, rain and snow flurries...we are far ahead of the average season pace.

Totals

Black Vulture 20

Turkey Vulture 71

Osprey 35

Bald Eagle 2

Northern Harrier 10 (new daily high)

Sharp-shinned Hawk 3

Red-shouldered Hawk 1

Red-tailed Hawk 1

American Kestrel 2

Merlin 1

Brian Taber

1,000th Bird at College Creek

Today we reached the 1,000th bird of the season and it's the earliest date, by 10 days, than for any of our 14 previous seasons. The event usually occurs in early to mid-April. The bird was, not surprisingly for the early season, a Turkey Vulture. The past 4 day totals of 63, 120, 108 and 51 are very impressive for the site.

Brian Taber

Prothonotary Boxes at Northwest River

Thanks to Shirley Devan (her photos), of the Williamsburg Bird Club and the Historic Rivers Chapter of VA Master Naturalist and Stephen Living and Erik Brittle of the VA Department of Game and Inland Fisheries and CVWO Vice-president and Master Bander Bob Reilly, 60 more Prothonotary Warbler nest boxes were installed at Northwest River Park in Chesapeake on March 11th. There are now 100 boxes there and the site is part of the important and growing network of Prothonotary researchers, studying this species of special concern.
Brian Taber

Glaucous Gull at College Creek Hawkwatch

This imm. Glaucous Gull, a new species for the hawkwatch, flew past this morning.

Brian Taber

College Creek Hawkwatch Feb Summary

Due to some unusually good weather for February and excellent coverage, we were able to shatter the previous high total for February, which was 204 in 1998. This February, with 19 days coverage, we recorded 344. As usual, Turkey Vultures made up the bulk of the early season flight, but our 8 species included 16 Black Vultures, 5 Ospreys, 12 Bald Eagles, 3 Northern Harriers, 1 Sharp-shinned Hawk, 1 Cooper's Hawk and 13 Red-tailed Hawks. A Peregrine, quite rare at this site, seen on February 24th, was headed south across the river and so not counted. Also on that day we saw 135 Tundra Swans. We have seen 2 Lesser Black-backed Gulls, the Glaucous Gull noted above, a few Tree Swallows and dozens of crows crossing the river, most of which did not vocalize.

The dark domes are the Surry Nuclear Power Plant, 2 miles across the James River to the south, the map shows the point of land at Hog Island Wildlife Management Area which the birds follow and the sign provides a bit of history.

Brian Taber

College Creek Hawkwatch Begins

We got off to a chilly (28F) start for the 15th consecutive late winter/spring hawkwatch at College Creek on Feb 9th, but Tom Armour, Fred Blystone and I were rewarded with 11 Turkey Vultures crossing the river on a southeast wind. We started a day earlier than scheduled due to predicted snow on Feb 10th. The hawkwatch is located on the James River, 3 miles southeast of Williamsburg, on the Colonial Parkway and operates daily through May, weather permitting, from mid-morning to early afternoon, when birds use the warming air to make the water-crossing. We often see a wide variety of other migrants, including shorebirds, waterfowl and swallows. Data is posted on Hawkcount.org site and regular updates are made to the VA List Serve and this blog. Visitors are always welcome, feel free to e-mail me directly for more information.

Brian Taber

Snow Buntings

These are part of a flock of 31 at Craney Island, Portsmouth today.

Brian Taber

Winter Boat Adventure

I was asked to lead a birding boat trip out of Lynnhaven, Virginia Beach, yesterday, organized by the Williamsburg Bird Club, aboard the "Bay Princess." Our captain said the very cold 37 degree water at the mouth of Chesapeake Bay had forced many fish and birds at least 50 miles south...we didn't see a single Northern Gannet which are usually plentiful. The air temperature was also in the 30s as we cruised along the Chesapeake Bay Bridge-tunnel, almost to the Eastern Shore. We were treated to a spectacular assemblage of at least 15 seals...photo by Seig Kopinitz...of a varierty of colors...usually we only see Harbor Seals....the single swimming seal picture appears to be a Gray Seal by the head profile, which would be quite rare this far south...another seal in the middle of the photo and the one to the far right appear to have much smaller, different-shaped heads. Comments are welcome. Thanks to some chumming of cut menhaden by the first mate, we had a following of hundreds of gulls.

Birds seen were:

Common Loon 3

Brown Pelican 2

Great Cormorant 12

Double-crested Cormorant 1,250

Brant 6

Lesser Scaup 440

Greater Scaup 10+

Long-tailed Duck 9

Black Scoter 13

Surf Scoter 625

White-winged Scoter 1

Bufflehead 800

Red-breasted Merganser 25

Osprey 1

Peregrine 1

Ruddy Turnstone 5

Sanderling 20

Purple Sandpiper 12

Bonaparte's Gull 16

Ring-billed Gull 135

Herring Gull 550

Lesser Black-backed Gull 2

Great Black-backed Gull 35

Brian Taber

What....no hummingbirds?

My feeder in Williamsburg, Dec 27th.
Brian Taber

Happy Holidays!

Brian Taber

Fall Raptorthon

On November 30th, the Observatory participated again in the "Raptorthon" for the Hawk Migration Association of North America (HMANA) as we did last spring at College Creek Hawkwatch... an event to help raise awareness and funds for hawk conservation. We report our data to the HMANA website at Hawkcount.org and their Raptor Population Index project uses such data for their excellent reports, such as "The State of North America's Birds of Prey," in 2008. HMANA coordinates the largest network of raptor migration monitoring sites in the world. To learn more, visit the HMANA.org website. Tax-deductible donations may be made directly to them or through CVWO for your support of the Raptorthon.

That's Kiptopeke Hawkwatcher Zak Poulton in the Raptorthon shirt...in 70 degree temperatures and strong south winds, we found 11 birds in 8 hours (2 Northern Harriers, 5 Sharp-shinned Hawks, 2 Cooper's Hawks and 2 Red-tailed Hawks) to end our season.

Brian Taber

750,000th Bird Update

Well..this milestone will just have to happen next September..it's clear that with migration winding down, the 750,000th bird at Kiptopeke Hawkwatch will not come by this month...we'll post more information about it starting August 2011...thanks to all those who sent in predictions for the contest!
Brian Taber

Merlin Meal

Fantastic photo by Steve Thornhill, taken recently at the Kiptopeke Hawkwatch, of a Merlin enjoying a favorite meal...dragonfly!

Brian Taber

Black-chinned Hummingbird

The purple gorget is evident in this adult male Black-chinned Hummingbird, found and photographed by Mark Mullins in Pulaski County, Virginia, where it stayed Nov 8-11. The species typically occurs west of the Great Plains.

Brian Taber

750,000th Bird Update

The Kiptopeke Hawkwatch has seen a recent slowdown, even though Northern Goshawks and Golden Eagles have appeared.....and the total as of Nov 3rd is 21,837....to get to 750,000 we have to reach 26,833....it should be close, so send in your predictions (see related piece just below)!
Brian Taber

The Feeders at Kiptopeke

With the recent cooler weather, the bird feeders at the Kiptopeke Hawkwatch have suddenly become very busy, with many American Goldfinches, Purple Finches, Red-breasted Nuthatches and Pine Siskins (above) joining the more usual species.

Brian Taber

Selasphorus Hummingbird

This hummer, rare in the east and identifiable only to the genus Selasphorus, was at the Kiptopeke Hawkwatch platform feeder on Oct 26th...photo by Zak Poulton.

Brian Taber

Northern Goshawk at Kiptopeke!

Terrific photo by Steve Thornhill, of the immature Northern Goshawk that flew right over the Kiptopeke Hawkwatch on Oct 30th.
Brian Taber

750,000 Birds!

The Kiptopeke Hawkwatch is closing in on a remarkable milestone...750,000 birds! See the button on the left side of our Home Page to enter our contest!

Regular updates to our season totals will be posted here. The total as of Oct 20 is 20,037 and we need to get to 26,833!

Brian Taber

More Bird Habitat at Kiptopeke

On October 8th, a ribbon-cutting ceremony was held to officially open the newly-acquired "Taylor Pond" area at Kiptopeke State Park. It was made possible through the efforts of those pictured and also singer/songwriter/environmentalist James Taylor, who donated proceeds of a concert held in Virginia Beach. Pictured, from the left are: Fred Hazelwood, District 1 State Parks Manager; Sam Sweeney, Kiptopeke Park Manager; Steve Parker, The Nature Conservancy; Willie Randall, Northampton County Board of Supervisors; Jack Humphries, Eastern Shore Master Gardeners; Laura McKay, VA Department of Environmental Quality, Coastal Zone Management; David Johnson, Director, VA Department of Conservation and Recreation and Daniel Jordan, Assistant Park Manager at Kiptopeke. Trees and other native plants were installed in recent weeks, which, in addition to the freshwater pond, will provide crucial stopover resources for migrant birds at this globally important natural area.

Brian Taber

Northern Wheatear

Paul Nasca digiscoped this very rare Northern Wheatear at the Chincoteague causeway...he and the Fredericksburg VA Birding Club found it Oct 2nd.

Brian Taber

Monarch Migration on the Eastern Shore

These are some of the estimated 10,000+ Monarchs at a rare roost site at the tip of Virginia's Eastern Shore on Sept 20th. They were found and photographed by CVWO Monarch Researcher Kaitlyn Parkins.

Brian Taber

Late Day Merlins

At the Kiptopeke Hawkwatch, in September, flights usually last all day, with Merlins typically the only hawks flying late in the day...these were there yesterday, still moving at sunset.

Brian Taber

Coyote!

After living in Virginia for 40 years, this is the first coyote I've seen here...today at Craney Island, Portsmouth....yet another threat to the colonial nesting birds there.

Brian Taber

White-cheeked Pintail

Distant picture, but still showing the famous cheeks...and even a bit of the red bill base...of the White-cheeked Pintail, found at Chincoteague right after Hurricane Earl blustered up the east coast, Sept 2nd. Could it have been storm-blown?

Brian Taber

Buff-breasted Sandpiper and Caspian Terns at Hog Island

Today, the juvenile Buff-breasted Sandpiper that Adam D'Onofrio found yesterday was still at Hog Island Wildlife Management Area in Surry County, along with a staggering assemblage of 811 Caspian Terns, an apparent State high count.

Brian Taber

Piping Plover

This Piping Plover was on the Chesapeake Bay shoreline at Grandview Beach, Hampton today.....with Semi-palmated Plover in 2nd image.

Brian Taber