Yellow-rumped Warblers dominated the flight as expected with 1639 northbound birds counted. A further 1011 warbler sp. were mostly far out to the east and unidentifiable, despite the high probability nearly all of these were Yellow-rumped. Enough other warblers were moving to leave room for uncertainty that every single warbler was Yellow-rumped. Totals of other late-season warblers including 32 Nashville, 6 Black-throated Green, and 5 Nashville warblers were nice to see.
Yellow-rumped Warbler
Nashville Warbler
A good array of other winter songbirds were on the move including both kinglets, Red-breasted Nuthatches, Eastern Phoebes, Brown Creepers, and the season's first Hermit Thrush and Purple Finch. Fish Crows also seem to be moving in flocks, with 18 counted. Good diversity of other migrants including raptors were migrating throughout the morning, and a surprise Cackling Goose was seen flying over in a flock of 19 Canada Goose.
Eastern Meadowlark
Cackling Goose (second from left)
The Kiptopeke Hawkwatch had a slower flight today with 145 raptors counted. A few accipitrine hawks were moving early in the day, and a nice push of Northern Harriers took place in the evening. Like Sunset Beach, a number of winter passerines appear to be in in force, as well as two Lincoln's Sparrows.
Northerly winds should allow more migrants to move through the area tonight, though it will likely not be as busy a day as this morning. Winds will briefly shift around to the west and southwest before northly winds return early next week.
Keep up with both of CVWO’s counts with our daily migration update on Facebook, Instagram, and the CVWO Blog:
https://vawildliferesearch.org/cvwo-blog-1
Follow along with our counts live every morning on our Trektellen pages:
Sunset Beach Morning Flight: https://trektellen.nl/count/view/3748/20251016
Kiptopeke Hawkwatch: https://trektellen.nl/count/view/4022/20251016
