Gentle southerly and south-southeasterly winds delivered an action-packed morning of forward migration at Sunset Beach. Totals of 32 species and 2713 individuals were counted.
The action started early with Blue-gray Gnatcatchers fighting the fighting the breeze, soon joined by a steady low stream of southbound Purple Martins, Barn Swallows, and Eastern Kingbirds, sometimes with all four species mixed together as they shot south. Purple Martins ran away with the totals for the day with 1510 counted throughout the morning, nearly double the highest count from last season! The pulses of Eastern Kingbirds brought them to their best day so far this season with 261, and Barn Swallows followed with159. Blue-gray Gnatcatchers totaled 89, another great day for this consistently numerous migrant.
There was a bit of interesting diversity interspersed with the southbound flow, including two Cliff, one Northern Rough-winged, and one Bank Swallow. Other passerines included the season’s first Red-eyed Vireo and a Summer Tanager. Warblers were represented only by two Pines. There was also a brief flurry of four Red-headed Woodpeckers late morning, all juvenile birds. Another seasonally early Merlin was seen migrating very low to the water of the Chesapeake Bay, and later on an American Kestrel rose up from the north. A local Yellow-billed Cuckoo also continues to make several trips across the parking lot each day carrying food to a nest.
Red-headed Woodpecker
Purple Martin
Yellow-billed Cuckoo
Northeast winds are forecasted for tomorrow morning with favorable conditions for overnight migration with the exception of possible overnight rain locally. Though northeasterlies do not steer birds to the coast in the same way as northwest winds do, there was plenty of action last fall on northeast winds which featured prominently through the first half of the season.
Stay tuned for tomorrow’s daily migration update on CVWO social media and the CVWO blog: https://vawildliferesearch.org/cvwo-blog
And follow along with the count live every morning on Trektellen: https://trektellen.nl/count/view/3748/20260814
