Still very birdy in Central Park

Northern Parula

Saturday was perhaps a bit less frenetically birdy that Friday, but still a lot of activity.

American Redstart singing

I had 46 species, seven of them first-of-year for me (up to 137 for the year). One of the FOY species was a Black-Billed Cuckoo (hiding deep in the leaves of a treetop near Warbler Rock), which doesn't always appear in Manhattan.

Lincoln's Sparrow

Two sparrows, Lincoln's and White-Crowned, usually show up somewhere but generally need some work to find.  The Lincoln's was hanging out in a marshy lawn area with just an Indigo Bunting, but the White-crowned was in a flock of seventy or so White-Throated Sparrows methodically working over a newly-seeded slope.

White-Crowned Sparrow with White-Throated Sparrows

The other four new species (Ruby-Throated Hummingbird, Least Flycatcher, Swainson's Thrush, and Magnolia Warbler) are common visitors, but always nice to see. And of course, many species already present were seen everywhere.

Rose-Breasted Grosbeak singing

It looks to me like the winds started out southerly tonight, but are turning westerly in the small hours. I think that means that some birds will move out, but fewer will come in. I could be completely wrong; we'll see.

Magnolia Warbler

I did miss one very good bird seen in the Ramble, a Summer Tanager.  Maybe tomorrow.  It's supposed to be a beautiful day again.

"I think Central Park birding rivaled the Andes today"

"I think Central Park birding rivaled the Andes today." That's what Brian Tilston Smith (Assistant Curator of Ornithology at the Museum of Natural History) tweeted on Friday, after a hugely birdy day. According to ebird.org, 109 species were seen in Central Park. One Hundred Nine bird species. In all of 2013, 226 species were reported in the park, so Friday saw 48 percent of all the species expected all year. Fantastic.

I saw 51 species--I think that's my best day ever--and 14 warbler species (of the 20 reported in the park). Ten new species for the year--including Indigo Bunting

I've finally taken a good picture of an Indigo Bunting

Rose-Breasted Grosbeak, Great Crested Flycatcher, Orchard Oriole, and six warblers (Ovenbird, Orange-Crowned Warbler, Nashville Warbler, Black-Throated Blue Warbler, American Redstart, and Hooded Warbler).

More photos tomorrow. Probably more birds tomorrow, too.

For the May Day is the great day...

Wednesday nigh the winds were generally southerly, and the rain mostly ended before dawn. So there was a pretty good migratory movement into Central Park, and I had a really good day: 43 species, ten first-of-year, ten warblers.

In the morning, I started off with a Blue-Winged Warbler at Maintenance meadow (it stayed around there all day).

Blue-Winged Warbler and prey

A Northern Parula warbler and a Warbling Vireo were high in trees above the Gill source; I saw Wood Thrush in various places, and heard their echoing songs; Gray Catbirds popped up here and there.

In the late afternoon, I returned--a Worm-Eating Warbler had joined the Blue-Winged, and down the Riviera were Canada and Chestnut-Sided Warblers.

Canada Warbler posing

Finally, as I was leaving, I joined a group looking at a Scarlet Tanager high in the trees near the "captain's bench".

Scarlet Tanager, suspicious

Yellow-Rumped and Palm Warblers remained ubiquitous, Black-and-white warblers were around in small numbers; a Yellow Warbler sang very loudly just south of Willow Rock, and a Prairie Warbler sang at Tupelo Meadow.

Prairie Warbler singing

In other warbler news, the Yellow-Throated Warbler was again seen near Tavern on the Green, and Black-Throated Blue Warblers and both waterthrushes were reported.

Winds look to be westerly, maybe West-southwest, tonight, so I expect there won't be a lot of movement out. Maybe I can still catch up with the Yellow-Throated.

Yellow Warbler on the move

(I'm now at 120 species this year in New York County; 14 species, or 9 days, ahead of last year.)

Rainy day

Heavy rain all day, so I didn't get out. Monday I stopped in the Ramble briefly on my way to the Bronx. I failed to spot the Hooded Warbler who was seen on the Point and also in the Captain's Bench area, missed the Spotted Sandpiper in the Oven by mere minutes, and didn't have time to try for the Yellow-Throated Warbler seen around Sheep Meadow and then south of Tavern on the Green. I did see my first Northern Waterthrush and Chimney Swifts of the season, which brought me to 109 species in Manhattan this year. The Chimney Swifts retruning is my marker for the real beginning of Spring.

The southwest part of Van Cortlandt Park was not as birdy as I expected. A lot of red-Winged Blackbirds are around, and I had a nice look at a female RWBB in the wetlands area south of the mansion.

Female blackbird calling

She was calling, rather sweetly for a blackbird. I also saw a lingering Rusty Blackbird there. There was a Ring-Necked Duck on the lake; I wonder if he was the same drake I saw there a month ago. A number of singing Yellow-Rumped Warblers were around, and also Tree Swallows, Barn Swallows, and (yes!) Chimney Swifts.

Tuesday, I saw a report early in the morning that the Yellow-Throated Warbler was seen just south of Sheep meadow, so I headed straight down there...and struck out. I spent an hour and a half getting "warbler neck" from scanning the trees between the 65th Street Transverse and the Bandshell. No dice. I did get a nice addition to my photo collection of House Sparrows nesting in interesting places:

Sparrow at her nest in a street sign

And a good look at the male Red-Tailed Hawk of the pair that is nesting near the Sheep Meadow.

I think that's a bit of his breakfast still in his beak.

Reaching the Ramble, I saw a Yellow Warbler right near Bow Bridge. Poor thing seemed to be missing its tail, but it was flying pretty well anyway. The other newly-arrived warbler species I didn't see, nor had anyone seen the Hooded Warbler from the day before again.

On my way out, at Maintenance meadow there were some Chipping Sparrows and one Field Sparrow.

Field Sparrow, ohsocute

There haven't been a lot of Field Sparrows this Spring. I think they're about the cutest thing going.

The yellow Warbler was my 110th species in New York county this year. Tomorrow it's supposed to stop raining in the afternoon, so I'll go see what's around after the storm.

Migration update

We visited the Cherry Blossom Festival at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden on Sunday. We weren't birding, but did hear a Chipping Sparrow singing near the Eastern Parkway entrance and saw our first-of-year Eastern Kingbird perched in a cherry tree at the Japanese Garden, hawking insects just above the pond surface. We didn't have a chance to chase the Prothonotary Warbler reported in Prospect Park on Saturday.

Meanwhile in Central Park, the expected migrants are moving in. A pair of Ruby-Throated Hummingbirds was seen at Maintenance in the Ramble; an Eastern Kingbird was around the ridge in the North Woods, and a Yellow-Throated Vireo was photographed at the High Meadow and seen in other locations there. Warbling Vireos were spotted in the Ramble, to go with the White-Eyed and Blue-Headed Vireos already present. The season's first Black-Throated Green Warblers, several of them, appeared in the Ramble. Less expected was a Broad-Winged Hawk seen soaring on thermals with the resident Red-Tailed Hawks on the west side.

I'm off to the Bronx to visit my aunts tomorrow, but I hope to bird the Ramble before going up, and to look in at Van Cortlandt Park on the way home.

Miss, miss, miss, miss, HIT

White-Eyed Vireo

Friday I went looking for the Nashville Warbler seen at the Oven and the Point, and didn't find it. Then I looked for the Northern Waterthrush reported at the Upper lobe, and didn't see that. Next I went uptown to the Pool, where I didn't see the Spotted Sandpiper reported there in the morning; and finally walked up and down the Loch and Ravine area, where I didn't see the Wilson's Snipe that had been seen there only an hour or so before. Oh, well. It was a nice day for a loooong walk through Central Park.

Saturday, I went to the Point, which remains pretty birdy--a Prairie Warbler continues there and has been singing, and lots of Yellow-Rumped and Palm Warblers, along with a House Wren (or two). There was briefly a nice view of a Great Egret in a tree along the Riviera across the way.

Nadir Souirgi, a very fine birder who mostly stays in the North End, showed up on the Point and said he'd seen a White-Eyed Vireo at Willow Rock. That's a nice bird for the park, and off I went. I found a small crowd of birders and photographers following a small bird high up in the trees just south of Willow Rock. I got my binoculars up and saw it was indeed teh Vireo, then tried to get a photo.

Small, active bird back in tree branches; not easy. I got a few shots off before it moved farther south, but I didn't think I had anything good. Where it had moved to, it was still back in branches and the glare was fierce, making it hard to see what was in the camera's viewfinder.

The Vireo had an encounter with another small bird, and one of them flew off. It turned out that a Blue-Headed Vireo had chased it off. I never re-found the White-Eyed, and I didn't hear that anyone else had either.

So I was happy to have seen the bird--my 107th species of the year in Manhattan--but reviewing the photos was disappointing. It was hard to judge on the little screen on the camera in the glare, but it looked like I had one photo where the Vireo was recognizable, but that's about all.

So I was delighted to see the photo above when I looked at the day's shooting on my monitor at home. Lessons:

• Keep chasing bird reports, the ones you get make up for the ones you miss.
• When you're photographing, keep on shooting. Shoot a lot, worry about the results later. 
• If you're in the right place and the right time, luck can work for you.
• Needless to say, never delete anything until you take a good look at it on a proper monitor.

Everybody sing

It's Spring and everybody's singing. The sparrows are singing in their own special ways:

a long chittering verse

"Oh sweet Canada Canada Canada!"

Cardinals are singing unstoppably at each other:

Anything you can sing, I can sing louder

Robins are singing all over:

we shall sing in the trees, we shall sing in the bushes, we shall sing on the ground, we shall never go silent

This House Finch did his best to convince me he was some other bird:

Take a deep breath and sing

And everybody wants to get into the act.

I am too a songbird