Concord Birds: Summer and Fall 2014

As it is the third week of October, some kind of update on the Concord Birds Project is long overdue, to put it mildly!  It is always tempting to let the numbers do the talking, but they don't tell the whole truth, do they?  Still, the very strong spring migration was evident in some telling comparisons with 2013, the first year of our town-wide eBird census.  Here are some numbers that indicate the very different pace of spring and fall migrations in 2013 and 2014 (running total by end of period):

2013 /  2014
Jan-Apr (143) (134)
May (191) (198)
June (193) (201)
July (198) (204)
August (205) (204)
Sept (214) (206)
Oct (218) (209)

You may recall that winter of 2013 was relatively mild, with open water, irruptive finches, and many birds over-wintering.  2014, by comparison, had northern owls and lots of ice.  May of 2013 was not spectacular, with only a few 19-warbler reports and only 47 species found.

Louisiana Waterthrush, Estabrook Woods, April 2014

May of 2014 was, by all accounts, one of the best in memory, with 63 species found and truly spectacular warbler reports routinely hitting the high teens, with one 23-warbler day by the Winstanley brothers in their back yard migrant trap! We went into May trailing 2013 by 9 birds and came out 7 ahead.

Fledgling Orchard Oriole, Great Meadows Concord, June 2014

Then things slowed down again, and by the end of September we were again trailing 2013 by the same margin as in early spring.  Part of the problem was the condition of Great Meadows: completely overtaken by lotus, with a late draining of the upper impoundment.  Not a single Snowy Egret was reported, and certainly no Little Blue Heron.  Compared to the relatively good shorebird migration of 2013, this summer was pretty grim.

Green Heron, Knox Trail wetland, July 2014

Fall warbler migration has been, in a word, slow; actually, it has been a mere trickle of birds, with an initial blast of Redstarts, but very small numbers of Blackpolls and Yellow-Rumps.  More productive was the number of nighttime flight call reports, including several Gray-Cheeked Thrushes and numerous Swainson's. Sparrows have been building in waves, with good reports from Kaveski and Barrett's Mill.  At least three Clay-Colored Sparrows have been found, but extremely few Dickcissels have been reported so far. At Great Meadows the first Coot and Ringnecks have arrived, and a week ago there was a spectacular fly-over of 54 White-Winged Scoters, unusual inland.

Dickcissel, Barrett's Mill Farmland, October 2013

Clay-Colored Sparrow, Barrett's Mill Farmland, October 2014

As of the third week of October, no rare geese have turned up, although one, perhaps two, candidates for Cackling Goose have been spotted.  Pipit flocks are growing and there has been one Longspur flyby.  It will take a serious turn-around, though, to make the 2013 number of 225.  Stay tuned!

Ludlow Loses a Lifer

It has been over a month since my last update. Some blogger I am!  I got an anonymous note from a reader urging me to a) post more often; b) incorporate video and audio; c) make it more exciting.  Agreed. So, to appease the masses here is a video of one of the Louisiana Waterthrushes located during April in Estabrook Woods in Concord (an ongoing project, as their breeding status is uncertain).

LOWA, Estabrook Woods 4/24/14

I have also been doing some recording in Estabrook, primarily of warblers and particularly of Louisiana Waterthrushes, in an attempt to identify individual birds and estimate how many singing males there might be.

This week Ludlow received the sad news that his Swainson's Hawk sighting on Birdathon 2013 had not been accepted by the Massachusetts Avian Records Committee.  It was a split vote, but ultimately my birdathon team was not able to resolve differences between our observations, nor were we able to eliminate some even rarer possibilities (Short-Tailed Hawk), so even though the committee agreed that it very likely was a Swainson's, without an official confirmation I am going to take down Ludlow's record, although we will note it as an unconfirmed sighting in Ludlow's eventual checklist.

May is off to a good start, but the lingering effects of the long, hard winter are still evident in low numbers and a consistent lag of 6-10 birds behind 2013. But, a few SW front have brought in decent warbler variety, with a high so far of 13 species on the MassPort Trail on May 7th.

Wild Goose Season in Concord: White-Fronted and Barnacle

Concord's location along the Sudbury and Concord rivers, as well as ample farm land, continues to draw in good geese.  Last fall we had a poor goose season due to weather, but we are making up for it this spring.

Chuck Johnson found a Greater White-Fronted goose a week ago on the Concord River by Great Meadows NWR, and while it has been hit or miss, many have seen it. As of 3/30 it has been hanging out in the fields by the old sewage treatment plant by Great Meadows.

Today, March 31, I found a Barnacle Goose by pure chance by the parking lot at Verrill Farm; as I pulled up it was the first bird I saw, but so far it it has not been relocated. Some record shots:

Winter Summary 2014

Winter 2014 continues. Now in the third week of March the impoundments at Great Meadows are still frozen and local ponds only have small sections of open water.  Much of the snowpack has melted, clearing corn fields for arriving geese. Birds are a bit late and the variety has been a bit limited due to limited migration windows (a few warm weekends with SW winds brought in some G-W Teal and Pintails to Nine Acre Corner; Killdeer are here, but in small numbers; no phoebes yet except for that February pioneer).  A very small number of Great Blue Heron have been observed arranging nests. Many Juncos are still here, although Tree Sparrows have gotten scarce.

In short, a slow start to 2014.  As of March 23, with Chuck Johnson's discovery of a Greater White-Fronted at Great Meadows, Ludlow G. has tallied 89 birds compared to 103 by the same date in 2013.  Granted, last winter we had irruptive finches and mild temperatures, but it's a stark difference.

Here's hoping for a good spring migration!

Ludlow Goes Big (again)

Yes, our virtual birding companion, Ludlow G., is at it again.  Realizing that if one year can be big, three can be bigger (and more meaningful), Ludlow will be compiling collaborative "big years" with birders in Concord during 2014 and 2015.

Gulp.

Some early comparisons between January 2013 and 2014 suggest why long-term surveys are so useful.

Winter of 2013 began mild and then snow began to pile up in February, while 2014 began very cold, with virtually no open water and some snow pack.  In January 2013, with a lot of open water, an irruption year for finches, and some lingering passerines, we had:

The amazing, continuing Rufous hummingbird, which lasted through Jan. 8
Wood duck, green-winged teal, bufflehead, mute swan
Common Yellowthroat, palm, pine, chipping sparrow, savannah, winter wren
Pine siskin, white-winged crossbill, pine grosbeak

Common Mergansers in the Assabet River, West Concord

This January we have missed all but the real cold water ducks, haven't had a winter wren yet or a barred owl, no red-breasted nuthatches, and only one reported redpoll. But birds we did not have last January are equally interesting:

Snowy and Short-eared owl (Hanscom, this year's bonus birds in early January)
Turkey vulture
Fox sparrow
Hermit thrush (numerous sightings)
Lapland longspur
Great Cormorant (amazing fly-over sighting at Hanscom)
Merlin (an active bird around Kaveski; we did finally see a Merlin in Feb. 2013)

Nevertheless, even though reporting is down a bit from a year ago, the current totals are similar (2014/2013): 73/75 by February.

Go Ludlow!

Let the Games Begin!

Rumor has it this was the demo video for a proposed sport at Sochi.  Putin rejected it, claiming "we have no crows in Sochi, and this is not funny."

For those counting, it's a hooded crow filmed somewhere in Russia.

Eagles!

On Saturday January 11th the Winstanleys found a deer carcass on the ice just below the bridge at Lowell Rd. and Liberty St.  On the carcass were three bald eagles, fighting over what was left, presumably after coyotes had gotten there first.  I arrived a few hours later to find a sub-adult eagle perched above the carcass.  It left, and very quickly a red-shouldered hawk showed up.  It was raining and foggy, thus the lousy shot.

One of the adults soon returned to have another go (compare size with the RSHA):

The juvenile then flew back in, and you can see its underwing coloring and uneven length flight feathers in the banner picture above.