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We are on the cusp of a massive influx of migrants. Well, massive being relative to where I am.  The trickle of new arrivals for here will soon be a flood. Most of the breeding birds returning here will arrive within the next 10 days to two weeks. Snow Buntings are usually our first to [...]

You’ve no doubt heard the famous expression, “If the mountain will not come to Mohammed, Mohammed will go to the mountain.” The pithy lesson contained herein reminds us that we control our own destinies, that if someone will not come to us, we must perforce go to them. But what if the mountain had come to [...]

To a birder, migration means that you can live in Minnesota, New York, Paris or Moscow and see exotic tropical birds such as Piranga olivacea and Icterus galbula on a regular basis without buying a plane ticket. The birds do the flying for you. Even if you don’t live in the summer range of a [...]

Migrating warblers typically pass through Cyprus from March until May every Spring – a fact that is sadly taken advantage of by illegal poachers. Their migration typically peaks about a week before the end of April however. Well, last weekend certainly held up to the rule, with April 22nd being a particularly good day. Sadly [...]

This spring has been rather lousy so far.  Like, really lousy.  Like, really cold, really wet, really windy, and almost completely lacking in days off work.  Of course, that is just my perspective and I have been known to think that birds that don’t show up until May are late if they aren’t here by [...]

U.S. Geological Survey geophysicist Jon Hagstrum believes birds may navigate home in migration by using Earth’s “low-frequency sound waves to identify the ‘address’ of home.” How would that work? “They are imprinting on the characteristic sound” of where they live, he told a crowd this week at a lecture at USGS headquarters in Menlo Park. [...]

My first sighting of an Eastern Phoebe each year is, for me, when spring officially begins.  I finally got my first phoebe of the year yesterday, Saturday, 19 March, a mere eighteen days after the first phoebe of the season was reported in New York City.  I actually ended up seeing two examples of Sayornis [...]

March and it’s like a switch flicks in birders brains in Europe, suddenly everyone’s ‘doing’ sub-Saharan migrants (or should that be trans-Saharan migrants and why don’t I know?). Birders the length and breadth of the continent salivating over the prospect of spring migration, hirundines, warblers, waders, scarce, rare; the excitement of that first Wheatear or [...]

This past Saturday I made my way to Jamaica Bay Wildlife Refuge’s West Pond a bit before sunset in order to try to get more flight shots of ducks like these as they made their way in to the pond to roost for the night.  On my way in I convinced a fellow Queens birder, [...]

The idea that tiny songbirds that weigh far less than the change found in the average pocket manage to migrate 600 miles across the Gulf of Mexico was long considered fanciful.  It was assumed that a few, at most, might make such flights, but most birds were thought to be circum-gulf migrants rather than trans-gulf [...]

Over the past week, a prolonged and unusually warm autumn has come to an end in western Montana. Snow is on the mountains, and has even made a brief appearance in the relatively sheltered valley where Missoula lies. Wind chills of ten to twenty degrees below zero are predicted as gusts of up to 35 [...]

I missed the bird the first time.  That, in and of itself, is not unusual when chasing birds.  This is especially true for me, a card-carrying member of the Dipper’s Club and recipient of that organization’s less than prestigious Lifetime Achievement Award for my strong work missing a staked out Black-headed Gull on six separate [...]

Both of the kinglet species of North America are known as fast-moving, frenetic, and friendly little creatures, that is, if one doesn’t mind risking charges of anthropomorphism by using an adjective like “friendly.”  Me, I’m more than glad to call kinglets friendly, mostly because every time I hear their thin call notes I get a [...]

This fall has been good to me in terms of getting good looks at migrant wood-warblers.  Whether I was watching birds at Alley Pond Park, Kissena Park, Central Park, along the coast, or in Bryant Park, the not-as-brightly-colored-as-they-are-in-spring-but-still-pretty-nice members of North America’s most sought after family of birds made seeking them out rather easy for [...]

Blackpoll Warblers are one of the species for which the term “confusing fall warbler” was made.  Their namesake black cap is entirely lacking by the time they start their epic journey south and they look like just another greenish-yellowish bird.  A close examination will reveal the streaking on the back that distinguishes Dendorica striata from [...]

The coast of Queens is a great place to bird, especially in the fall on a day with north winds after a night with north winds.  Small birds that found themselves over water when dawn broke have had to fight their way back to land against the wind and are too busy searching for food [...]

Those who read this blog regularly might recall how this past December I was fortunate enough to have a close encounter with an overly confiding Ovenbird and at the end of April I was lucky enough to see an American Woodcock.  Both of these encounters took place in Manhattan’s Bryant Park, a couple of blocks [...]

Today, Thursday, the 23rd of September 2010, is the autumnal equinox in the northern hemisphere, otherwise known as the first day of fall.*  Our night and day will be as close to equal length as will happen all year.  And while the sun has crossed the celestial equator on its way south many of the [...]

Well played, well played all around.  Give yourselves a hand, birders.  Though it took a little prodding on Facebook several of you found the intestinal fortitude to risk looking foolish and being mocked by guessing the answers to the Diabolical Fall Migration Quiz.  Surprisingly, though at least one quiz-taker thought the quiz was indeed diabolical, [...]

After the last quiz, which proved to be not-at-all diabolical, I vowed to make the next one a doozy.  And I think I have succeeded.  There are four images below, all of which are migrant birds that have come through Queens in the last week.  Your task is to figure out which species is in [...]