Final fling

Sadly the start of our last day didn't go to plan as the weather was against us for final banding session.  We did manage to open some nets but the rain came and we closed without catching a bird.

We packed and cleaned and the weather cleared so we managed a last visit to the Meadows before leaving. Nothing of real note but there did seem to be a strong passage of tree swallows south along with 9 killdeer and 5 pec sands. Maybe signs of things to come...

As we had a late flight we decided to give Brigantine another shot in the hope we could get a new species for the day. We ended up with 3 leaving us with only one day where we didn't add anything new. Not bad.
The first species was a rather scruffy juv ring necked duck feeding with a flock of wood ducks. Then I managed to pish out the 8th sparrow sp of the trip, the surprisingly smart saltmarsh sharp-tailed sparrow. A good one to get as it has a fairly limited east coast distribution.
There were a few more waders about that the first visit with a scattering of greater and lesser yellowlegs, a couple of dunlin and a small roost of grey plover that contained 3 dowitcher sp (I could only see their heads) and our final new bird, 7 knot.
Great views of a clapper rail bought out trip to a nice end.

Thankfully the journey to the airport was uneventful!

Pic 1 - observation tower at Brigantine gave great elevated views over the site. Might build one at Titchwell ;-)

They think its all over...

Well sadly it nearly is :-(

With no warbler flight in sight we decided to spend the morning banding with Patti. The right decision as we had the best morning of the trip.

Although we were not getting big catches, there was a really nice selection of birds. I was very happy as I got to band a black & white warbler along with northern waterthrush, several American redstart, eastern phoebe and a couple of yellowthoats.

Two net rounds stick out. The first held only 3 birds but it was magic extracting 2 American redstarts and the B&W warbler! The second was a net of 4 red eyed vireos or that is what we thought. Turned out that one of them was smaller and lacking the bold head pattern of red eyed. It turned out to be a warbling vireo, the 5th species of vireo on the trip!

As we were finishing Patti called one of the raptor banders to see how their morning was going. It had been very quiet but he had just caught a peregrine. 5mins later we were looking at a stunning juv male. I was surprised at how small the bird actually was in the hand. We took a few pics and away it went.

Decided to have a last look at Higbee Wood in the afternoon.  Things were pretty quiet but we did find a lovely little feeding flock of 10 tufted titmouse, 5 carolina chickadee, 3 black & white, magnolia, male black throated blue warbler, couple of red eyed vireo and an ovenbird! Not a bad flock... ;-)

Pic 1-2 - eastern phoebe
Pic 3 - carolina wren
Pic 4 - 1st yr female common yellowthroat
Pic 5 - warbling (left) and red eyed vireos
Pic 6-7 - warbling vireo
Pic 8 - red eyed vireo
Pic 9-10 northern waterthrush
Pic 11-14 - juvenile male peregrine caught by the raptor banders
Pic 15-16 - last evening walk along the beach with the black skimmer flock for company :-)

Reflections

Its only Monday afternoon but our trip to Cape May already seems ages ago!

It was a fantastic trip and I would encourage anyone that is interested in observing migration to visit for a couple of weeks.
Yes, like all migration sites it can be quiet and our 2nd week was but there are always things to see especially being somewhere where the birds are unfamiliar. There were plenty of waders on the beaches at Stone Harbor,  searching for crakes and rails and getting your head around sparrows! There was also great satisfaction in pulling out a very elusive Connecticut warbler and getting great views.

But when it's good, it's awesome. The weather front in our first few days bought in big numbers of warblers, large numbers of flickers and cedar waxwings and the huge movement of American kestrels. The large numbers of roosting terns, gulls and skimmers on the beach each evening was special.

The place itself was great.  All of the sites were easy to find and in a nice compact location. The roads were great meaning the sites further away were in easy reach. Everyone was very friendly and more than happy to help. It was quite odd at times helping the American birders id 'their' own warblers but that is all part of the fun.

Special thanks must go to hospitality of Richard Crossley and Patti Hodgetts who kindly allowed us to ring with them. It really gave something extra to the trip and was a great learning experience.
The staff and volunteers working for the Cape May Bird Observatory on the Hawk Watch, monarch tagging demos and in the Northwood Center were excellent.

We ended up with a trip list of 171 which I was very happy with. If I knew more of the calls I'm sure I could have added more.

The top 3 species was actually quite tricky but I ended up with...

#1 Black & White warbler
#2 Piping plover
#3 Black throated green warbler

I will be back again soon :-)

Banded Shorebirds

I think I must have been here too long, I'm picking up the lingo. Ringed Waders to those of us from the other side of the pond ;-)

Took another trip up to Stone Harbor this morning to have a look at the roosting waders again. When we were there a few days ago we managed to read a few colour rings so we hoped to do the same again. This time the flock was much smaller and only consisted of about 20 sanderling. Too many people and a peregrine had probably moved most of the birds on.
We did however managed to read 5 sanderling rings to go with the 2 western sands from the other day.
Having reported the western sands (PT3 & HU3) it turns out that they were both ringed at Stone Harbor on October 3rd 2007. The sanderling rings are very similar so I am assuming that they will have been ringed there too.
I still have an American oystercatcher and GBB gull to hear back about.

A look around the small patch of woodland again produced a nice selection of birds.  We managed our best views of robins, found a gray cheeked thrush, couple of red eyed vireo and a yellow rumped warbler.

No new species added today so we stay on 167.

Pic 1 - sunrise at Stone Harbor
Pic 2 - colour ringed sanderling. Like the western sands from the other day, this bird was probably ringed at Stone Harbor
Pic 3-4 - great views of America robins today
Pic 5 - all sparrows seem to be tricky to id. This one is a song sparrow unless anyone disagrees
Pic 6 - northern flicker
Pic 7-9 - roosting common nighthawk shown to me by a couple of local birders.
Pic 10 - the common and everywhere northern mockingbird. They have a lovely little song thrush-like song

Royal Migration

Birding was slow again today. We tried Hidden Valley for the first time, got wet feet but did add white crowned sparrow to the list. Banding was also very quiet so we headed to the Meadows. A birding group told us of a vesper sparrow that was hanging out with a couple of savannahs but the trail was pretty busy and we didn't see any sparrows at all. A single greater yellowlegs was on the pool (water levels have been high since last weeks rain) and a small group of 5 pec sands roosting on the island. There must have been a load roosting out of view because 25 took off and flew south!

Having seen a tagged monarch while we were banding in the morning, we decided to check out the tagging demo run by the CMBO. There was an excellent introduction to the scheme and all about the life cycle, their threats and migration of the butterflies before the tagging started.

Quite amazing that they will have 4-5 generations in a year but it is only the last one, after August, that migrates south to spend the winter in Mexico. They then return to the southern States where they breed and die. They never return back to New Jersey. Tagged individuals have been recorded flying over 500 miles in 3 days!!

The monarchs are caught and a tagged with a small sticker on the underwing with a unique number. They are sexed, the wing condition is assessed, fat stores recorded and the wing is measured before it is released.

Still amazes me that they undertake such a long migration and can even reach the UK. 

Pic 1 - the tagged monarch we saw feeding in the morning. The tag has an individual number and email address to report it to
Pic 2 - male monarch. They have thinner black lines (look more orange) and have black spots on the hindwing
Pic 3 - female monarch. The black lines are much thicker and they don't have the black spots
Pic 4 - one of the CMBO volunteers explaining about the tagging
Pic 5 - the monarchs are kept cool and in a small breathable bag to stop them flapping too much
Pic 6 - wing condition checked for wear
Pic 7 - a small patch of wing scales are rubbed off before the tag can be applied. This causes no harm to the butterfly and doesn't fall off
Pic 8 - wing length taken. This can be up to 56mm but the average is about 50mm. The same as a goldcrest!!
Pic 9 - data recording
Pic 10 - release
Pic 11 - shows the migration routes the monarchs are taking.

All quiet on the western (weather) front

The weather has been in the east now for the last week and it has gone very quiet. As with most, if not all migration sites, when the conditions are right they offer some of the best birding you can imagine.  When the conditions are not right it can be very tough going.

Today was one of those days.

Started off at Higbee Wood but it was a real struggle to find any warblers. The few that were around were very mobile and I only managed to get onto an American redstart and a probable blackpoll warbler so i gave up after an hour.
Dropped in to see if Patti was banding but I think the early rain had put her off so it was on to Lily Lake.

Things were slow but there did seem to be more cardinals about and there was a nice movement of blue jays. They are only resident in small numbers so a flock of 79 over were definitely migrants.
There really didn't seem to be any birds until we came across a feeding flock in some cedars. The majority of the flock was at least 20 yellow rumped warblers but there was also 4 'tooting' red breasted nuthatch,  ruby crowned kinglet, several chickadee, yellow warbler and 2 Cape May warblers, one of which was a very smart male. The flock was very mobile and almost as soon as we had found them they were gone!
All nice stuff but its nothing like last week.

WE NEED A WESTERLY WEATHER FRONT PLEEEEEEASE

All at sea

Hit the tourist trail a bit today and decided to go on a dolphin/whale watching trip this afternoon.  We decided to go on the longer 3hr trip in the hope of getting a seabird to two and maybe a migrating humpback whale that pass through the area.

In the end it turned out to be a nice trip but wasn't very productive.  As we passed out through the harbour there was a nice roost of American oystercatcher on the breakwater and a 1st summer male black scoter in the harbour mouth.
The first part of the trip was along the front of Cape May looking for bottle-nosed dolphins. This was very successful with several groups seen including at least one small youngster. We had decent views through bins but photography was tricky.

We then turned and steamed out into deeper waters up to 3 miles offshore in the hope of whales. Despite the boat using fish finding equipment to locate whales we couldn't find any this time. Bird interest was also limited with only 2 black scoter and 2 Arctic skua seen.

A quick walk around the block at the end of the day proved fruitful with solitary sandpiper added to the trip list (163)

Pic 1 the best I could do with the dolphins on my phone!
Pic 2-6 Cape May from the water