BirdCapeMay.org

Dreary rain dampened proceedings around Cape May this past 24 hours, which is always a shame when so many people are out there trying to scout for their World Series of Birding teams - just two more days to go now!! The weather seems to have supressed bird movements through the area temporarily too, but the forecast for the weekend currently looks quietly promising, with dry weather and a light SW wind hinted at. Hmmm, sounds good for Higbee Beach!

Despite the rain, small parties of shorebirds and other waterbirds trickled through Cape May Point today, with our state park walk turning up a very smart breeding-plumaged Tricolored Heron and three Black Skimmers as well as some passing Willets, Short-billed Dowitchers, Dunlin and Least and Semipalmated Sandpipers. Some of the highlights that I have heard of over the past few days have included King Rails reported from Heislerville and Turkey Point (both Cumberland County), a White-winged Dove at Whilldin Avenue, Cape May Point on 5th, singing Lincoln's Sparrow at Higbee Beach on 7th, Clay-colored Sparrow at Swainton, the occasional Parasitic Jaeger in the rips on and off and a Brown Pelican off the point today. Heislerville continues to attract good shorebirds, though water levels are higher than intended there this year due to a faulty sluice gate system, which is being worked on I hear. Still, White-faced Ibis, Stilt and White-rumped Sandpipers, Ruddy Duck and a number of other species have been there of late so let's hope they hang on until the weekend!

One of the most remarkable events of the past few days has been the unprecedented numbers of Whimbrel reported from the Nummy's Island/Stone Harbor area. On May 5th, Sam Galick and Tom Reed counted a remarkable 1,144 Whimbrel flying in to roost in the area in the evening, which I believe sets a new reocrd count for New Jersey and must have been a fabulous sight.

In a bit of a blow to Cape May birding, the marina and restaurant area at Twomile Landing has changed ownership, with the new ownership not permitting birding access to the area. This restriction is effective immediately; please pass the word.

It's been a mixed week weatherwise, though not unusual for the time of year; after Tuesday - with its balmy temperatures - produced a spectacular butterfly flight, things took a turn for the worse for insects on Wednesday and Thursday as temperatures dropped again and they found themselves grounded. Indeed, it was rather sad to see so many thousands of Red Admirals just too cold and tired to move, being gobbled up by birds or simply trampled under foot. You normally expect a butterfly to get out of the way and in this instance I think that their rather cryptic underwing markings meant they went un-noticed by most people while sitting helpless on the ground. On Thursday at Higbee Beach, we were picking them up off the trails and placing them out of harm's way, but of course these boom and bust populations are part of nature's way of ensuring that the species survives.

Will Kerling, who has been studying butterflies in the USA far longer than me, mentioned to me that this is the biggest movement of spring butterflies that he can remember. Interestingly, I checked up on Red Admiral ecology in the eastern US States in the excellent Butterflies of the East Coast by Cech and Tudor, published in 2005. I was impressed to discover that they had effectively predicted this year's major movement by stating that such large migrations typically occur approximately once every ten years, with previous events noted in 1981, 1990 and 2001. So maybe we could have expected it last year, but perhaps weather trends weren't quite right last spring.

With a warming of tempartures on Friday, butterflies were again in the news and I heard reports from as far away as Asbury Park in North Jersey, as well as throughout Cape May County. Text messages to my phone revealed a very widespread movement with members perhaps even more impressive than on Tuesday - Tom Reed, for instance, texting 500+ butterflies a minute passing Stone Harbor Point mid-afternoon. My own observations around Cape May Point were intriguing, since Tuesday had produced a movement largely of Red Admirals with a few American Ladies and Question Marks, but Friday seemed to be largely of the last two species, with Red Admirals in the minority. These movements are of course a successful strategy for the butterflies, which allows them to overwinter in the warmer south and avoid the worst of the cold weather in the north.


As well as the butterfly migration, another highlight at the Northwood Center this past 10 days or so has been the Rose-breasted Grosbeaks at the feeders. This species doesn't breed with us here, but migrants stop of each year and just for a sort period it is possible to get really good views of what can be a rather retiring species here. Getting up close and personal with birds often gives an opportunity to take birding skills to the next level - so if you are at Northwood, see if you can tell the age of the Rose-breasted Grosbeak you are looking at. Here's some pictures to help you...




Recent Reports
Warblers and other assorted summer arrivals have been in the news here over the last 36 hours or so; locations around Cape May Point and at Cox Hall Creek WMA have all been good for a variety of warblers, with Cerulean and Blackburnian being sighted amongst the commoner species. Warbling Vireo, Yellow-breasted Chat, Wood Thrush and Blue-winged Warbler were singing well at Higbee Beach Friday morning and I hear that over 200 Whimbrel were logged on The Osprey boat trip. One or two reports of migrant Red-headed Woodpeckers are coming in from around Cape May Point, including The Beanery, where both Yellow-billed and Black-billed Cuckoos were seen this morning. Sam Galick reported a Tennessee Warbler from the state park today and a Cape May Warbler was reported from there by Stephanie Brown on 4th.

A White-winged Scoter was reported from the concrete ship on 4th and a Luna Moth became a star attraction at the Northwood Center today as it spent most of the day hanging in a juniper right over the road at the store entrance.

Today was a great day to be in Cape May - and things are certainly starting to warm up for The World Series of Birding on May 12! This morning, our Bird, Bugs & Botany was great on Birds and botany, short on bugs, due to overnight rain and overcast skies. Most of the trees are well into leaf now and it's a lot easier sorting all those oaks out now. There was a wealth of plants to be enjoyed for the first hour, but after that we could resist all those birds calls and songs no more and our second hour (and beyond!) saw us focussing on some nice little feeding groups that were working their way through the canopy. Black-and-white, Black-throated Green, Yellow-throated, Blackpoll and Yellow-rumped Warblers, Northern Parulas, Blue-headed and Red-eyed Vireos, Scarlet Tanagers - it was a real treat, and all mixed in with the local Eastern Bluebirds, Chipping Sparrows and assorted woodpeckers. A couple of Ruby-throated Hummingbirds made rapid fly-bys and Green Heron and Belted Kingfisher both boosted our lists.

The Northwood Center was pretty busy today too, with Blackburnian and Blackpoll Warblers reported early on and at least one female and four male Rose-breasted Grosbeaks coming to the feeders. Wednesday evening at Northwood also provided me with great views of a superb male Scarlet Tanager and an adult male Baltimore Oriole in the birdbath. Wherever you go in Cape May right now, you are likely to find birds!

As well as all the songbird action, I hear that shorebirds are building up nicely at both Stone Harbor/Nummy's Island and Heislerville and, with clear skies right now, I reckon things will be moving out there - what will tomorrow bring?!

Some recent pictures
It's been a while since I had time to put up a photo gallery of recent pictures, so here's a few that arrived recently.

Someone flicked the switch last night and the difference was palpable. April 30th hovered somewhere around 57F with something of the threat of rain in the air. May 1st, after a bit of a rainy night, temperatures zoomed up another 20 degrees at the point and I wouldn't mind betting that the north of the county touched 80F. Birds have been finding their way to Cape May in dribs and drabs so far, but that's pretty typical for April. There's been no major arrival of night migrants as yet, though day-flying migrants such as swallows and martins have certainly been arriving in good numbers. One of the things you can afford to do when you live in Cape May is experiment with your time, rather than needing to maximize birding time by sticking to the tried and tested locations. Having been out of the country for a week, I was keen to see what had been arriving in my absence so yesterday I was out at a little wetland on the 'unfashionable' east side of the peninsula and was surprised to find a nice selection of birds. At least 80 Barn Swallows, plus smaller numbers of other hirundines, were hawking insects over a grassy meadow and two Eastern Kingbirds argued with each other over a favored perch. Seven dapper Blue-winged Teals floated serenely on a nearby pond, a Green Heron flushed from the reedy margins and both Indigo Bunting and Orchard Oriole were in song - both firsts-of-the-year for me. Better still, warblers were mooching through the field edge and in a nearby piece of wet woodland. I could hear the soft 'sigh' of a Blue-winged Warbler, a startling male Prairie Warbler in full razzamataz showed up and a brief glimpse of a white eyering eventually fully evolved into a Nashville Warbler. Ahhh, spring migrants are here - and here now!

Jumping forward to today, the fully 180 degree turn-around in the weather was provided by a very welcome warm front from the south. Such fronts seem always to be accompanied by rain at this time of year, but the clouds slowly rolled away and with the improving weather came a fantastic migration of butterflies. I was slaving over a hot laptop when Tom Reed's initial text message came through, alerting us to a noteworthy northward movement of Red Admiral butterflies, but it wasn't until I took a well-earned cup of Earl Grey (old habits die hard don't you know!) later in the afternoon that I became aware of a steady stream of butterflies pressing northward wherever I loooked! Only one place to be right now I thought, so I took my trusty camera down to the wonderful Beach Plum bushes at Higbee Beach - and they were awesome! The early spring meant that many bushes were past their best but there was still plenty of flowers to keep these hungry travellers happy. Here's a few photos of the diners:








Sunday I was up at Belleplain for the latest in our new series of wildlife walks. As ever, the wildlife did not let us down with Great Crested Flycatchers, Ovenbirds and Blue-gray Gnatcatchers clearly here in good numbers now and many other treats in store:

Sam Galick and I spent a bit of time perusing the swallows late in the morning, and came up with the following very broad estimates: 525 Barn Swallows, 250 Tree Swallows, 125 Purple Martins (many of these likely belonging to the State Park colony), 40 Bank Swallows, 30 Northern Rough-winged Swallows, and 20 Cliff Swallows. Over 100 Chimney Swifts were also evident. It should be noted that there were actually quite a few more Bank and Cliff Swallows last evening, and it appears that some of these escaped on today's more subdued breeze out of the east.

[Click on image(s) to see larger version(s). All photos copyright by Tony Leukering.]


While I really had intended this semi-regular feature to treat only those groups of arthropods that are not very popular with birders and other naturephiles (thus, no butterflies or dragonflies/damselflies), today I took a picture that just screamed to be used on the blog. So, this one time only, here's a dragonfly as the bug of the week.


Harlequin Darner is about the earliest dragonfly species to emerge each spring in southern New Jersey, flying from early April into June, at the latest. In my previous springs here in Cape May, I've spent most of my field time on Cape Island, which has so little native forested habitat left that Harlequin Darner is very rare there. This spring, though, I've been concentrating my field time in the northern half of the county, in an endeavor to learn the early-season dragonflies to be found there and not on the island. I've been amazed at how common Harlequins are there, particularly on the various powerline cuts that I've wandered through.


Today's wanderlust had me heading to the Swainton area, specifically to look for Frosted Elfins, but I think that it was just a wee bit cool for them. Harlequin Darners, however, were quite common. Despite the many that I've seen this spring, I was very surprised when watching one fly around and then land on the bole of a Pitch Pine to note that there were others perched on that same pine! In fact, more than just a few others! Hopefully, you can find the seven individuals in the picture, above.


Darners, as a group, tend to perch hanging from vegetation, though some, like Harlequins, will perch on the trunks of trees; perching on the ground is somewhat rare in the group. So, I also spent some time photographing Harlequins perched on the ground.


One of the nicest aspects of Harlequin Darner for photographers, at least, is their penchant to hover in place for long enough to get a camera focused on them. Thanks to the bright sun, I was able to have both reasonable depth of field and a fast-enough shutter speed to both get the whole bug in focus and to nearly freeze the wings. Thanks, Sun!