Bird Sightings: The Voice of Audubon

Ross's Goose, photo courtesy of David W. Baker, Wikimedia.

To submit bird sightings, call Mass Audubon’s Wildlife Information Line at (781) 259-2150, or send us an email.

The Voice of Audubon offers regular updates on birds sighted across the state to introduce you to the wide variety of species Massachusetts has to offer.

Below are the most recently published sightings. Sightings in the past month are also available.

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Cape Cod

Wednesday, July 1, 2009

The seabird show has started to dwindle this week but there are still some good sightings and numbers. A two hour sea watch from Race Point in Provincetown on 6/27 produced the following: 3 Cory's shearwaters, 250 greater shearwaters, 25 sooty shearwaters, 200 Wilson's storm-petrels, 75 Northern gannets, 1 killdeer, 75 laughing gulls, 150 herring gulls, 4 lesser black-backed gulls, 40 least terns, 200 common terns, 2 Arctic terns, 12+ parasitic jaegers, and 4+ long-tailed jaegers. We have been spoiled with number and variety of species, but these numbers are still very impressive.

Migrant shorebirds are starting to make their way back south. It may not be possible to decipher which individuals are early migrants and which ones perhaps never left the Cape. At the Wellfleet Bay Wildlife Sanctuary, a dozen or so greater yellowlegs have started popping up, seemingly overnight. Another shorebird of note at the sanctuary this week was a whimbrel which was present on Thursday morning. This is a very early date for a migrant whimbrel but this individual might have been staying on the sanctuary or Lt Island and enjoying the smorgasbord of fiddler crabs since spring. Fiddler crabs are a favorite food and so Lieutenant Island and the Wellfleet Bay Wildlife Sanctuary can be some of the best places in the state to see whimbrel in summer and fall. A white-rumped sandpiper and a short-billed dowitcher were also noted this week at nearby Indian Neck in Wellfleet.

Also present at the sanctuary this week was a Leach's storm-petrel passing by very close to shore. A survey of breeding birds at the Wellfleet Bay Wildlife Sanctuary this week produced a surprising number of orchard orioles. Six pairs were found, most with two fledglings. This is a large increase from one pair four years ago and three pairs last year. While adult male Baltimore orioles are bright orange, have loud whistled songs, and make deep pendulous nests over water, a path, or a field; orchard oriole adult males are smaller, burnt chestnut in color, sing a song similar to a finch, and build a shallower nest usually in thick pine needles. Be sure to check any loud baby bird sounds you hear, you may have an orchard oriole family in your yard. But be quick, because orchard orioles leave by mid-August.

A few hours birding on South Beach in Chatham on 6/27 had the following highlights: 8 white-winged scoters, 1 red-necked grebe, 4 snowy egrets, 1 Northern harrier, 380 black-bellied plovers, 6 semipalmated plovers, 12 piping plovers, 8 American oystercatchers, 1 greater yellowlegs, 70 willets, 14 ruddy turnstones, 40 red knots, 25 sanderlings, 80 semipalmated sandpipers, 2 least sandpipers, 7 white-rumped sandpipers, 6 dunlin, and 40 short-billed dowitchers.

If you have questions about these sightings, or want to report a sighting, call the Wellfleet Bay Wildlife Sanctuary at 508-349-2615 or send e-mail to sightings@massaudubon.org.

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Eastern Massachusetts

Thursday, July 2, 2009

Species noted in the Georgetown/Rowley State Forest as part of the Breeding Bird Atlas project included 7 Wood Ducks, 1 Green-winged Teal, 2 Pied-billed Grebes, 125 Great Blue Herons, 1 Great Egret, 1 Virginia Rail, 1 Sora, 2 Yellow-throated Vireos, 5 Marsh Wrens, 5 Veerys, and 3 Pine Warblers, and another atlas report from Winchendon included 2 Broad-winged Hawks, 3 Spotted Sandpipers, 1 Alder Flycatcher, 2 Least Flycatchers, 6 Blue-headed Vireos, 11 Red-breasted Nuthatches, 1 Winter Wren, 15 Hermit Thrushes, 10 Nashville Warblers, 3 Black-throated Blue Warblers, 11 Yellow-rumped Warblers, 20 Pine Warblers, 1 Grasshopper Sparrow, 21 White-throated Sparrows, 2 Dark-eyed Juncos, and 7 Purple Finches.

Seabirds seen at the south end of Stellwagen Bank this week included 7 Northern Fulmars, 15 Cory's Shearwaters, roughly 500 Greater Shearwaters, 230 Sooty Shearwaters, 220 Wilson's Storm-Petrels, 1 Pomarine Jaeger, 1 Parasitic Jaeger, and 5 unidentified jaegers, and another seabird report from waters roughly 7 miles east of Orleans yesterday included roughly 1500 Greater Shearwaters, 1000 Sooty Shearwaters, 700 Wilson's Storm-Petrels, and 1 Northern Fulmar.

Miscellaneous reports this week included 5 Lesser Black-backed Gulls at Nantucket, and a Henslow's Sparrow and nesting Merlins in western Massachusetts. For more information about the western reports, call the western Voice of Audubon at 781-259-8805, ext. 2.

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Western Massachusetts

Monday, June 29, 2009

A male Henslow's Sparrow has been found in the town of Montague. This species breeds in grasslands in the east central U.S. from western New York to Missouri and has been declining steadily for the last 50 years. Since it discovery on Saturday, hundreds of people from all over New England have visited the hayfield to see it and hear it sing.

Four black ducks, two sharp-shinned hawks, a red-shouldered hawk, an American kestrel, seven alder flycatchers, three brown creepers, a brown thrasher, and a blackpoll warbler were also found in Montague.

Three ruffed grouse, an alder flycatcher, 16 least flycatchers, four red-breasted nuthatches, four golden-crowned kinglets, two blue-winged warblers, seven blackburnian warblers, four prairie warblers, a cerulean warbler, and a Canada warbler were reported in the central Quabbin Reservoir watershed.

Both alder and willow flycatchers were found in Belchertown.

A family of Cooper's hawks, an American kestrel, an alder flycatcher, four willow flycatchers, a brown thrasher, six prairie warblers, eight field sparrows, three savannah sparrows, three grasshopper sparrows, seven indigo buntings, an eastern meadowlark, and two pine siskins were seen in Southwick.  The yellow-breasted chat was last reported in Southwick on Saturday.

A survey of the towns of Adams and Cheshire turned up two black vultures, 28 turkey vultures, a northern goshawk, a yellow-billed cuckoo, nine least flycatchers, 14 eastern kingbirds, 150 cliff swallows, 120 barn swallows, three winter wrens, three golden-crowned kinglets, four magnolia warblers, a Louisiana waterthrush, 25 savannah sparrows, and 13 indigo buntings.

 

 

 

 

 

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About the Voice of Audubon

These bird sighting reports are transcripts of recorded messages from each of three regional bird hotlines maintained by Mass Audubon, known as the Voice of Audubon. Beginning November 1, 2006, the phone number for the Voice of Audubon is (781) 259-8805. The toll-free number will no longer be in service, but all three recorded reports from throughout the state will continue to be accessible through the new number, and the transcripts will still be available anytime on our website (www.massaudubon.org/voa). The Voice of Audubon is the oldest phone-based bird alert in the United States, first established on December 1, 1954 (original phone number, KEnmore 6-4050). See the original 1954 press release*.

These reports are intended to provide a "snapshot" of the noteworthy bird activity in each region within Massachusetts. Sightings incorporated into these reports include, for example, rarities, early/first-arriving migrants, late-departing migrants, high counts, unusual sightings (e.g., a seabird found on an inland lake), or simply those that represent exemplary sightings for the time and place.

The Boston Globe publishes one or more of these transcripts (with limited editing) each Sunday. To submit bird sightings call (781) 259-2150.

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