Strange weather

What began as a rainy day, turned into a foggy day for a few hours, then finally a beautiful, sunny afternoon. As soon as the fog rolled out to the lake, early afternoon, there were birds in the air. The broadwing/redtail flock quickly grew to 123 Broad-winged Hawks and 28 Red-tailed Hawks, including a juvenile dark/intermediate redtail, presumably the same individual from yesterday. (The 'Krider's' type bird wasn't seen again today.)

The afternoon flight again turned into a pretty good Peregrine Falcon flight. A total of 8 Peregrines were counted, tying with May 4 for highest day count so far. This species is now a daily sighting, or at least has been for 6 days straight. Most of today's birds were adults, but this is an immature.

Cooper's Hawk is not quite a daily sighting, but I had one again today. This is an immature bird. Other sightings included 3 Ospreys, 3 Bald Eagles, 4 Northern Harriers, 87 Sharp-shinned Hawks, 1 Red-shouldered Hawk, 12 Rough-legged Hawks, 1 Golden Eagle, 3 American Kestrels, and a Merlin.

Krider's Red-tailed Hawk?

The bird of the day was this unusually pale adult Red-tailed Hawk, showing several field marks good for 'Krider's' Red-tailed Hawk, a Great Plains race of the Red-tailed Hawk.

The bird was around for most of the day, and may very well still be present tomorrow.

It never got very close to the hawk platform, so my shots are very low quality. Still, the following distinguishing field marks are visible: extremely pale underparts, with practically no belly band; no markings on the underwing coverts; a pale head with a slightly darker malar mark and a neck strap; faint patagial bars.

Visible in the field, but not in my photos, were the following field marks: extensive white spotting on the upperwing coverts; basal part of the tail white, distal part orange-reddish.

Jerry Liguori in Hawks From Every Angle warns against confusing pale eastern borealis redtails with Krider's, but those birds generally exhibit only one or two Krider's-like characteristics. Our bird appears to show all those characteristics.

Chris Neri may have better photos of this bird... to be continued.

There was also a juvenile dark/intermediate Red-tailed Hawk present today. Other sightings included 9 Turkey Vultures, 1 Osprey, 10 Bald Eagles, 10 Northern Harriers, 259 Sharp-shinned Hawks, 2 Cooper's Hawks, 3 Northern Goshawks, 59 Broad-winged Hawks, 19 Red-tailed Hawks, 21 Rough-legged Hawks, 2 Golden Eagles, 4 American Kestrels, 2 Peregrine Falcons, and 2 unidentified buteos. The total count was 403 raptors.

On sharpshins

Joe Nault covered the count for me today, and recorded another pretty good early May flight, similar to what we've been seeing for a number of days now, albeit with fewer buteos. Roughlegs actually did do pretty well today. Many thanks for providing me with a day off, Joe!

Overall count reached 481 today, and included the following raptors: 12 Turkey Vultures, 14 Bald Eagles, 12 Northern Harriers, 380 Sharp-shinned Hawks, 3 Northern Goshawks, 8 Broad-winged Hawks, 5 Red-tailed Hawks, 27 Rough-legged Hawks, 1 Golden Eagle, 16 American Kestrels, and 3 Peregrine Falcons.

Sharp-shinned Hawks still dominate the flight, although their peak flight probably occured last week, when a couple of days had more than 1,000 sharpies. Right now, there's a mix of adults and immatures migrating through Whitefish Point. Soon, the flight will be dominated by juveniles. For practically all raptors, adults precede juveniles in spring. This makes sense, because the adults need to be on territory by a certain time (which differs per species). Show up later, and the best spots to raise a family will be taken by someone else already.

At some other sites I've counted I have seen a two-peak seasonal pattern in Sharp-shinned Hawk migration, with the first peak consisting largely of adults and the second largely of juveniles. This two-peaked pattern appears not to occur, at least not as a rule, at Whitefish Point. Here, as records show, the percentage of juveniles gradually increases as the season progresses, without a secondary peak.

Top bird is an adult male, with fine barring across the chest and a dark red eye. Second bird a subadult female, with body feathers showing a mix of mostly juvenile feathers (streaking) with some adult feathers (barring) growing in, and a yellow-orange eye. Both photos taken today.

Great Peregrine and Golden Eagle day

Clear skies and hardly any wind set the stage for a pretty good hawk flight, with highlights being 9 Golden Eagles - 8 of which were seen soaring together - and 8 adult Peregrine Falcons. I felt bad for one of our visitors, who stayed a little later than planned hoping to see at least one Peregrine, and when she left said "you'll probably get it after I'm gone". About 20 minutes after she left, we got the first one, with 7 more to follow. All these birds were in the afternoon.

Again several kettles of broadwings were visible throughout the day, this time their count reached 493. Overall count (all raptors combined) was 704 today.

Tomorrow's (Tuesday) weather forecast looks particularly good for a hawk flight, and may produce a big broadwing flight. With stronger SE winds, birds should be right overhead and not too high.

Decent early May day

Sunday was a pretty decent early May Whitefish Point hawk watching day, with broadwing numbers still increasing, and the highest day count for Peregrine Falcon yet. Golden Eagles again put in a good showing, with at least 5 counted. That too is a day high count for this species, but it was reached three times earlier this season: twice in March (18th and 30th) and once in April (23rd).

As I've said before, on days like this when the winds aren't exactly favorable, it is not easy sorting out just how many Golden Eagles there are in the area, and what part of that number is really moving through, and what is there on multiple days. Golden Eagles were seen throughout the afternoon, flying out to the Point, sometimes past the Point, and very often returning. At least 4 of them were seen in the air at the same time, all juveniles. (The adult Golden Eagle flight is essentially over, they should really be on territory by now.) In the last hour of the count, a young Golden Eagle was seen flying at some altitude in a straight line toward and beyond the Point, with a Rough-legged Hawk in tow. I watched them until they were dots, and they were not seen returning. Now if this was a bird that had tried many times earlier today and this time finally made it, or whether this was a new, gutsy individual that went on the first try... who can say for sure?

Most Broad-winged and Red-tailed Hawks also mill around, very afraid of all that water between Whitefish Point and Ontario. There were small kettles of broadwings around for much of the day, but I didn't see any leave the Point for Canada, although some of them probably did.

The total count today reached 535, and included 11 Turkey Vultures, 4 Bald Eagles, 5 Northern Harriers, 135 Sharp-shinned Hawks, 1 Cooper's Hawk, 3 Northern Goshawks, 307 Broad-winged Hawks, 26 Red-tailed Hawks, 18 Rough-legged Hawks, 5 Golden Eagles, 13 American Kestrels, 1 Merlin, 4 Peregrine Falcons, and two unidentified (distant) buteos.

A few more broadwings

A few more broadwings were counted today by Nathan, who used to be a counter here some years ago, while I (John) had a day off. Thanks so much Nathan!

Best sightings today included those 123 Broad-winged Hawks, an adult Peregrine Falcon, 3 juvenile Golden Eagles, and 2 Merlins. The overall count got to 424, exactly half of them were Sharp-shinned Hawks.

There was also at least one Short-eared Owl around on the Point today.

Lots of hawks

Like most raptors today, this Golden Eagle came in low and provided great looks to the three hawk watchers on the platform. Diversity was a little lower today compared to the last couple of days, but that was made up for by yet again higher numbers. Particularly Sharp-shinned Hawk put in a strong showing, with 1,641 for a day count. Most of them were seen in the second half of the morning, when strong southerly winds produced a strong flight. Other raptor counts included 12 Turkey Vultures, 17 Bald Eagles, 24 Northern Harriers, 1 juvenile Cooper's Hawk, 1 juvenile Northern Goshawk, 16 Broad-winged Hawks, 57 Red-tailed Hawks (including another intermediate 'rufous' morph, different individual from yesterday), 37 Rough-legged Hawks, that Golden Eagle, 31 American Kestrels, and 2 Merlins. The overall count reached 1,840 - the highest day count so far this season.

This last day of the month is a good moment to once again take stock of how the hawk season is progressing this year. With a month and a half behind us and only a month to go, let's review the numbers.

For Turkey Vulture, April 2009 was average, with 200. It's interesting to note that, unlike at most other hawk watches, there is no clear peak in the numbers. This species is almost at the northern edge of its range, and the birds counted at Whitefish Point may well be primarily summer residents flying past the hawk watch, not migrants.

April 2009, with 39, was low for Osprey, though not as low as April 2006 for example. Their migration continues into the first half of May.

Bald Eagle (205) had the best April of the last four years, as did Northern Harrier with 429.

Today's phenomenal flight of Sharp-shinned Hawks helped put April 2009 into second place of the last four years. Only last year's April count was better, by about 800 birds.

This April was easily the best April of the last four for Cooper's Hawk, with 38 counted. Recently, April counts have ranged between 10 and 26. This high count was helped tremendously by an unusually strong flight of 12 on the 24th. Most of those 12 birds were seen within a two-hour time frame: a bubble with Cooper's Hawks. This species is much more common downstate, but reaches the northern limit of its range here at Whitefish Point.

Of the last four years, only last year's April had a higher Northern Goshawk count than this year.

The buteos are interesting, because one of them had the best April of the last four years (Red-shouldered Hawk), while another had the worst April by far of the last four years (Broad-winged Hawk). Red-tailed Hawk had the second worst April of the last four, while Rough-legged Hawk had the second best April (last year was better).

Golden Eagle had the best April of the last four years, beating last year's April count by two eagles.

The falcons did poorly overall in April 2009. All three falcons - American Kestrel, Merlin and Peregrine Falcon - had the worst April of the last four years! For Merlin and Peregrine, the differences with other years are not as pronounced, but this year's count for American Kestrel is about half the normal count for that species...