Look at the Hawk Watchers, Too! Not Just the Hawks.

October 29 I was hawk watching at Lighthouse Point, in New Haven, Connecticut, one of the best hawk watch sites in New England. The day was not what I had expected; the winds were far weaker than forecast and the count was only a little over 100 by early afternoon, but with a good mix, highlighted by a Peregrine perched for an hour and an immature Bald Eagle that spent some time soaring over us, trying to determine what it wanted to do.

Activity was slowing in the early afternoon, when I believe Lynn James said she had a large hawk out front. Lynn, who has incredible distance vision, said the bird was in a large gray cloud above a blue slit in heavy cloud cover. Everyone scanned for the bird and gradually we found it. People remained glued to their scopes as the bird was way out and still quite small, but acting like a very large bird. Someone had earlier remarked that the site had not had a Golden Eagle yet this season, so it was about time, though it was clearly not typical “Golden” weather.

I got on the bird fairly quickly and soon felt very good about it. It had a Red-tailed Hawk kind of dihedral, visible at great distance. The bird was quite large but gliding straight toward us without apparently moving a muscle or a wing, so we couldn’t pick up any contrast on it, much less a head/tail ratio. I think everyone was thinking “golden,” but just could not see enough to call it. As the bird angled slightly, I was able to see a bright white basal third of the long tail and the smaller head. I shouted Golden, and everyone began cheering and concurring. The excitement was palpable as the bird continued to glide towards us.

I had been hunched over my scope straining to watch this bird. When I stood up to relax for a second, I noticed that half the scopes were pointing north and half east. I shouted there must be two goldens, that half the people were looking at a different bird than I had been. Everyone looked up, and then over, and sure enough, half of us had found one golden eagle and half another. The northerly bird slowly glided over, revealing a lot of white in the flight feathers, a long rectangular white patch in each wing. My golden, following a few minutes later, had a lot less white in the wings. Strangely, after not having had a golden for two months, two occurred at the same time, They were followed by a third golden just a few minutes later, a bird with very little white in the wings or tail. It was a terrific fifteen minutes, but we all had to laugh. If one of us had not looked briefly at the hawk watchers instead of the hawks, would we have ever noticed there were TWO Golden Eagles?

Golden Eagle photograph by Joseph Kennedy. Used with permission. (Not one of the "Lighthouse" birds.)

Ramblings on Migration in Tropical America

What images come to mind when you think of migration? Geese flying south in V-formation? Exhausted warblers resting on Gulf Coast beaches? Broad-winged hawks kettling their way south along the Appalachians? I think about the familiar cycle of migrating birds that breed in temperate forests and winter further south.

I must say that spending time in the tropics – most recently on HMANA’s Costa Rica trip – has given me a different perspective on migration. I no longer refer to the local New Hampshire breeders in my area as “our birds”. It’s hard not to when a Baltimore oriole arrives in your backyard in spring, spends the summer there raising its young and keeping you company with its lovely song and bright plumage. We feel connected to this and a sense of this bird and its young “belonging” here. But think about how much time that oriole spends with us versus time spent on migration and in the tropics throughout the winter. A mere three months, maybe four? Baltimore orioles were all over many of Costa Rica’s tropical forested habitats this October, and many of them are settled in until spring! In truth, the oriole (and many other familiar breeding birds of the Northeast US) spends the majority of its time in the tropics and comes north to the temperate forests to take advantage of a very brief food supply and a place with fewer competitors.

The more I learn about migration, the more questions I have. One thing that is certain is that migration is a constantly changing and widely variable phenomenon. Throughout North America, we have short and long distance migrants, complete and partial, altitudinal migrants, and irruptives, to name a few types of migration strategies. But what about those species which carry out their migrations within tropical latitudes? HMANA’s recent trip to Costa Rica to witness migration touched on this spectacle.

On a drizzly afternoon, our group watched four resplendent quetzels feeding in an avocado tree at 2000m on the road to Volcan Irazu. They were taking full advantage of this fruiting tree, but in typical falls, these birds will migrate further south on the Caribbean slope and mainly be found between 500-800m.
From our hotel room in San Jose, my husband and I watched a distant fruiting Jamaican Plum tree through our scope for one hour. Within that time, 20 different species of birds fed at this tree, most of which were migratory species.

Historically, most migration research has focused on movements of birds between temperate and tropical habitats, but the ‘intrartropical’ migrants – those birds moving within the tropics – haven’t received as much attention. According to Gary Stiles, coauthor of Birds of Costa Rica, approximately half of the bird species found in Costa Rica show some evidence of seasonal movement. These movements likely reflect changing food availability and/or weather changes (wet vs dry seasons). There are even a few tropical species that travel long distances to follow burned areas – ‘fire followers’. Food is still the underlying reason for their movement.

It’s easy for us to notice migrating flocks of swallow-tailed and plumbeous kites (large birds moving through the open sky along ridges and coasts), but most other movements happen very quietly, which is part of why this movement was overlooked for so long.

Today, more tropical research has taken place within Costa Rica than any other area in the neotropics, and it is thought that the local migration patterns between mountains and lowlands are probably typical of the rest of Central America. Birds are making localized short distance movements up and down in elevation. If you’re a bird that doesn’t shift its diet when food becomes scarce, then you have no choice but to move. Interestingly, the species most likely to migrate are the fruit and nectar eaters since this food supply changes seasonally more than insects do. Hummingbirds, parrots, toucans, quetzals, and bellbirds are just some bird families that employ this strategy seasonally.

If you are as fascinated as I am about migration in the tropics, or just curious about general behavior and breeding of tropical birds, be sure to check out Birds of Tropical America by Steven Hilty. It’s a terrific book and has answered so many of my questions about migration and more.

(Photo: plumbeous kite at the Kekoldi Hawkwatch)

Hawkwatching at its Best

What could be more fun than floating on your back in warm waters of the Caribbean and watching thousands of raptors swirl overhead above you? This was just one of the many highlights from HMANA’s recent birding and hawkwatching tour to Costa Rica last week.

Where to even begin?! We journeyed through the country exploring the Central foothills and highlands, Caribbean lowlands and the Pacific slope. Overall our group saw or heard an amazing 393 species of birds. Among those were 31 species of raptors, 26 hummingbirds, 21 antbirds, 35 flycatchers, 29 warblers and 30 tanager species. It was 10 glorious days of colorful birds, beautiful rainforest and coastal landscapes, good coffee and lots of fruit.

But the grand focus of this tour was spending 2 days at the Kèköldi Hawkwatch inside the Kèköldi Indigenous Reserve on the Caribbean slope. This has always been a very special place to me. From my first season spent counting there in 2001, and then again when I returned to do peregrine falcon research in 2005, I have been itching to get back. And as always, it was just as magical as ever and did not let us down.

The hike up to the watchsite involved a lot of mud, sweat and thorns. What would be the fun of seeing all those migrants if you didn’t have to work for it, right? We wove our way up the mountain through an abandoned cacao plantation, stopping of course to sample the sweet and tangy fruit along the way. Black and green poison dart frogs hopped across the trail and laughing falcons called from the canopy. I could spend all day on this 2km long trail, studying leaf cutter ants, the towering strangler fig trees and the huge diversity of understory species like antbirds, tinamous and hermits (hummingbirds). Looking up at any one time, we saw glimpses of swirling kettles through the canopy, reminding us of what was in store and to pick up the pace.

As soon as we reached the top of the hawkwatch tower and were catching our breath, the counters handed me a clicker and said, “You’re in charge of peregrines!” Just like old times. For the next few hours, I counted over 100 peregrines passing overhead. Some scattered over the ocean, others kettling up over the mountains in groups of 5-10.
Turkey vultures were the dominant migrant during our visit but mixed in were thousands of broad-wings and Swainsons hawks with the occasional Mississippi Kite, osprey or merlin. At times, the skies would be full of solely broad-wings or Swainson’s as if they were very courteously taking turns using the sky.

The phrase, “Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god” was a common one, as tour participants shifted from kettle to kettle, trying to take in the sheer magnitude of the movement. Aside from raptors, chimney swifts and various swallow species swept past in the millions. By the end of the day, 70,000 raptors had been tallied.

To anyone who visits, it’s easy to see that Kèköldi is a truly remarkable place. As with many hawkwatch sites, Kèköldi is struggling to stay afloat and is in need of more financial and volunteer support. The two to three volunteer counters this season are overworked and overwhelmed by the volume of birds coming through. This site requires a team of at least 4-6 counters to effectively cover the skies.

Several brainstorming sessions took place amongst tour participants and Daniel, the project coordinator (& our local guide) on how to help this project succeed long-term. It was great to see people eager to share their thoughts and ideas on how to build upon this important project with outreach and fundraising strategies. HMANA is currently working with Kèköldi to find ways to offer support. Hopefully one way we can continue to offer support is through more tours like this one!

Observing Non-Raptor Migration at Hawk Watches (Part 2)

One of the differences between general birding and birding at a hawk watch is that at a hawk watch the salient feature of the birds we see is their flight. More often than not in general birding we look at birds sitting on the water or wading in it, perching on twigs, or walking on the ground, or jumping from one thing to another. At hawk watches we look at flight.

The focus on flight at a hawk watch encourages us to pay attention to a dimension of birding, and birds, that, strangely enough, often gets short shrift. Years ago, I thought I was pretty good at identifying ducks in the harbor until I met an old retired duck hunter who could actually tell what birds he was seeing in flight! Birding at a hawk watch encourages us to increase our skills in that direction and also our appreciation of the birds we observe.

I’ve heard American Bitterns, seen them frozen in marsh grasses, and sometimes seen them taking brief and quick flights from one patch of marsh to another. But my most memorable sighting of an American Bittern was at the hawk watch when I had a chance to watch one fly for over a mile in migration with its distinctively patterned two-toned wings and ponderous flight. Somehow, seeing that very secretive bird so exposed and taking part in such a dangerous activity as migration was very moving.

In my last blog I talked about finding loons when scanning for soaring raptors. This is another exciting feature about hawk watches. Scanning for raptors we find things we never would have seen otherwise. After birding for decades I’d never seen a Sandhill Crane in New York State. Now, at our hawk watch in western New York, I see Sandhill Cranes on at least five or six different days during the spring migration.

Paying attention to the non-raptor migration at hawk watches expands the profound experience presented by observing the raptor migration. Seeing something otherwise secret and yet something that provides such a sense of connectedness with deep, universal forces will bring me back to the hawk watch year after year, as long as I’m able.

Observing Non-Raptor Migration at Hawk Watches (Part I)

After nearly 50 years of general birding in western New York State, I began seeing Common Loons regularly only after I began spending time at our local hawk watch. Not only did I begin seeing loons regularly, but I began seeing them in pretty much a new way.

Loons for me had been early- and late-winter harbor birds, infrequently seen, usually apart from the rafts of relatively diminutive ducks, looking big and solitary. Seeing a loon always made a special birding day for me.

Attendance at our hawk watch introduced me to a new dimension of loons and the likelihood of seeing them often. Previously I saw loons usually swimming and diving, only now and then flying; when I see them at the hawk watch they are always flying. And what flight! Powerful, high, fast, straight-line, totally lacking in hesitation, directly out and over Lake Erie toward Canada.

At the hawk watch we pick up loons while scanning with binoculars for soaring raptors. On April 19th this year we saw 12 loons, most of them singles, presenting their unique flight signature as they powered toward their northern nesting territory. We saw loons on at least three other days in the spring of 2010. If we hadn’t been scanning for raptors, the loons without doubt would have passed entirely unnoticed. They could have been flying, unobserved, for hundreds of miles before we picked them up.

Hawk watches provide unique opportunities for observing non-raptor migration, loon-sightings being only one example. 500 or more Blue Jays in one day, tens of thousands of blackbirds in mixed flocks in one day, ducks, hundreds of Tundra Swans and more, all almost routinely seen and with a new perspective.

Time to step up to the bat!

My public radio station is having its fund drive this week. Perhaps yours is, too. If you are a public radio listener, or a public television viewer, then you are aware that those services are available to us only because of the financial support of some of those who listen and watch. It’s sort of like HMANA!

Think of all the services HMANA is providing ---- FREE! You can go to our website and download all kinds of great information, for FREE! You can enter watch data into HawkCount, you can read reports from sites north to south, east and west every day, for FREE! You can download those wonderful silhouette guides and other ID materials for, you guessed it, f-r-e-e. HMANA is a volunteer organization, but we do have costs, and, would you believe it? Of the thousands of hits our on-line services get, only a small percentage of those folks are members of HMANA! That’s right, paying members of HMANA number fewer than 500. There are many more folks out there (you?) who use HawkCount, who are site leaders, who watch hawks and support the very same goals who haven’t joined HMANA.

Membership is only $25! For that amount of money (way less than you spend on your boutique coffee in a week) you not only will get our excellent publication, Hawk Migration Studies, discounts on various offers such as the trip currently underway to Costa Rica, but you will be supporting HMANA’s ongoing efforts to conserve raptors and their environment. And even better, you will get rid of any guilt feelings you may have been having about not supporting those efforts! Don’t procrastinate any longer! Please help pay for HawkCount, RPI, the statistical analyses of the data you collect and submit, for our website. Please join and help our membership numbers double. Those numbers mean a lot to grant-providers. Your support is very important. Click on http://www.hmana.org/ where you can use a major credit card or send a check made out to "HMANA" for $25 (U.S. currency) to John Weeks, HMANA Membership, 51 Pheasant Run, North Granby, CT 06060-1016 (U.S.A.). Or do we need to get Ira Glass to call you?

Migration in the Americas: the ties that bind

A few years ago I made my first October “pilgrimage” to Veracruz. No hawkwatcher needs an explanation of what that means. Although my goal was to experience the Rio de Rapaces, I knew that raptors weren’t the only migrants sweeping through that sky funnel in eastern Mexico. I wasn’t surprised, therefore, to see masses of Anhingas and Wood Storks, squadrons of White Pelicans. Nor was I surprised to see scrims of dragonflies and the pink semaphores of Scissor-tailed Flycatchers’ axillars as dozens and dozens of those beauties passed the rooftop watch in Cardel. Enchanted, yes. Exhilarated, definitely! But not surprised.

What did surprise me, however, were the butterflies. No, not monarchs. We all know that monarch butterflies winter in Mexico, but their route takes them west of the coastal region toward the mountain forests of Michoacán. No, the butterflies that so amazed me were yellow. They were sulphurs of several species, large and small, and they were migrating! The air was filled with them, hundreds of thousands, nay, millions of southbound fragile beings stirring the air as their forebears have been doing for millennia. From just above the ground to at least 10 meters up, and nearly wingtip to wingtip as far as the eye could see in every direction, they went. Such a density is, of course, vulnerable to incursion, and so it was on the highways as the intrepid voyagers fell victim to trucks and buses and cars. Resembling flower petals liberally strewn on the highway, drifts of body-less wings swirled in yellow clouds among the passing vehicles.

Later, standing on the remains of a pyramid in the Toltec ruins of Cempoala, I pondered those streams of birds overhead. Stretching from horizon to horizon hawks and vultures, pelicans and storks became threads tying together the continents north and south. And in a nearly tactile way so did the gentle yellow ephemera filling the surroundings with soft flutterings. A visible physical connection, yes, and how very evident it was. But there was a temporal component as well, for as I stood there on those ancient stones I experienced a powerful connection to those people who had built this temple. I realized that these very same astonishing sights had moved them, too.