As our late season heat wave came to an end, the weather has become unsettled with storms and heavy rain for at least part of the last three days and these conditions have produced a number of unusual shorebirds as the fields in the area along the river have filled back up with water in a few spots. I have mainly been concentrating on warblers but the pull on unusual shorebirds have found me scanning various fields the last few days. I was mainly stuck around the house on Friday as unforeseen circumstances kept me home with Wilson. On Saturday I headed up to Great Pond where I had a spectacular morning with over 60 species at the location including notable species like Virginia Rail, Sora, an unidentified rail, three flyover American Golden Plovers, American Bittern, large numbers of Eastern Phoebes, Marsh Wren and nine species of warbler including a Mourning Warbler feeding high in a tree and my first Palm Warblers of the fall migration season. I hit a few spots in Hadley and Northampton on my way home and had a Black bellied Plover at the Honey Pot and struck out on relocating a Connecticut Warbler that Mary had in the East Meadows (warblers are always tough to relocate after an initial sighting and this is especially the case with CONW's). Following more storms yesterday I headed out on another foggy early morning to a mosquito filled Arcadia in a fruitless hunt for Connecticut Warbler (the four Sandhill Cranes continued so all was not lost). After getting tired of swatting at mosquitoes I headed over to the East Meadows and had some great luck with unusual shorebirds. I noticed some movement near the phalarope puddle (which has been very quiet so far this fall migration) and quickly turned up a juvenile American Golden Plover plus a number of other more expected shorebirds and seven Green winged Teal. I then heard a Black bellied Plover flying in and it landed in the same area. I got the word out to a few other birders and multiple people then arrived. A White rumped Sandpiper popped up with a couple Lesser Yellowlegs among a total of ten species of shorebird. A Peregrine Falcon came zipping in and scattered most everything but thankfully it appeared the falcon was unsuccessful in its hunt. After spending over an hour and a half in the East Meadows I went across the river to the Honey Pot and turned up a huge gathering of Killdeer (over a hundred) plus a Baird's Sandpiper and one each of Black bellied Plover and American Golden Plover as well as other shorebird species. I ended the morning with a lucky 13 species of shorebirds including four plover species.
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