The first week of June has now come to an end and so far for the month I have located 126 species despite being back to work and therefore not birding everyday. I started out the month trying to relocate some continued rarities and found a few including the Prothonotary Warbler in South Hadley, the long staying Common Goldeneye at Winsor Dam, a slightly late Common Nighthawk at home and both Pine Siskins and Red Crossbills. I ended the first day of the new month with 108 species.
On the 2nd I conducted my Breeding Bird Survey for my 15th year and reached my highest species count along the route with 84 species.
On the last day before I had to return to work I conducted a bird survey at a WMA that has had work done in the last couple years to create some pine barren habitat and I was very happy with the species diversity that has taken advantage of the change in habitat with several Eastern Whip Poor Wills before dawn and several species of scrub type species as the morning wore on including Brown Thrasher, Field Sparrow, Eastern Towhee, Blue winged Warbler, Chestnut sided Warbler and Prairie Warbler. It will be interesting to see how the next few years shakes out with species at the location. I also spent some time at both Quabbin Park and Lake Wallace with both locations being quite active.
I had to work on the 4th so only able to bird a bit before work and during that time I didn't have anything too unusual. Once I was out of work on Wednesday morning I made a few stops on my way home including the East Meadows, Silvio Conte NWR (striking out on any Purple Martins), the rail trail in Amherst and then Quabbin Park. Quabbin Park was fairly productive with the continued pair of Common Goldeneyes (likely that one of the pair in injured in some way and the mate is staying with them as the pair bond is quite strong...this species should be way into Canada breeding at this point). I also had at least two Cerulean Warblers continuing but no sign of a female yet.
I had to work on the 6th also and it was an overall rainy day so not much to report from that day. I did get out to a few spots after work today to end the first week of June. I failed to relocate the Prothonotary Warbler in South Hadley and I think it has moved on. I took my first hike with some elevation since I got hurt a few weeks ago and I picked the Mount Holyoke Range SP in Granby to try to get some photos of Worm eating Warbler and I had some success. There were a number of other species around too with nothing unexpected. By the end of the first week of June I had found 126 species in Hampshire County.
More on warblers to start July can be found at the follow link: Warblers for the first week of June
No comments:
Post a Comment