With a busy tour and travel schedule once again this fall (every year I say I will schedule fewer things in my favorite season to bird in Maine!), my time at Sandy Point is at a premium.  Since it takes certain conditions to make birding here worthwhile, I get quite excited when conditions line up for a good flight.

I was very anxious to arrive at “my office” on Tuesday morning.  Moderate northerly winds overnight turned to the northwest, resulting in an exceptional flight over and through SandyPointBeach come dawn.  Here is the morning’s scorecard:

-6:23-10:45am.
-37F, Clear, Light northwest, increasing.
-Jenny Howard and Jeannette Lovitch assisting with the count.

1195 Unidentified
984 Northern Flickers (*2^nd highest count)
703 Northern Parula (*New high count; old record only 234!)
391 Cedar Waxwings (*New high count)
153 American Redstarts
152 Blackpoll Warblers
145 Black-throated Green Warblers (*2^nd highest count).
101 Broad-winged Hawks (*New high count)
35 Yellow Warblers
28 Black-and-white Warblers
23 Yellow-rumped Warblers
21 Red-eyed Vireos
19 Magnolia Warblers
17 Swainson’s Thrushes (*ties high count)
16 Eastern Phoebes (*New high count)
12 Nashville Warblers
11 American Goldfinches
9 American Robins
9 Rose-breasted Grosbeaks (*New high count)
7 Palm Warblers
7 Scarlet Tanagers
6 Common Loons
6 White-throated Sparrows (in bushes; no crossings)
5 Tennessee Warblers
5 Common Yellowthroats (in bushes; no crossings as usual)
4 Cooper’s Hawks (*New high count)
4 Unidentified vireos
4 Blue Jays
3 Ospreys
3 Least Flycatchers
3 Unidentified empids
3 Philadelphia Vireos
3 Chestnut-sided Warblers
3 Blackburnian Warblers
3 Bay-breasted Warblers
3 Black-throated Blue Warblers
3 Chipping Sparrows
3 Rusty Blackbirds (first of season)
2 Sharp-shinned Hawks
2 American Kestrels
2 Bald Eagles
2 Ruby-throated Hummingbirds
2 Golden-crowned Kinglets
2 Ruby-crowned Kinglets
2 Cape May Warblers
2 European Starlings (first time I have “deemed them migrating”)
2 Dark-eyed Juncos
1 Red-tailed Hawk
1 Northern Harrier
1 Unidentified small falcon
1 Eastern Wood-Pewee
1 “Traill’s” Flycatcher
1 Blue-headed Vireo
1 Red-breasted Nuthatch
1 NORTHERN MOCKINGBIRD (6 false-starts before apparently crossing)
1 Pine Warbler
1 CONNECTICUT WARBLER (3^rd of the season as Tom Johnson and Jenny Howard had one here on 9/15 as well)
1 Northern Waterthrush
1 Red-winged Blackbird
1 Purple Finch
1 Monarch butterfly

Total= 4,134 (*2^nd highest count of all time!)

Simply put: wow!  That was one heck of a flight.  In fact, it was downright overwhelming at times – flocks of flickers, waves of warblers, packs of waxwings.  It was almost too much to count, and thankfully, Jenny Howard agreed (OK, so maybe I didn’t exactly ask, but beg) to tally flickers for the busiest part of the morning for me. That helped a whole lot.

After a flood like yesterday morning, I am not disappointed by the slow, but steady trickle through the point this morning.  It was a more manageable number to count, with quite a few birds lower than yesterday, and often only a few at a time; it was easier to sort through.

Here’s this morning’s scorecard, then, we’ll compare the different flights as viewed on the radar.
– 6:21-9:05
– 41F, Clear, Calm becoming very light west.

265 Northern Parulas (*2^nd highest count)
202 Unidentified
54 Black-throated Green Warblers
45 Northern Flickers
32 Cedar Waxwings
32 American Redstarts
26 Yellow-rumped Warblers
17 Yellow Warblers
14 American Robins
14 Blackpoll Warblers
13 Blue Jays
10 Red-eyed Vireos
7 Nashville Warblers
6 Eastern Phoebes
6 Black-and-white Warblers
4 Ruby-crowned Kinglets
4 Tennessee Warblers
4 Palm Warblers
4 Wilson’s Warblers
4 Chipping Sparrows
3 Common Loons
3 American Kestrels
3 Blue-headed Vireos
3 Chestnut-sided Warblers
3 Common Yellowthroats
2 Unidentified empids
2 Ruby-throated Hummingbirds
2 Swainson’s Thrushes
2 Black-throated Blue Warblers
2 Magnolia Warblers
2 Rose-breasted Grosbeaks
2 Baltimore Orioles
2 American Goldfinches
1 Peregrine Falcon
1 Solitary Sandpiper
1 Least Flycatcher
1 “Traill’s” Flycatcher
1 Unidentified flycatcher
1 Philadelphia Vireo
1 Unidentified vireo
1 White-breasted Nuthatch
1 Prairie Warbler
1 Scarlet Tanager
1 Purple Finch

Total: 801

I’ll admit, I wasn’t expecting it to be quite this good.  And despite really only a “good” flight, parulas had their second highest tally – I didn’t think there would be any left after yesterday’s flight!  And yes, this more manageable flight was more “enjoyable,” if considerably less awe-inspiring.

So, what made me have lower expectations for today?  Let’s go to the radar!

First, the massive flight overnight Monday into Tuesday that led to all of the records yesterday.  I have included the 10pm, 12am, 2am, and 4am radar and velocity images:

Combined, these images show a very strong flight all night long, with a lot of birds offshore come twilight, and likely a lot of birds arriving at the coast come dawn.  Looking at that image when I went to bed, and when I awoke, coupled with the light northwesterly winds all night left no doubt that things would be hopping at Sandy Point.  And, as we now know, there most certainly was. If you see a radar image that looks like this – go birding in the morning!

In fact, it was a good day all-around for migrants, and everywhere we looked up yesterday, raptors were on the move.

Now, let’s take a look a the radar and velocity images from 10pm, 12am, 2am, and 4am last night:

As night fell Tuesday night, clear and mostly calm conditions let birds take to the air once again – but not nearly as many as the night before. Notice how much smaller the area of return is, and how much less dense? Meanwhile, the velocity image was much less distinctly fast-moving, north-to-south as the previous night (of course, with little to no wind, the ground speed of the birds would be less anyway) – a little more ambiguous than the night before.  Furthermore, with a forecast for westerly winds (not as good as northwesterly), and the chance that they would become southwesterly by dawn, I did consider skipping Sandy Point this morning, but with the rest of the week looking even less productive, I knew I had to give it a go.

And, obviously, I am glad that I did.  But upon returning to the store, and checking those above radar images once again, I find it a bit odd that the radar image (small in diameter, but very dense) did not translate to a more distinct velocity image.  Perhaps there was a lot of slow-moving stuff up there (insects, pollen, dust, etc) that clouded the motion of the birds.  Either way, it was a good night for flying, and if it’s a good night for flying, it’s a good morning to be at Sandy Point!