The northwest wind delivers and even though really nothing personally rare to report, a nice variety of warblers surged through. Most active of those locations, the western slope of Lookout Hill with its abundant White Wood Asters and Snakeroot wildlfowers harbored quite a few birds spilling over up to the north end of Butterfly Meadow. Other active locations were the 16th Street park entrance , the "sparrowbowl", the vale between the Picnic and Tennis Houses and the Upper Pool wildlfower meadow with nice numbers of Savannah Sparrows, though the latter genera is a big puzzle with its lacking with October known for sparrow migration. The migration movement was moderately decent , not spectacular but good enough to keep me going without experiencing "boredom". I wound up on my own with 15 species warblers plus the usual species you would see this time . Check out my list.
Oh, 64 Northern Shovelers now keep the western sector stirring and the coot population has gone up to two! :)> One additional note: in the distance on the lake, I saw a hen teal species but its hard to distinguished Green-winged from Blue -winged with 8 power bins.Hope it sticks around for a scoping.
Peter's List
Location: Prospect Park
Observation date: 10/5/09
Number of species: 57
Canada Goose X
Mute Swan 7 lake
Wood Duck 9 --upper pool island east shore;7 drakes, 2 hen
Mallard X
Northern Shoveler 64 lake
Great Blue Heron 1 upper pool
Sharp-shinned Hawk 2 -- f/o long meadow;f/o nethermead
Cooper's Hawk 2--f/o nethermead; f/o near bartel
Red-tailed Hawk 2 f/o nethermead
American Coot 2 lake
Ring-billed Gull X
Herring Gull X
Rock Pigeon X
Mourning Dove X
Chimney Swift X
Northern Flicker (Yellow-shafted) 3
Eastern Wood-Pewee 1 sparrowbowl
Eastern Phoebe 6
Blue-headed Vireo 3
Red-eyed Vireo 2 16th st entrance
Blue Jay 3
American Crow 8 ballfields
Tufted Titmouse 3
House Wren 2
Winter Wren 1 tennis house
Golden-crowned Kinglet 1 sparrowbowl
Ruby-crowned Kinglet 2
Gray-cheeked Thrush 1 cant remember
Swainson's Thrush 4
American Robin X
Gray Catbird 5
European Starling X
Cedar Waxwing 18 f/o 16th st entrance
Tennessee Warbler 1 16th st entrance
Nashville Warbler 3 lookout
Northern Parula 2
Magnolia Warbler 12
Black-throated Blue Warbler 5--3 lookout;2 ravine
Yellow-rumped Warbler 4
Black-throated Green Warbler 4 --2 sparrowbowl;2 lookout
Pine Warbler 1 sparrowbowl; 1st yr female
Palm Warbler 22 near Binnen pool; about 10 elsewhere
Palm Warbler (Western) 1
Black-and-white Warbler 1 Lookout
American Redstart 3
Ovenbird 4--3 ravine;1 I forget
Common Yellowthroat 12
Wilson's Warbler 1 sparrowbowl
Scarlet Tanager 3 16th street entrance
Chipping Sparrow 2 horse trail Center drive
Savannah Sparrow 6 Upper Pool wildlflower meadow
Song Sparrow 6
White-throated Sparrow 10 ( obviously more, but horse trail Center drive mostly)
Northern Cardinal 5
Indigo Bunting 3--1@16th street entrance;2 sparrowbowl
American Goldfinch 1
House Sparrow X
This report was generated automatically by eBird v2(http://ebird.org)
**********************
I received a report from Rob Bate that he saw Mourning Warbler at the north end of the Butterfly Meadow, a first year bird. So, this is an incentive to check out that "hot " area tomorrow and maybe before Wednesday's predicted rains. Rob also reported Lincoln Sparrow at Lamppost #249.
**********************
From Rob Jett :
> Date: October 5, 2009 8:37:44 PM EDT
> > Subject: eBird Report - Prospect Park , 10/5/09
>
>
>
> Location: Prospect Park
> Observation date: 10/5/09
> Number of species: 56
>
> Canada Goose 120
> Mute Swan 8
> Wood Duck 4
> American Black Duck 4
> Mallard 25
> Northern Shoveler 65
> Double-crested Cormorant 1
> Great Blue Heron 1
> American Kestrel 1
> American Coot 1
> Spotted Sandpiper 1
> Rock Pigeon X
> Mourning Dove 8
> Chimney Swift 5
> Red-bellied Woodpecker 2
> Yellow-bellied Sapsucker 1
> Downy Woodpecker 1
> Hairy Woodpecker 1
> Northern Flicker 26
> Eastern Wood-Pewee 1
> Eastern Phoebe 7
> Blue-headed Vireo 3
> Blue Jay 9
> Black-capped Chickadee 2
> Tufted Titmouse 1
> Red-breasted Nuthatch 2
> Carolina Wren 2
> House Wren 2
> Golden-crowned Kinglet 6
> Ruby-crowned Kinglet 2
> Swainson's Thrush 4
> Wood Thrush 2
> American Robin X
> Gray Catbird 4
> European Starling X
> Magnolia Warbler 6
> Black-throated Blue Warbler 3
> Yellow-rumped Warbler 9
> Black-throated Green Warbler 1
> Pine Warbler 3
> Palm Warbler 4
> Black-and-white Warbler 1
> American Redstart 1
> Common Yellowthroat 5
> Scarlet Tanager 1
> Chipping Sparrow 4
> Savannah Sparrow 2
> Song Sparrow 5
> Swamp Sparrow 1
> White-throated Sparrow 30
> Northern Cardinal X
> Indigo Bunting 1
> Red-winged Blackbird 14
> Common Grackle 2
> Baltimore Oriole 1
> House Sparrow X
>
> This report was generated automatically by eBird v2(http://ebird.org)
**********************
From Michele Dreger ( with Heidi Steiner ) leading 1st Sunday Audubon Center 10/4 walk (BBC sponsored)
On Saturday, I noticed that the Prospect Park signs all said that the first Sunday of the month bird walk was at 10am. The PPAC web site said it also. But we all know that it leaves at 8am. So Heidi and I lead 2 tours for the first Sunday in October. There were 21 in the 8am group and 11 in the 10am group. It was such a great day that I didn't mind walking for 5 hours.... but then I had to walk home. Plus, my neck was killing me from all the unexpected birds in the top of the tree's. We made some new friends this weekend and hope to see them all again soon. Below is Heidi's list. We saw the immature redheaded woodpecker with the 10am group. But we saw the Scarlet Tanagers with the 8am group.
From: Heidi Steiner heidi.steiner@verizon.net
To All,
In spite of some scheduling confusion we had 21 people meet for bird walk on Sunday which turned out to be the most beautiful autumn day.
We started the morning with a nice sighting from the rustic shelter in the Lullwater of a juvenile Black-crowned Night Heron accompanied by an adult.
After that we spent a good deal of time looking at a rusty brown sparrow sized bird that we saw high in the tree that none of us could positively ID.
Later in the day I described the bird to a other birders and they suggested that it could be a female adult nonbreeding Indigo Bunting. Checking the books I think that this is probably what we saw but I’m not sure enough to call it. I never did see the the bill clearly and the bird I saw appeared to have more streaking on the chest but that could be variable and the bird was also always obscured by a few leaves. Take a look at your field guides and tell me what the rest of you think.
Although we didn’t see a huge number of species we had a few real surprises including a juvenile Red-headed Woodpecker near the Butterfly Meadow.
I think everyone finally got good looks at it after we spent quite a while watching. This is an unusual visitor to Prospect Park and the NYC urban area in general.
We also had nice looks at 2 Scarlet Tanagers up on Lookout Hill. One was definitely a male since it still had splotches of his red breeding plumage on his chest and belly. We didn’t determine if the second was a male or female. A couple of us were fortunate enough to run into Rafael Campos as we walked back to the Audubon Center and he pointed out a couple of Common Nighthawks soaring overhead. I’m sorry we didn’t get the second group back in time to see them.
Another unusual sighting that we had was a baby snapping turtle (only about 1 1/2” long) on the southern most path of Lookout Hill. Unfortunately the little fellow was dead but it left us wondering if the female would lay her eggs that far away from the lake or if she had placed her eggs closer to the water but perhaps a bird had picked up the tiny turtle soon after it had hatched but had dropped it while flying over Lookout.
Last night, while talking to other birders, we commented how both of our groups had not seen a single rapture which is so strange for this time of year. This should be prime migration time but I guess they didn’t have the proper air currents. I don’t recall even seeing a resident Red Tail in the park yesterday which is really unusual. Between now and next month if you get a chance to bird keep looking up. The raptures will be coming through.
Have a good month. See you on Nov 1st.
Heidi
Here are the birds from yesterday.
Black-crowned Night-Heron
Mallard Duck
Herring Gull
Rock Dove
Mourning dove
Common Highthawks
Chimney Swift
Yellow-bellied Sapsucker
Red-headed Woodpecker
Red-bellied Woodpecker
Downy Woodpecker
Northern Flicker
Red-eyed Vireo
Blue-headed Vireo
Blue Jay
American Crow
Black-capped Chickadee
Tufted Titmouse (heard only)
House Wren
American Robin
Gray Catbird
European Starling
Nashville Warbler
Northern Parula Warbler
Magnolia Warbler
Black-throated Green Warbler
Pine Warbler
Black Poll Warbler
Common Yellow-throat Warbler
Scarlet Tanager
Northern Cardinal
House Sparrow
American Goldfinch
House Finch
