I'm still here...

...just waiting for a cold front, thanks.

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Warblers in Flight: A Photographic Collection

While active migration has always been my favorite bird behavior to observe, my interest in the phenomenon called “morning flight” of nocturnal migrants had been minimal due to the unfortunate reality that I lived well over an hour’s drive from the nearest known reliable observation site, Bluff Point State Park in Groton, CT. In autumn 2020, thanks to improved public access to Hammonasset Beach State Park in Madison, CT, I began to explore the northern tip of Willard’s Island as a morning flight viewpoint and was pleased to find that under the right conditions a reliable flight could be observed there. The volume of birds passing through is not large (a small fraction of what passes through Bluff Point), but the flight line is consistent and can be observed under good lighting conditions. Between autumns 2020-22 I visited the site 20 times in total and recorded 27 warbler species in morning flight. All but a few of these have been photographed, often poorly! I immediately found mysel
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Last winter's gull review

Today's cooler, blustery conditions combined with the appearance of an Ivory Gull in Cape May got me thinking more about the upcoming gull season and reflecting on last year's. The 2008-09 gulling in the northeast was pretty damn good and included a few really exciting birds. The season started out with a bang exactly one year ago today with CT's first Slaty-backed Gull . On 12/12 an adult Thayer's Gull put in a brief appearance at the Windsor-Bloomfield Landfill, CT's premier gull hotspot, followed by a first-winter bird on 12/23. A Black-headed Gull spent the winter in New Haven Harbor. Perhaps 'gull of the year' was a subadult Glaucous-winged Gull in Rochester, NH, found by Scott Young...a first record for New England. Meanwhile Gloucester, MA was once again the gull capital of New England. I happened to already be up in Boston when news of an adult Ivory Gull broke on 1/17. I still get chills thinking about that weekend. Of course there were plenty
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Canada Geese? Cackling Geese? Or Hybrids?

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Before you read any further, I recommend that you have your favorite headache remedy handy, because you might need it. For some background reading on this problem, check out David Sibley's blog post about a confusing flock of white-cheeked geese he encountered in Massachusetts around this time last year . Also, there was recently a "problem goose" found by Frank Mantlik in Stratford. View my post and Frank's really nice photos . I suggested the bird might represent a "Lesser" Canada Goose or hybrid rather than a Cackling Goose. After getting a few more opinions on it, there actually seems to be a bit of a consensus...that it is not really identifiable and may represent a hybrid Canada x Cackling Goose, as it does not fit neatly into any one particular Canada or Cackling form (as far as we know now, anyway) and shows features of both species. And more background...here are some examples from past years of "Richardson's" Cackling Geese ( B
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