The morning of April 22 looked very promising! Sharp-shinned Hawks flew through the area almost nonstop from 9 to 11 a.m. The Broad-winged Hawks finally arrived in some numbers, and by noon, they formed a kettle of around 100 birds. Soon, the kettle moved away in the northeast direction, and only a handful of [...]
We are only a couple of days into the spring waterbird count and have already seen some significant movement at the Point. The first day of the count saw what is probably the last major push of Sandhill Cranes, 3,198 of them in a single day. The vast majority of the birds moved through [...]
Although the weather slowed things down a bit, it was another productive week. While our numbers were down from last week, the owl diversity that Whitefish Point is famous for picked up a bit in recent nights. We banded five Boreal Owls (BOOW) this week, including four on April 15. This would not have [...]
The fifth week of the raptor count saw some dramatic rises and falls! On April 8 and 9, hawk migration intensified, with 141 Sharp-shinned Hawks recorded on the 8th and 312 Red-tailed Hawks on the 9th. Then the wind direction changed, and quite dramatically! Within less than 24 hours, the wind turned almost 180 [...]
After getting skunked on April 3, the owl migration finally kicked in this past week, including a night when we banded 110 owls — 39 Northern Saw-whet Owls (NSWO) and 71 Long-eared Owls (LEOW). This total represents the second-biggest night of owl banding ever at WPBO. The LEOW total is a new nightly total [...]
April 8 has yielded the highest raptor count so far this season: 369 birds! A kettle of about 100 Red-tailed Hawks formed west of the point, with individual hawks moving eastward towards the lake; most would circle back and rejoin the kettle. Interestingly, there were almost as many Rough-legged Hawks (75), including several dark [...]
Although the weather conditions were not great again this past week, they did improve, and thankfully, the owl migration did, too. Given the weather, it was a relatively productive week, including a few highlights. We banded 51 owls and recaptured seven previously-banded owls. Species diversity has not kicked in yet, and 49 of the [...]
The third week of the hawk count saw highs and lows but culminated with 181 birds on April 1! The weather was unstable, with some cold and windy days when no raptors were seen and milder days when the kinder winds from the southwest brought the first Red-tailed Hawks! Four species made their first [...]
Coming into this past week, we knew the weather would be a challenge, but we did not expect this. Since our last update, actually since March 15, we have only banded two owls. The season's first Long-eared Owl (LEOW) was banded on the first net check on March 21. Conditions were not too bad [...]
Bad weather tested the second week of the count. Drizzle, light rain, and drifting snow, coupled with strong northern and northwest winds, provided less-than-optimal conditions for observation on most days. On March 20, I had to interrupt the count because of whiteouts. Bald Eagles were the only regularly recorded species, with a few adults [...]
