Holiday Beach Hawk Watch Amherstburg, Ontario, Canada Daily Raptor Counts: Oct 07, 2019 ------------------------------------------------------------------- Species Day's Count Month Total Season Total ------------------ ----------- -------------- -------------- Turkey Vulture 769 16875 17733 Osprey 0 4 29 Bald Eagle 0 21 113 Northern Harrier 3 79 321 Sharp-shinned Hawk 161 1386 3777 Cooper's Hawk 3 50 112 Northern Goshawk 0 1 1 Red-shouldered Hawk 0 22 22 Broad-winged Hawk 0 855 25765 Red-tailed Hawk 3 103 247 Rough-legged Hawk 0 0 0 Golden Eagle 0 1 1 American Kestrel 4 364 1585 Merlin 1 11 92 Peregrine Falcon 3 12 33 Unknown Accipiter 0 3 5 Unknown Buteo 0 4 5 Unknown Eagle 0 0 0 Unknown Falcon 0 0 0 Unknown Raptor 0 0 4 Swainson's Hawk 0 0 1 Total: 947 19791 49846 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Observation start time: 07:00:00 Observation end time: 15:00:00 Total observation time: 8 hours Official Counter: Maryse Gagné Observers: Elizabeth Kent, Hugh Kent Visitors: Thank you to our few visitors; Ken and Linda from Peterborough, Gabrielle, Kathy, Jane, Mitch and Gene from Detroit, and Tara. Also thank you to Mike for his visit and his caffeinated gifts for the observers! Weather: Good weather on the tower today. We started with a cooler morning with winds from the West, only to change towards the South in early afternoon as the temperatures rose and ending with a bit of heat. Raptor Observations: We experienced a pretty slow day with not many species all mostly Sharp-shinned Hawks (161) and Turkey Vultures (769). The Turkey Vultures were travelling very far North of the tower, forcing us to use scopes to count them. Other notable species were a Merlin and three Peregrine falcons flying just above our heads. Non-raptor Observations: What we lacked in raptors was made up with Blue Jays! We ended our count with 11,080 Blue Jays, most migrating in the morning. It was also a busy day for American Goldfinches, Starlings, Red-winged Blackbirds, and Crows. In the afternoon, when the raptors were nowhere to be seen, we counted many gulls mostly Ring-billed Gulls but also a lot of Bonaparte's Gulls. Lastly, we had a high count of Chimney Swifts, with 33 swifts for the day. Blue Jays: 11,080 American Goldfinch: 398 Starlings: 950 Red-winged Blackbirds: 273 American Crow: 30 Ring-billed Gull: 71 Bonaparte's Gull: 61 Monarch Butterfly: 32 https://ebird.org/eBirdReports?cmd=subReport Predictions: Tonight, we are expecting Northern winds, which should push some birds towards us, hopefully some more warblers. We expecting a cooler morning with again Northern winds only to shift to the South in the afternoon as temperatures are expected to climb. Hopefully, we should be seeing many more Turkey Vultures, and buteos like Red-tailed Hawks and Red-shouldered Hawks. ======================================================================== Report submitted by Maryse Gagné (maryse.gagne35@gmail.com) Holiday Beach Hawk Watch information may be found at: http://hbmo.ca/ More site information at hawkcount.org: http://hawkcount.org/siteinfo.php?rsite=100