Mostly Birds (but not always): Hawkfest and Yardbirds 9/20-9/23

Tuesday, September 23, 2014

Hawkfest and Yardbirds 9/20-9/23

Saturday September 20, was the first day of Hawkfest at Lake Erie Metropark. After 170,000 Broad-winged Hawks were counted earlier in the week, Saturday's count yielded more visitors than birds. One of the attractions of the festival is the close-up views of raptors provided by members of the Michigan Hawking Club.

The Red-tailed Hawk in the photo below belongs to Mark Tomich. I met Mark back in July when he and Dave Hogan returned a rehabilitated young Peregrine Falcon that had earlier fallen from its nest area at my soon-to-be-former workplace. Turned out that I have known Mark's brother Blaze since the mid-80's, when we were both worked in an aluminum fabricating factory.

American Kestrel

Size comparison of Bald Eagle and Broad-winged Hawk

Since Saturday I've had quite a few good birds visit my yard. First up, Swainson's Thrush early Saturday morning

Sunday afternoon I spotted a Common Nighthawk fly over.

Saturday and Monday mornings another Blackpoll Warbler visited the yard.

This morning the yard had its second ever Bay-Breasted Warbler. This bird was around all morning. I took a couple hundred photos of it as it ducked in and out of the shadows in my Sycamore trees. Most of the photos were either over or under exposed because I kept exposing for shadows just as it would hop into the sun and vice-versa.

In between Bay-breasted Warbler photo-ops a male Scarlet Tanager flew into one of the Sycamores. It is only the third time I've seen one of them in the yard. The second time was just a few weeks ago on August 31. My initial Scarlet Tanager visit predates my daily yard surveys, but checking my notes on the first sighting I found it was 7 years ago......... to the day, 9/23/07. Different bird same schedule.