As of the end of yesterday, April 1st, the 17th day of the 2nd Annual Bradbury Mountain Spring Hawkwatch project, sponsored by the Wild Bird Center of Yarmouth, 344 raptors of 11 species have been tallied (a complete breakdown of the daily counts can be found on hawkcount.org. At this point last year we had tallied 367 birds. But, it was a 104 bird day on 4/1 last year that skewed this statistic quite a bit, as only 263 birds were tallied in March as compared to 337 this year.

However, this year we started 5 days earlier (March 15th) in order to catch a little more of the passage of our earliest migrants: Northern Goshawk, Rough-legged Hawk, Red-shouldered Hawk, and Bald Eagle. While we have yet to tally a Rough-legged Hawk this season, we have already tied last year’s count of Northern Goshawk (4), we’re nearing last year’s total of 29 Red-shouldered Hawks (24 to date this year), and we’ve already beaten last year’s total of 38 Bald Eagles (43 already so far this season). And, the 62 total raptors tallied on March 18th clearly demonstrate the potential of starting the count on March 15th. Unfortunately, we’ve been plagued by strong north and northwest winds this “spring” so far (although last season we lost more days due to snow and/or fog than we have this year) which has limited our total tally. Nevertheless, we are off to a great start, and things will only continue to heat up (and hopefully, so will the air temperatures!)

Yesterday was Dane’s day off, and Jeannette and I were to cover the count – or at least try to. Dense fog (thanks to warm - finally! - temperatures that rose into the upper 50’s, and a still deep snowpack – 1-2 feet in the woods) precluded an on-time start. I REALLY wanted to get up on the hill, however, as the winds were an absolutely perfect light-moderate south-southwest. Unfortunately, the fog was just too dense too see anything, let alone migrant hawks (which, depending on how low the fog layer is, may have been migrating right overhead of it all), but I just couldn’t sit around any longer. Since birds seem to appear (likely birds that had been migrating over the fog banks) as soon as fog lifts, I wanted to be up at the summit for when it broke. I arrived at 11:15, and set up the sign, scope, and sat down in our chair to patiently await the lifting of the fog and the commencement of what was sure to be a big flight.

An hour passed. Still near-zero visibility. What was I doing up here? But, as I began contemplating heading home for at least a little while, my friend Casey arrived. We hadn’t seen each other in a while, so we decided to spend our foggy time together chatting and catching up, and waiting for that blasted fog to lift. Occasional quick breaks in the
fog would reveal one of the fields in the distance teased us repeatedly; moments later, visibility would once again be close to zero. Another hour went by.

At about 1:30, the fog FINALLY began to REALLY lift, and 15 minutes later, a local Turkey Vulture took to the air to look for lunch. At 2:15 a Cooper’s Hawk was in flight, heading northwest – our first migrant of the day! Finally, we weren’t skunked! Over the course of the next hour, the fog cleared out, and there were even a few breaks of sun and blue sky, but it seemed that conditions hadn’t become favorable soon enough in the day.

Jeannette arrived at about 3:00 to finish up the day, but rain drove her off the mountain at 4:20. Despite our optimism, undue enthusiasm, and dedication to fog-watching, we only managed a total of 7 migrant raptors on the day – although 2 apparent non-migratory Bald Eagles that were engaged in a dogfight in the distance helped make up for some of the slower moments, as did a visit from the Bohemian Waxwing flock (16 today).

(And, in case anyone is interested, here’s some of the background regarding our interest in starting this project, as I had blogged about after the first day of the count last spring.

Meanwhile, after I came down from the hill in the afternoon, Dane and I took a ride to Bowdoinham to see if the mouth of the Abagadasset was still frozen. Although it was, a flock of 100+ Snow Geese that were put up by a passing Bald Eagle made up for it. They were far; out in Merrymeeting Bay beyond the mouth of the Abby. But, this was by far the largest group that I have ever seen in Maine, and one has to wonder if this was the same group that passed by The Brad a few days ago!?

About 50 Common Mergansers and 100+ American Black Ducks were also in the bay here – while other smaller numbers of mergs were seen elsewhere, 12 Killdeer were in a field off of Brown’s Point Rd, and a quick stop at the Bowdoin Mill in Topsham produced my first two Double-crested Cormorants of the spring.

Of course, today’s strong and blustery northwesterly winds do bring this whole “spring” thing back into question once again. Nevertheless, my visit to Hedgehog Mountain Park did produce a few migrants: 11 Song Sparrows, 5 Dark-eyed Juncos, and 1 American Woodcock.