[Maine-birds] Fwd: Bradbury Mountain State Park (06 Apr 2016) 15 Raptors

Bradbury Mountain State Park
Pownal, Maine, USA

Daily Raptor Counts: Apr 06, 2016
Species	Day's Count	Month Total	Season Total
Black Vulture	0	0	0
Turkey Vulture	5	31	253
Osprey	1	9	11
Bald Eagle	0	0	46
Northern Harrier	0	2	19
Sharp-shinned Hawk	2	10	49
Cooper's Hawk	1	2	46
Northern Goshawk	0	0	2
Red-shouldered Hawk	1	3	52
Broad-winged Hawk	0	0	1
Red-tailed Hawk	0	9	192
Rough-legged Hawk	0	0	0
Golden Eagle	0	0	0
American Kestrel	2	17	52
Merlin	2	3	7
Peregrine Falcon	0	0	0
Unknown Accipiter	0	0	3
Unknown Buteo	1	1	6
Unknown Falcon	0	0	0
Unknown Eagle	0	0	0
Unknown Raptor	0	0	6
Total:	15	87	745

Observation start time:	08:00:00
Observation end time:	16:00:00
Total observation time:	8 hours
Official Counter	Anna Stunkel
Observers:	Julie Krasne, Tom Downing

Visitors:
29 people visited the hawkwatch, including a group from the Friends School of Portland. Thank you for your interest and your good questions!

Weather:
It was mostly cloudy today, with winds mainly south southwest and becoming more southerly during late afternoon. Windspeed picked up quite a bit during the afternoon, which slowed migration to a trickle. However, there were some beautiful lenticular clouds towards the end of the count.

Raptor Observations:
It was a slow day, probably as a result of the winds which were stronger than expected during the afternoon. There was still good raptor species diversity. During the last hour, in which winds were quite nippy, two close Merlins zipping by were a wonderful treat. Local Bald Eagles were active, including a close immature bird and several distant adults. A Cooper's Hawk was displaying near Hedgehog Mountain.

Non-raptor Observations:
A flock of ~40 Bohemian Waxwings landed on Bradbury Mountain about 10 minutes into the count. Corvids were very active especially during the morning, with ravens playfully displaying their acrobatic talents. 27 bird species were observed.

Species deemed migrating:

19 European Starlings

1 American Goldfinch

1 American Robin

1 Common Loon

Predictions:
Unfortunately it may rain throughout the day tomorrow. Some counting time may be possible in the morning if rain is light or late in arriving, but there is unlikely to be much migration going on. We hope that there will be a nice push of raptor movement after this weather passes.

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Report submitted by Jeannette Lovitch (freeportwildbird@yahoo.com)
Bradbury Mountain State Park information may be found at: www.freeportwildbirdsupply.com/hawkwatch.asp