[Maine-birds] MACHIAS SEAL ISLAND REPORT

I left the island late Wednesday afternoon. It was a relatively uneventful 4 weeks with no unexpected birds and the migration mostly a slow trickle with no big nights. Birds around the lightstation proper were further disrupted by ongoing renovation work on the lighthouse. A couple of the annual but less common fall migrants were 2 TOWEES that stayed for several days in late September and a female CARDINAL that arrived on Monday and was still around today. Perhaps the single exception to the modest numbers was the large number of RED BREASTED NUTHATCHES through most of September. As always, there is a large buildup of HERRING & GREAT BLACK BACKED GULLS around the island in late Summer and through the Fall. They use MSI and GULL ROCK for roosting, particularly at night. You get a real idea of the numbers when an EAGLE flies by and several thousand gulls rise en masse. The gull population has been particularly high this fall, attesting to reports of HERRING stocks to our East & South. The gulls and GANNETS seem well enough fed that schools of Herring on the surface & close to the island have been almost completely ignored most of the time. It's likely that most people have seen and noted very high-flying gulls on clear, warm, sunny days but offshore they occasionally appear like huge kettles of Vultures, travelling many miles, spiraling and soaring above 2000 feet and then dropping out and gliding down over tens of miles. I watched one of those events a few days ago, in late afternoon, when perhaps 3000 or more gulls appeared from the southward (where they were presumably feeding), spiralling at 2000 feet or higher and moving like an avian tornado. Then they began the drop-out with at least 1000 landing at MSI & Gull Rock to spend the night and many more continuing on towards Grand Manan. The very last PUFFINS were gone by the 3rd week of September but, as of Tuesday, there were still LEACHE'S STORM PETRELS on the island. I expect those last few Petrels will fledge this week. Another late bird was a SPOTTED SANDPIPER seen on Wednesday. It was actually seen with an early PURPLE SANDPIPER. I've seldom seen these typically summer and winter species together in the Fall and only occasionally in the Spring. While not strictly avian species, several varieties of Butterfly were noted throughout recent weeks. The island hosts extensive areas of PURPLE ASTOR and GOLDEN ROD, as well as DANDELION and other late bloomers. Added to that, we seldom have killing frost until much later than the Mainland. We haven't even been close to frost yet. Thus, late Butterflies and Hummingbirds are expected and regular. Wednesday yielded a female HUMMINGBIRD and 2 MONARCH BUTTERFLIES, as well as PAINTED LADY, SULPHUR, MOURNING CLOAK & CABBAGE WHITE BUTTERFLIES.

--
Maine birds mailing list
maine-birds@googlegroups.com
http://groups.google.com/group/maine-birds
https://sites.google.com/site/birding207
---
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Maine birds" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to maine-birds+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com.
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.