[Maine-birds] Fwd: Bradbury Mountain State Park (10 May 2023) 5 Raptors

Bradbury Mountain State Park
Pownal, Maine, USA

Daily Raptor Counts: May 10, 2023
Species	Day's Count	Month Total	Season Total
Black Vulture	0	0	2
Turkey Vulture	0	0	500
Osprey	2	22	273
Bald Eagle	0	10	63
Northern Harrier	0	4	80
Sharp-shinned Hawk	0	70	381
Cooper's Hawk	0	3	35
Northern Goshawk	0	0	2
Red-shouldered Hawk	0	2	52
Broad-winged Hawk	1	113	2000
Red-tailed Hawk	0	7	73
Rough-legged Hawk	0	0	0
Golden Eagle	0	1	1
American Kestrel	0	14	265
Merlin	0	13	65
Peregrine Falcon	0	0	4
Unknown Accipiter	0	1	8
Unknown Buteo	2	3	4
Unknown Falcon	0	0	4
Unknown Eagle	0	0	0
Unknown Raptor	0	5	21
Total:	5	268	3833

Observation start time:	08:00:00
Observation end time:	16:00:00
Total observation time:	8 hours
Official Counter	Zane Baker
Observers:	Biz Houghton, Dick Baker, Jen Baker

Visitors:
16 visitors.

Weather:
Sunny and warm with temps in the low 70's. Mostly clear skies developed some thin high clouds midday which dissipated towards the end of the count period. Heat shimmer was pretty bad today and there was a slight haze in the distance. Winds were mainly calm but there were off and on gusts of wind from the W all day.

Raptor Observations:
This was frustrating and curious. Hardly anything was moving today and two of the birds I counted couldn't even be broken down to the species level due to distance and heat distortion. Later in the afternoon after hours of not seeing much in the air, what seemed like a pair of Osprey, one of which was packing lunch, slowly made their way N. Local activity was very still with the exception of some TV's and Red-tails.

Non-raptor Observations:
The summit was eerily quiet again, even first thing this morning. It took quite some time before I could hear or spot more than five species. We did end the day with a total of 26, four of which were firsts for the season and those were: Great Crested Flycatcher Eastern Kingbird Solitary Sandpiper Black-throated Blue Warbler Northbound birds were sparse but those include: 15 Blue Jays 3 Chimney Swifts 3 Yellow-rumped Warblers 2 American Goldfinch 2 Barn Swallows 1 Belted Kingfisher 1 Solitary Sandpiper 1 Eastern Kingbird

Predictions:
Temps in the mid 70's sound pretty good for tomorrow along with a little cloud cover which will help for spotting. Winds are predicted to be coming from the WNW but should be a little lighter than today. I hope the overnight conditions produce a few more song birds and the daylight hours bring some raptors.

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Report submitted by Jeannette Lovitch (freeportwildbird@yahoo.com)
Bradbury Mountain State Park information may be found at: www.freeportwildbirdsupply.com/bradbury-mountain-hawkwatch
More information at hawkcount.org: [Site Profile] [Day Summary] [Month Summary]

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