Bird Sightings: The Voice of Audubon

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The Voice of Audubon offers regular updates on birds sighted across the state to introduce you to the wide variety of species Massachusetts has to offer.

Below are the most recently published sightings. Sightings in the past month are also available.

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Cape Cod

Wednesday, May 15, 2013

A yellow-throated warbler was seen at Santuit River preserve in Mashpee this week, and a Mississippi kite was seen at Mass Audubon’s Pilgrim Heights hawk watch in Truro.

A summer tanager was near Cahoon Hollow in Wellfleet on Sunday, where a parasitic jaeger, a white-crowned sparrow, several feeding humpback whales, several harbor porpoises, a few minke whales, and a pod of dolphins were also noted this week.

Humpback whales were also noted feeding off of Coast Guard Beach in Eastham on Tuesday, where bird sightings included a short-billed dowitcher, a merlin, and several least terns.

Sightings at Tern Island in Chatham included 400 black-bellied plovers, 500 dunlin, 40 semipalmated sandpipers, 6 short-billed dowitchers, and 14 red knots.

At High Head in Truro, sightings this week included 2 northern bobwhites, an American bittern, 2 northern harriers, 2 Virginia rails, a solitary sandpiper, a magnolia warbler, a purple finch, and 2 pine siskins.

Seabirds noted in Provincetown included a black tern, a roseate tern, a Caspian tern, 600 common terns, and a parasitic jaeger, and warblers seen at Foss Woods included blackburnian, Nashville, black-throated green, black-throated blue, and northern parula.

Birds sighted at Wellfleet Bay sanctuary included 130 brant, 3 ruddy turnstones, 7 semipalmated plovers, 2 killdeer, 4 least sandpipers, a northern harrier, a sharp-shinned hawk, a yellow-throated vireo, a blue-headed vireo, a warbling vireo, a blackpoll warbler, a blackburnian warbler, 16 Baltimore orioles, and an orchard oriole.

Other sightings around the Cape included 4 short-billed dowitchers and a peregrine falcon at Seagull Beach in Yarmouth,  a late bufflehead in Wellfleet, a lingering American coot, 2 ruddy ducks, and a greater scaup in Eastham, continuing red and white-winged crossbills elsewhere in Eastham, and flyover pine siskins in Truro and Provincetown.

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Eastern Massachusetts

Friday, May 17, 2013

Migration was in full swing this week, culminated by the first appearance of several new species and good numbers of many others.  Among the more recent arrivals were reports of Semipalmated Plover, Lesser Yellowlegs, Semipalmated Sandpiper, Short-billed Dowitcher, Least Tern, Yellow-billed and Black-billed cuckoo, Common Nighthawk, Whip-poor-will, Eastern Wood-Pewee, Willow and Least flycatcher, Yellow-throated Vireo, Cliff Swallow, Swainson’s Thrush, warblers including Cape May, Bay-breasted, Blackburnian, Blackburnian, Blackpoll, Canada, and Wilson’s, as well as White-crowned Sparrow, Scarlet Tanager, Rose-breasted Grosbeak, Indigo Bunting, and Bobolink.

In Newburyport Harbor there were 58 Greater Yellowlegs, 6 Lesser Yellowlegs, 30 Semipalmated Sandpipers, 250 Dunlin, 4 Short-billed Dowitchers, 140 Bonaparte’s Gulls, and an immature Little Gull.

Reports from Parker River Refuge on Plum Island this week included 15 Glossy Ibises, a King Rail, 3 Caspian Terns, a Black-billed Cuckoo, a Willow Flycatcher, 3 Least Flycatchers, a Blue-headed Vireo, a Common Raven, 2 Veeries, a Swainson’s Thrush, 19 species of warblers including a Kentucky Warbler, a Clay-colored Sparrow, and a White-crowned Sparrow.

In the salt pans near Pikul’s Farm on Rt. 1A in Rowley, 25 Glossy Ibises, a Ruff and 3 Wilson’s Phalaropes have been present for most of the week, and not far away a Yellow-crowned Night-Heron has been seen on several occasions in the vicinity of the Newbury boat ramp by the bridge crossing the Parker River.

A survey of the Kettle Island heron colony this week produced nest totals of 201 Great Egrets, 167 Snowy Egrets, 6 Little Blue Herons, 46 Black-crowned Night-Herons, and 65 Glossy Ibises.

Observed at Point of Pines in Revere were 15 Manx Shearwaters, 5 Piping Plovers, and an Iceland Gull, and at Marblehead Neck Sanctuary in Marblehead a Summer Tanager has been present since last weekend.

Mount Auburn Cemetery in Cambridge has hosted many migrants all week, most notably 19 species of warblers, and several Scarlet Tanagers and Rose-breasted Grosbeaks.

A report from Pond Meadow Park in Braintree included an Eastern Wood-Pewee, 9 Red-eyed Vireos, 2 Blue-gray Gnatcatchers, a dozen species of warblers including Blue-winged, Nashville, 14 Northern Parulas, Chestnut-sided, Blackburnian, Blackpoll, American Redstart, and Northern Waterthrush.

In the Boston Public Garden there were sightings of Black-billed Cuckoo, Willow and Least flycatcher, Cedar Waxwing, and several species of warblers.

Among the many migrants reported from Franklin Park in Boston this week were Yellow-throated Vireo, Wood Thrush, a good variety of warblers including  Blackburnian, Black-throated Blue, Black-throated Green, and Wilson’s as well as 24 White-throated Sparrows, 2 Bobolinks, and an Orchard Oriole.

At Gooseberry Neck in Westport, many migrants were noted this week coming in off the waters of Buzzards Bay at first light including 18 species of warblers including Orange-crowned, Kentucky, Bay-breasted, and Canada.

Miscellaneous reports this week included 2 Yellow-billed Cuckoos at Fowl Meadow in Canton; 4 Common Nighthawks in Wayland; 7 Cliff Swallows at the Hanover Street Bridge in Newbury; and a Vesper Sparrow at Denehy Park in Cambridge.

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Western Massachusetts

Tuesday, May 14, 2013

Less common nesting species reported in small numbers this week were American bitterns, green herons, Virginia rails, whip-poor-wills, fish crows, brown thrashers, northern waterthrushes, worm-eating warblers, Canada warblers, grasshopper sparrows, indigo buntings, eastern meadowlarks and orchard orioles.   

Regular migrating species found stopping here on their way north were northern harriers, lesser and greater yellowlegs, least sandpipers, solitary sandpipers,  Swainson’s thrushes, Cape May warblers, Tennessee warblers, bay-breasted warblers, Wilson’s warblers, white-crowned sparrows and pine siskin.  

Three sandhill cranes and a vesper sparrow were seen in Worthington.  

A summer tanager was coming to a yard in Great Barrington.

 A greater scaup, a great egret and a common gallinule were at the Pondside marsh in Longmeadow.  

Two pectoral sandpipers were reported in Northampton. 

 An olive-sided flycatcher was found in New Salem. 

 A sora and a marsh wren were seen in Lenox.

A grey-cheeked thrush was found in Easthampton and a black vulture in Holyoke. 

 

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About the Voice of Audubon

These bird sighting reports are transcripts of recorded messages from each of three regional "bird alerts" maintained by Mass Audubon, known as the Voice of Audubon. The phone number for the Voice of Audubon is (781) 259-8805. All three recorded reports from throughout the state are accessible through this number, and the transcripts are available anytime at www.massaudubon.org/voa). Not all sightings that are submitted are included in the VOA reports. Those that are included are intended to provide a "snapshot" of the current, noteworthy bird activity in each region within Massachusetts, and might include, for example, rarities, early/first-arriving migrants, late-departing migrants, high counts, unusual sightings (e.g., a seabird found on an inland lake), or simply those that represent exemplary sightings for the time and place.

The Boston Globe publishes one or more of the transcripts (with limited editing) each Sunday. To submit bird sightings call (781) 259-2150.

The Voice of Audubon is the oldest phone-based bird alert in the United States, first established on December 1, 1954 (original phone number, KEnmore 6-4050). See the original 1954 press release*.

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