Cape Cod Bird Sightings — Tuesday, August 25, 2026

Cape Cod Weekly Wildlife Sightings is sponsored by the Bird Watchers General Store in Orleans and Mass Audubon's Wellfleet Bay Wildlife Sanctuary. The following sightings were reported between August 19 and August 25, 2026.

After several years of presumed breeding activity by Swallow-tailed Kites on the Upper Cape, birders finally got proof this week in the form of two recently fledged juveniles being fed by two adults in Cotuit. A Mississippi Kite was also seen in the same location.

Birds at Race Point in Provincetown included 4 Black Vultures, a Baird’s Sandpiper, a Black Tern, 250 Roseate Terns, 40 Wilson’s Storm-Petrels, a Leach’s Storm-Petrel, and a Dickcissel.

A survey of a remote part of Monomoy National Wildlife Refuge turned up 8 Blue-winged Teal, 12 Gadwall, 45 American Black Ducks, 15 Green-winged Teal, 7 Ruddy Ducks, 4 American Coots, 3 Pied-billed Grebes, an American Golden-Plover, 3 Hudsonian Godwits, 22 White-rumped Sandpipers, and 5 Black-crowned Night-Herons.

Birds at Bell’s Neck Conservation Area in West Harwich included a Clapper Rail a Tricolored Heron, a Little Blue Heron, 2 Glossy Ibis, 100 Snowy Egrets, and 90 Great Egrets.

Other sightings around the Cape included a Stilt Sandpiper in Chatham, a Little Blue Heron at Mud Pond in Harwich, a Dickcissel at Harwich Community Gardens, and a Summer Tanager in Wellfleet.

If you have questions about these sightings, or want to report a sighting, call the Wellfleet Bay Wildlife Sanctuary at 508-349-2615 or send e-mail to [email protected].