Cape Cod Weekly Bird Sightings
Cape Cod Bird Sightings — Tuesday, May 26, 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 May 20 and May 26, 2026.
A Chestnut-collared Longspur was found at Crosby Beach in Brewster on the 22nd, representing the 5th Cape and Islands record of this bird of vast western prairies.
At least one White Ibis continued this week in Chatham, where it was joined by up to two even more rare White-faced Ibises, representing just the second record of this species for the Cape and Islands. Two Little Blue Herons were also in the same complex of marshes and salt ponds.
A pair of Prothonotary Warblers has apparently taken up residence in a birdhouse in the Brewster area, in perhaps the first known nesting attempt on Cape Cod for this cavity-nesting songbird of southern swamps.
A Mississippi Kite was seen over Chatham on the 21st and another over Mashpee on the 25th. A Swallow-tailed Kite was seen in one of the usual areas, north of Santuit Pond in South Sandwich.
Sightings at Race Point in Provincetown included an American Golden-Plover, 2 American Oystercatchers, a White-rumped Sandpiper, a Parasitic Jaeger, a Little Gull, an Iceland Gull, 2 Arctic Terns, a Thick-billed Murre, a Red-necked Grebe, a Sooty Shearwater, 6 Manx Shearwaters, and 2 American Kestrels.
Migrants tallied at the Provincetown airport one morning last week included a Black-billed Cuckoo, a Yellow-billed Cuckoo, 26 Eastern Kingbirds, 665 Blue Jays, 2 Purple Martins, 1450 Cedar Waxwings, 2 Purple Finches, and 5 Pine Siskins.
At least two Chuck-will’s-widows continued at Nauset Light Beach in Eastham, and other sightings around the Cape included a White-throated Sparrow in Falmouth and another in Orleans, a Harlequin Duck at South Cape Beach in Mashpee, a Common Murre in Cape Cod Bay, a Black Vulture in Yarmouth, a Red-necked Grebe off Harding’s Beach in Chatham, an American Pipit in Brewster, and an Evening Grosbeak at Beech Forest in Provincetown.
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].