Cape Cod Bird Sightings — Tuesday, September 15, 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 September 9 and September 15, 2026.

The Crested Caracara continued at Duck Harbor in Wellfleet this week.

Late sightings of at least one Swallow-tailed Kite continued in Mashpee and Cotuit this week.

Birds at Race Point/Hatches Harbor in Provincetown included an American Golden-Plover, a Buff-breasted Sandpiper, a remarkable 16 Stilt Sandpipers, a Pectoral Sandpiper, 7 Lesser Black-backed Gulls, 2 Black Terns, an Arctic Tern, 250 Roseate Terns, 200 Common Terns, 27 Wilson’s Storm-Petrels, 6 Cory’s Shearwaters, 3 Great Shearwaters, 11 Manx Shearwaters, a Peregrine Falcon, and a Blue Grosbeak.

Birds in Nauset Marsh in Eastham included 11 American Oystercatchers, an American Golden-Plover, 300 Semipalmated Plovers, 19 Western Sandpipers, and 15 Lesser Black-backed Gulls.

At the south end of Monomoy National Wildlife Refuge, birds included 8 Blue-winged Teal, Northern Shoveler, a 22 Gadwall, 160 American Black Ducks, 3 Green-winged Teal, 8 Ruddy Ducks, 2 American Coot, 4 Pied-billed Grebes, an American Golden-Plover, 3 Red Knots, and 22 Lesser Black-backed Gulls.

Migrants along the Hering River in Wellfleet included a Sora, an Olive-sided Flycatcher, a White-eyed Vireo, a Philadelphia Vireo, and a Cape May Warbler.

Other sightings around the Cape included single Little Blue Herons in Barnstable and Harwich, a Leach’s Storm-Petrel off Chatham and 2 more in the bay off Barnstable, a Golden-winged Warbler at Fort Hill in Eastham, a Summer Tanager in Wellfleet, a White-throated Sparrow in North Truro, and 11 Red-necked Phalaropes and a Leach’s Storm-Petrel on Stellwagen Bank.

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].