Hawk Cliff Hawkwatch Port Stanley, Ontario, Canada Daily Raptor Counts: Oct 28, 2023 ------------------------------------------------------------------- Species Day's Count Month Total Season Total ------------------ ----------- -------------- -------------- Black Vulture 0 0 0 Turkey Vulture 1580 12530 12751 Osprey 0 3 61 Bald Eagle 16 113 247 Northern Harrier 44 227 590 Sharp-shinned Hawk 330 2070 5411 Cooper's Hawk 25 152 199 American Goshawk 0 4 4 Red-shouldered Hawk 92 182 182 Broad-winged Hawk 1 29 32328 Red-tailed Hawk 533 1005 1056 Rough-legged Hawk 3 13 14 Golden Eagle 9 24 24 American Kestrel 27 686 1982 Merlin 1 33 84 Peregrine Falcon 0 28 54 Unknown Accipiter 0 0 0 Unknown Buteo 0 0 0 Unknown Falcon 0 0 0 Unknown Eagle 0 0 0 Unknown Raptor 0 0 0 Total: 2661 17099 54987 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Observation start time: 07:00:00 Observation end time: 16:30:00 Total observation time: 9.5 hours Official Counter: Tom Bolohan Observers: Dave Brown, Ernie Gribble, Ken Wootton, Mac McAlpine, Mark Cunningham, Matt Oswald, Ronnie Goodhand, Tom Stewart Visitors: Quite a few visitors today and too many to list out. Thanks to the usual crew Tom B, Matt, Tom S, Ronnie, Ernie, Mark and Ken... and to Brett F and Barb for helping with a lot of IDs. Weather: Not quite the weather that was forecast today with much heavier cloud cover but the winds were as predicted moderate from the NW and N for the entire day. With all of the cloud cover spotting the birds was easier and I think helped keep the birds a bit lower for better viewing. Temp got to a high of 12C today and the pressure was rising fairly rapidly for the day. Raptor Observations: Very similar flight today as compared to the good flight we had last weekend with today's tally being 2,661 birds. The bulk of the flight was TVs (1,580) but some good numbers of Redtails (533) and Sharpies (330). There were Rough-legged Hawks (3) today all light morph birds, and a decent number of Red-shoulders (92) and a pretty late in the season Broadwing. Highlights today were the Golden Eagles (9) with 4 coming through quite low in the last full hour of the day as we enjoyed a bit of a down-flight. We also had a very dark Redtail that came through and was well photographed and may have been a Harlan's... we'll have to see what a review of the photos gives us on the ID. Non-raptor Observations: There were a TON of non-raptors on the move past the hawk watch today with black birds numbering in the 1000s and lots of flocks of other species as well including...a flock of Eastern Bluebirds that totaled at least 35 or more, a good sized flock of Long-tailed Ducks, another flock of about a dozen White-winged Scoter and a smaller flock of Red-breasted Mergansers. I've submitted an eBird checklist that you can have a look at for all of the species seen today. https://ebird.org/checklist/S153291104 Predictions: Looks like a pretty wet Sunday tomorrow with rain forecast all day BUT if the rain clears out very early Monday in the am then the forecast for NW winds Monday could bring another good flight past Hawk Cliff. ======================================================================== Report submitted by Dave Brown (ez.raptor1210@gmail.com) Hawk Cliff Hawkwatch information may be found at: http://www.ezlink.ca/~thebrowns/HawkCliff/index.htm More site information at hawkcount.org: https://hawkcount.org/siteinfo.php?rsite=392