Chirps and Cheeps

Fall migration has started and I've been running out to bird here and there - pretty much whenever my work load will allow.  I've been keeping my eyes open for migrants plus any birds I may have missed this year during spring migration.

One very cool bird I found this week was right in my own backyard - a Yellow-bellied Flycatcher. This is definitely a first for our yard and I was excited to see it AND get a couple of decent photos of it.

A little further east, near the Batavia Wastewater Treatment Plant, a young, curious Red-tailed Hawk peeked in over my sunroof on my car as I was looking over a farm field. That was a real surprise! He even let me grab a few awkward photos of him.

After the treatment plant, I drove around the Geneseo area looking for migrants. I did find a few shorebirds, but the only interesting ones were a couple of Solitary Sandpipers mixed in with some Killdeer and yellowlegs.

A trip out to Montezuma brought a year bird - two Hudsonian Godwits way out in the Knox Marcellus marsh. A poor digiscoped photo is included.

Around the yard, after the Yellow-bellied Flycatcher, I found our first migrating warbler, a beautiful male Magnolia.  We are still seeing Ruby-throated Hummingbirds - but only the females and the young ones now. The males have all left to return to their wintering places in the tropics. I haven't seen a Baltimore Oriole at our feeders for a couple of weeks now and I just brought in the grape jelly feeder for cleaning.