Detroit River Hawk Watch Brownstown, Michigan, USA Daily Raptor Counts: Sep 14, 2021 ------------------------------------------------------------------- Species Day's Count Month Total Season Total ------------------ ----------- -------------- -------------- Black Vulture 0 0 0 Turkey Vulture 0 0 0 Osprey 0 10 10 Bald Eagle 0 3 3 Northern Harrier 0 24 24 Sharp-shinned Hawk 2 41 41 Cooper's Hawk 0 1 1 Northern Goshawk 0 0 0 Red-shouldered Hawk 0 0 0 Broad-winged Hawk 0 227 227 Swainson's Hawk 0 0 0 Red-tailed Hawk 0 11 11 Rough-legged Hawk 0 0 0 Golden Eagle 0 0 0 American Kestrel 9 59 59 Merlin 1 1 1 Peregrine Falcon 2 7 7 Unknown Accipiter 0 0 0 Unknown Buteo 0 1 1 Unknown Falcon 0 0 0 Unknown Eagle 0 0 0 Unknown Raptor 0 0 0 Total: 14 385 385 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Observation start time: 08:00:00 Observation end time: 14:30:00 Total observation time: 6.5 hours Official Counter: Kevin Georg Observers: Andrew Sturgess, Mark Hainen Visitors: We are still dealing with the residue of the Covid 19 situation. The workers at the site will be in an enclosed area that is designed for four people only. We still love to interact and share our love of hawk watching with visitors. Feel free to ask questions and look over our shoulders to help you follow the birds. Watch the weather for favorable forecasts as the birds are predictable to some degree based on weather situations. One other thing of note this year; the boat-launch bathroom building has been shut down for the foreseeable future due to plumbing issues. There are Porta-Johns in the parking lot should you require them. Weather: It will officially be Fall on September 22nd this year. Bring it on.... Please! We seem to have an interminable long, hot summer going on at the watch. High temps near ninety degrees today with a strong southerly wind exerting itself over our shoulders pushing most birds to the north of us. Falling barometric pressures accompanied the frenzied buildup to another set of afternoon severe thunderstorm warnings. Skies darkened to the west of us and took on a more ominous look. The turbulent hot and humid atmosphere seemed like it was cooking up some more mayhem to serve the region. Surprisingly, we saw a lot of blue in the sky early today instead of the mostly cloudy scene that was predicted, the clouds did finally arrive, although in a scattered, disordered fashion befitting the amount of energy the wind was expending. Raptor Observations: Well, the falcons pulled their weight today which is more than we can say for the rest of the species. We did achieve the falcon hat trick with all three regularly seen species showing up. The kestrels led the way with nine counted. A single merlin gave us a fairly close look, fairly close being a relative term this year. Two peregrines were noted in the final hour. Only two sharp-shinned hawks fluttered their way past. The local bald eagles and ospreys were busy today and our local red-tailed hawk, still licking his wounds from yesterday’s eagle encounter, was seen for a moment. The final incident of interest today was something that happened by the stacks. An osprey was seen carrying a fish and it appeared to have a pair of birds chasing after it, not an uncommon occurrence. When seen through the camera, however, it appeared to be a peregrine harassing a local Cooper’s hawk and that may have been merely coincidental to the osprey passing nearby. Non-raptor Observations: We observed some lesser yellowlegs flying over today, only three total though. The winds seemed to push even the local gulls and swallows further away today. That tends to make the dark gulls look even more like raptors. More warblers were reported on the trails. Twenty-two hummingbirds were seen buzzing by today. The monarchs had another low count but we expected that with the winds blowing a gagger; only eleven were counted. Predictions: Tomorrow’s forecast shows some elements of a good day. The barometer is rebounding off its lows of today at a good angle. The winds have some northern elements, but not the preferred NE. Cloud cover is predicted to be about sixty to seventy percent as the disturbances of today clear out. Hope springs eternal, and it is with hope, though not total conviction, that I say it has to be better than today. ======================================================================== Report submitted by Andrew Sturgess (ajyes72@gmail.com) Detroit River Hawk Watch information may be found at: http://www.detroitriverhawkwatch.org More site information at hawkcount.org: https://hawkcount.org/siteinfo.php?rsite=285 Count data submitted via Dunkadoo - Project info at: https://dunkadoo.org/explore/detroit-river-international-wildlife-refuge/detroit-river-hawk-watch-fall-2021