Detroit River Hawk Watch Brownstown, Michigan, USA Daily Raptor Counts: Sep 09, 2024 ------------------------------------------------------------------- Species Day's Count Month Total Season Total ------------------ ----------- -------------- -------------- Black Vulture 0 0 0 Turkey Vulture 0 6 6 Osprey 0 0 0 Bald Eagle 0 1 1 Northern Harrier 2 12 12 Sharp-shinned Hawk 20 66 66 Cooper's Hawk 0 4 4 American Goshawk 0 0 0 Red-shouldered Hawk 0 0 0 Broad-winged Hawk 1 239 239 Swainson's Hawk 0 0 0 Red-tailed Hawk 0 18 18 Rough-legged Hawk 0 0 0 Golden Eagle 0 0 0 American Kestrel 4 22 22 Merlin 0 2 2 Peregrine Falcon 0 1 1 Unknown Accipiter 0 2 2 Unknown Buteo 0 3 3 Unknown Falcon 0 0 0 Unknown Eagle 0 0 0 Unknown Raptor 0 1 1 Total: 27 377 377 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Observation start time: 08:00:00 Observation end time: 15:00:00 Total observation time: 7 hours Official Counter: Michael Patrikeev Observers: Andrew Sturgess, Erika Van Kirk Visitors: We welcome visitors to our site by the boat launch in Lake Erie MetroPark. We are willing to spread the gospel with pamphlets and information cards, along with tips on IDing the raptors, and photography tips for those behind the cameras. Let us share our enthusiasm for this miracle of nature with you. Weather: Normally, after the first NFL game of the year I would write about the Lions being mathematically eliminated, it wasn’t true in a mathematical sense, but come on, we all knew that it was over. Now confusion reigns in the Detroit area as we actually seem to have a good team. It was a slow process to rebuild since 1957, but it finally paid off. We had a slow process this afternoon as the promising morning flight of sharpies dried up completely. The wind was raging again today. Staying mostly west, with forays slightly south of that, it gained ten mph during the watch to fifteen mph, with gusts exceeding that. The temperature climbed to seventy-eight, with real-feels a couple of degrees hotter. While the winds and temps climbed, the barometer dropped rather sharply on the graph, but actually only a tenth of an inch. Whether the climbing winds or falling barometer affected the birds more is subject to debate, but for whatever reason, the birds disappeared. Raptor Observations: It looked like the annual flight of the sharpies had begun in earnest this morning. By early afternoon, we had twenty of them. Not that impressive, but we are very hungry for birds at our site. A pair of harriers and the same number of kestrels, and a lone broadwing completed the count. Hopefully it was a scout for the thousands to come. The local eagles were aloft today long enough to earn platinum status in their frequent flyer program. A few local TV’s wafted around and the local red-tail joined in occasionally. Non-raptor Observations: A lot of the gulls that normally are up in kettles hawking insects were absent today. Instead, it was the mixed swallows that were interfering with our sight lines, when there were birds to be seen. A single sandhill crane was observed in the distant sky. A visitor from out of state wanted to see the American white pelicans but chose to walk the trail rather than pay his dues at the site. Sure enough, two of them showed up, (an unusually low number) during his absence. When will they learn? With the high winds it was a pretty slow day, although the kingfisher was seen once, as was a cedar waxwing. Five mute swans were out by the jetty, their usual hangout. Predictions: Tomorrow has a couple of elements that look good, mostly before the watch starts though. Light northeast winds and a rising barometer will start the day, but the wind will swing to south southeast as the watch proceeds. They will be light winds though, not the hard pushing winds we have had recently. With a top predicted speed of five mph the sharpies should be able to manage a crossing, hopefully in our neighborhood. This looks much better than we have had up till now, although still not perfect. Temperatures will drop a few degrees from today before rising in the next two days to the eighty-degree mark. A little higher speed for the early northeast winds and longer duration in that direction would be a very good deal. ======================================================================== 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