Holiday Beach Hawk Watch Amherstburg, Ontario, Canada Daily Raptor Counts: Sep 25, 2026 ------------------------------------------------------------------- Species Day's Count Month Total Season Total ------------------ ----------- -------------- -------------- Turkey Vulture 378 2111 2111 Osprey 0 25 25 Bald Eagle 13 187 187 Northern Harrier 15 494 494 Sharp-shinned Hawk 273 4284 4284 Cooper's Hawk 7 81 81 American Goshawk 0 0 0 Red-shouldered Hawk 0 0 0 Broad-winged Hawk 63 106875 106875 Red-tailed Hawk 18 342 342 Rough-legged Hawk 0 0 0 Golden Eagle 0 0 0 American Kestrel 30 1118 1119 Merlin 0 94 96 Peregrine Falcon 1 24 24 Unknown Accipitrine 1 1 1 Unknown Buteo 0 2 2 Unknown Eagle 0 0 0 Unknown Falcon 1 2 2 Unknown Raptor 0 20 20 Swainson's Hawk 0 1 1 Total: 800 115661 115664 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Observation start time: 07:00:00 Observation end time: 15:00:00 Total observation time: 8 hours Official Counter: Michael Burton-Smith Observers: Andrew Fix, Juliette Herdman, Kitty Bradshaw, Matt Brannagan, Mike Jaber, Noel Herdman, Robin Smallwood Visitors: Thanks to Matt, Mike, Noel, Juliette, Kitty, Robin and Andy for helping conduct today's count. We are especially grateful to Kitty, who leaves us now after volunteering her keen eyes and clicker fingers over the last two weeks and really helping us keep on top of the Sharp-shinned Hawks! Thanks to our many other visitors who came up through the day, it was lovely to have so many people enjoying the pelicans and the jays with us. Weather: Around 50% cloud cover throughout the day, with moderate northerlies dying in the mid-afternoon. A bit frigid initially, warming to the early twenties as the wind eased. Raptor Observations: The day went more or less as scripted, with an increase in Sharp-shinned Hawks and American Kestrel on the previous day, and another reasonable passage of Turkey Vultures in the mid-afternoon. It was also nice to see a couple of small kettles of Broad-winged Hawks again; these should dry up completely within the next few days. The two thousand Turkey Vultures we have had so far is higher than we usually expect at this stage in the season, either indicating a slightly earlier migration or that we are in for another record year for this species. Non-raptor Observations: The day's checklist can be viewed at https://ebird.org/checklist/S396201231. We had high counts for the season so far for three daytime-migrating passerines, with 675 American Goldfinch, 10 American Pipit, and 21,300 Blue Jay. There were also reasonable numbers of Cedar Waxwing (210) and Red-winged Blackbird (176). The American White Pelicans continue to show well on the marsh, with 360 present today. The morning is the best time to see the birds feeding among the lilies, but it is in the early afternoon that we have been getting the amazing spectacle of pelicans riding the thermals above us. The 38,397 Blue Jays recorded since they started migrating on the twentieth is substantially lower than we have had by the same stage over the past few years, tracking at a similar pace to the 2023 season where 250,000 birds were recorded - a far cry from the one million counted in the fall of 2020! Predictions: Tomorrow is forecast to be relatively similar conditions, so we can expect to see more Blue Jays as well as smaller shifts in Sharp-shinned Hawks in the morning. It will be interesting to see at what point the Turkey Vulture migration really ramps up, with conditions set to be perfect for them over the next three days. ======================================================================== Report submitted by Michael Burton-Smith () Holiday Beach Hawk Watch information may be found at: http://hbmo.ca/ More site information at hawkcount.org: https://hawkcount.org/siteinfo.php?rsite=100