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| Bay breasted Warbler, Skinner SP, Hadley, MA, May 16, 2019 |
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| Tennessee Warbler, Quabbin Park, MA, May 9, 2019 |
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| Cape May Warbler, UMASS, Amherst, MA, May 15, 2019 |
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| Blackpoll Warbler, rail trail, Amherst, MA, May 8, 2019 |
With the end of May comes the end of warbler migration for the most part (there are still some birds moving north but the big numbers are gone). It was a very active month with a total of 29 species of warbler in Hampshire County for me (I'll cover all those in a later post). The most noteworthy part of the warbler migration this year was an absolutely amazing influx of a number of northern breeding species (that feed extensively on spruce budworms) including Bay breasted Warbler, Tennessee Warbler, Cape May Warbler and Blackpoll Warbler. The numbers were not totally unexpected as these above mentioned species have had great breeding success the last couple years but this year was truly spectacular. The most impressive species for me was the large numbers of Bay breasted Warblers. There are some years it is tough to find the species around here with just a handful seen with lots of looking. This year I had them in multiple numbers on many days including days when I had double digit counts of the species at a single location! To illustrate just how impressive the numbers of Bay breasted Warblers (and the other species mentioned above) were I have looked at the last several springs and added up my total sightings for each species during spring in Hampshire County.
Bay breasted Warbler Tennessee Warbler Cape May Warbler Blackpoll Warbler
2019 106 80 56 107
2018 11 53 22 36
2017 3 5 3 31
2016 4 17 1 23
2015 3 8 1 29
2014 7 16 3 33
It will be interesting to see if the high numbers of the species continue this fall.
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| Mourning Warbler, Quabbin Park, MA, May 23, 2019 |
The end of the month also brought in another decent count of Mourning Warbler with a total of 13 seen so far. I continue to record all the singing Mourning Warblers I can to assist a researcher from New Hampshire who is studying the four different ‘regiolects’ of the species (Western, Eastern, Nova Scotia and Newfoundland). Individuals from each area sing a distinct song that sets them apart from those of other areas. I have managed to record songs of three of the four regiolects (I have not yet had a western one around here). I have included an eBird list with an example of the three different regiolects I was able to record this spring.
Eastern regiolect
Nova Scotia regiolect
Newfoundland regiolect
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| Bay breasted Warbler, Home, Belchertown, MA, May 22, 2019 |
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| Blackpoll Warbler, Home, Belchertown, MA, May 24, 2019 |
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| Bay breasted Warbler, Home, Belchertown, MA, May 24, 2019 |
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| Bay breasted Warblers, Home, Belchertown, MA, May 24, 2019 |
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| Blackpoll Warbler, Home, Belchertown, MA, May 25, 2019 |
The yard was also productive for warblers with 23 species for the month including amazing numbers of Bay breasted and Blackpoll Warblers including several that were captured by the motion camera at the water feature.
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