Despite the conditions looking good for late season migration the last two nights and the Birdcast forecast saying the same, the birds apparently had other ideas and neither night resulted in much movement. I have been spending quite a bit of time lately trying to track down a Hooded Warbler in Hampshire County for the year but have come up empty so far (I have not had the species at all anywhere for the year before today). The species is at the northern limit of its range in the area but most years at least one shows up (and usually a few). After a rather wet and mosquito filled walk along Mitch's Way I decided to take advantage of some extra time in the morning I decided to leave the county and make the drive down to Westfield to check on the small breeding population of Hooded Warblers that have been present for several years. I got there a bit before seven and started walking up the hill. After a bit of listening and looking I heard a Hooded Warbler singing distantly. Eventually the bird came in a bit closer and I was able to get some good looks, a few recordings and some identifiable photos (despite the overcast and gloomy conditions). I walked a bit more to see if I could find more but didn't have any luck and I wanted to get back home before the showers and thunderstorms rolled in. Although I didn't find any more Hooded Warblers I did have a Black throated Blue Warbler trying its best to make me think it was a Cerulean Warbler. This is a fairly common problem with Black throated Blue Warblers in the area of central New England and one that is not warned about in field guides. David Sibley wrote a great article explaining it much better than I can and the article can be found at the following link. I still have hopes a Hooded Warbler will show up in the county sometime in the near future.
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