Below are the results of our weekly shorebird/gull survey conducted at
Chincoteague National Wildlife Refuge on Sunday May 24, 2015. All water areas
(impoundments and beach areas) were covered in a 9.5 hour survey. All
individuals are counted for the target species; other birds seen or heard on
the survey are followed by a dash. It was another wonderful spring migration
shorebird survey at the Refuge. The Refuge's impoundments continue to provide
excellent habitat for all shorebirds from those needing shallow water or
mudflats to those needing deeper water depths.
We counted 18,272 individual shorebirds which is a notch down from last week's
28,161. We saw 19 species of shorebirds which is also lower than last week. It
appears that we are on the downward slope of shorebird migration. However, we
still see many (hundreds or thousands?) of shorebirds using portions of the
impoundments that are so far from our route that we can't even determine if
they are peeps or larger species such as Yellowlegs, Willets or Dowitchers. How
many birds are actually using the Refuge? We may never know exactly but it
certainly more than we see on our survey which follows a very strict route and
protocol so the data is comparable to past surveys.
We also noticed that some species which were dominant in the past few weeks are
now at much lower numbers such as Dunlin (last week: 9,694 and this week:
2,889) and others that have not moved on since last week such as Semi-palmated
Sandpiper (8,000 this week and 9,314 last week). This seems to reflect the
well known peaks in bird migration with some species peaking earlier than
others.
If you and/or the Refuge visitors are looking to see shorebirds, we continue
to recommend the Wildlife Loop with Pond B-South having over 9,000 individual
shorebirds to be studied and admired.
For us, the best bird of the survey was not even a shorebird. We saw a Sooty
Shearwater not far from the shoreline of Wild Beach about half-way between the
parking lots and the MD State Line. Though this is a fairly common pelagic
seabird worldwide, it usually requires a boat trip far offshore. However, even
more exciting is that the bird knows how to read, since it showed up in
Chincoteague just when "Birds of Virginia" says it should: " Small numbers are
seen from shore, particularly during strong easterly winds in late spring."
(Wind was from the east the day before the survey).Clyde Morris & Joelle Buffa
| Canada Goose | -- |
| American Black Duck | -- |
| Mallard | -- |
| Black Scoter | -- |
| Red-breasted Merganser | -- |
| Wild Turkey | -- |
| Common Loon | 5 |
| Sooty Shearwater | 1 |
| Double-crested Cormorant | 183 |
| Brown Pelican | 24 |
| Great Blue Heron | -- |
| Great Egret | -- |
| Snowy Egret | -- |
| Little Blue Heron | -- |
| Tricolored Heron | -- |
| Cattle Egret | -- |
| Green Heron | -- |
| White Ibis | -- |
| Glossy Ibis | -- |
| Black Vulture | -- |
| Turkey Vulture | -- |
| Osprey | -- |
| Northern Harrier | -- |
| Bald Eagle | -- |
| American Oystercatcher | 39 |
| Black-bellied Plover | 242 |
| Semipalmated Plover | 1,432 |
| Piping Plover | 31 |
| Killdeer | 10 |
| Spotted Sandpiper | 1 |
| Greater Yellowlegs | 132 |
| Willet | 52 |
| Lesser Yellowlegs | 10 |
| Greater/Lesser Yellowlegs | 2 |
| Whimbrel | 43 |
| Marbled Godwit | 1 |
| Ruddy Turnstone | 271 |
| Red Knot | 16 |
| Sanderling | 2,309 |
| Dunlin | 2,889 |
| Least Sandpiper | 19 |
| White-rumped Sandpiper | 1 |
| Semipalmated Sandpiper | 8,000 |
| peep sp. | 2,060 |
| Short-/Long-billed Dowitcher | 751 |
| Laughing Gull | 155 |
| Ring-billed Gull | 8 |
| Herring Gull | 311 |
| Lesser Black-backed Gull | 88 |
| Great Black-backed Gull | 118 |
| Least Tern | 78 |
| Common Tern | 18 |
| Forster's Tern | 46 |
| Royal Tern | 1 |
| Black Skimmer | 81 |
| Mourning Dove | -- |
| Yellow-billed Cuckoo | -- |
| Chuck-will's-widow | -- |
| Northern Flicker | -- |
| Merlin | -- |
| Eastern Wood-Pewee | -- |
| Great Crested Flycatcher | -- |
| Eastern Kingbird | -- |
| American Crow | -- |
| Fish Crow | -- |
| crow sp. | -- |
| Purple Martin | -- |
| Tree Swallow | -- |
| Barn Swallow | -- |
| Tufted Titmouse | -- |
| Brown-headed Nuthatch | -- |
| House Wren | -- |
| Carolina Wren | -- |
| American Robin | -- |
| Gray Catbird | -- |
| Northern Mockingbird | -- |
| European Starling | -- |
| Cedar Waxwing | -- |
| Black-and-white Warbler | -- |
| Common Yellowthroat | -- |
| Yellow Warbler | -- |
| Pine Warbler | -- |
| Yellow-throated Warbler | -- |
| Prairie Warbler | -- |
| Yellow-breasted Chat | -- |
| Eastern Towhee | -- |
| Chipping Sparrow | -- |
| Field Sparrow | -- |
| Song Sparrow | -- |
| Northern Cardinal | -- |
| Blue Grosbeak | -- |
| Indigo Bunting | -- |
| Red-winged Blackbird | -- |
| Eastern Meadowlark | -- |
| Common Grackle | -- |
| Boat-tailed Grackle | -- |
| Brown-headed Cowbird | -- |
| Orchard Oriole | -- |
| Baltimore Oriole | |
| House Sparrow | -- |
