Rockfish Gap Hawk Watch
Waynesboro, Virginia, USA
Daily Raptor Counts: Oct 23, 2018
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Species Day's Count Month Total Season Total
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Black Vulture 0 0 0
Turkey Vulture 0 0 0
Osprey 0 21 222
Bald Eagle 0 71 253
Northern Harrier 1 19 50
Sharp-shinned Hawk 62 1277 1864
Cooper's Hawk 5 232 350
Northern Goshawk 0 4 5
Red-shouldered Hawk 0 13 28
Broad-winged Hawk 0 1029 23586
Red-tailed Hawk 15 213 269
Rough-legged Hawk 0 0 0
Golden Eagle 1 7 13
American Kestrel 4 105 266
Merlin 2 22 73
Peregrine Falcon 0 15 52
Unknown Accipiter 0 11 16
Unknown Buteo 0 1 4
Unknown Falcon 0 1 7
Unknown Eagle 0 0 1
Unknown Raptor 0 16 34
Mississippi Kite 0 1 10
Total: 90 3058 27103
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Observation start time: 08:15:00
Observation end time: 14:00:00
Total observation time: 5.75 hours
Official Counter: Brenda Tekin
Observers:
Visitors:
We say "Farewell" to Joe Minor. He and his wife are heading out tomorrow
to make their trek northward back home to Hamilton, Ontario. Safe journey,
Joe, and hope you can make it back and thanks again for your help and
being quick with the camera to capture that late MIKI last week!
Weather:
A lovely and pleasant day once it warmed up a bit. Steady west wind
20-25km/h throughout the day. Bright blue cloudless sky except for the
rare sighting of a stray high wisp suggesting a cloud that quickly
evaporated once it reached high over the gap. Temp: 10.6c>15.8c; Humidity:
46%>52<47%; Bar.Pressure: 27.96<27.88. Visibility clear for miles!
Raptor Observations:
Surprising trickle of birds for most of the day until the last hour.
Sharp-shinns continue to move through, with mostly groups of twos at a
time, sometimes three and four. An adult Golden Eagle came in fairly close
then steered westward. Counter's first adult male Northern Harrier came in
close enough for decent views at 12:16EST; Merlin #2 of the day first
spotted by Joe Minor when it flew up on the east side of the parking lot
coming straight toward us for close in your face looks before it quickly
moved a bit northward across the gap, back across, zip, zip, zip in typical
Merlin fashion. Images seem to show it was feeding on the fly as it
continued southward.
Non-raptor Observations:
Pretty slow with not much in the sky except for some Ravens, vultures, a
couple of unidentifiable little silhouettes and 9 Monarch Butterflies.
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Report submitted by Brenda Tekin (brenda@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx)
Rockfish Gap Hawk Watch information may be found at:
http://www.rockfishgaphawkwatch.org
More site information at hawkcount.org:
http://hawkcount.org/siteinfo.php?rsite=491
