2014 New England Fall Migration

Fall Migration: New England (15 August - 31 October)

See the Winter 2014 map for further data on these birds.

Move the rectangular slider at the bottom of the interactive map to animate the birds' movements.

Scroll down for updated commentary on each bird's movements.

The players (in order of migration start):

Snowy (green) Martha's Vineyard, MA, adult female-17 Aug.

Edwin (light orange) Fishers Island, NY, adult male-18 Aug.

Tilton (white) Tilton, NH, juvenile male-19 Aug.

Bergen () Bridgewater, NH, juvenile male-20 Aug.

Bridget (orange) Ashland, NH, juvenile female-20 Aug.

Flow (yellow) Essex, MA, juvenile male-20 Aug.

Uncas (gray), Connecticut River male-30 Aug.

Blackie (teal), NE Mass young male-4 Sep.

Gerry (hot pink), Connecticut River male-11 Sep.

Clyde (blue), Long Island juvenile male-12 Sep.

Charlie (red), Fishers Island male-12 Sep.

Donovan (pale green) NH adult male-18 Sep.

Belle (burgundy), Martha's Vineyard female(?)-19 Sep

North Fork Bob (brown), Long Island adult male-19 Sep

Roger Tory (light blue), Connecticut River adult male-22 Sep.

DJ (pale green), Martha's Vineyard adult male-2 Oct.

Notes: I think I've got the colors right now, although they may show up differently on different computers.

Hover the cursor over a dot to see which bird is which. Click on it for location details

You can zoom in and out and move the map around. If you slide a birds marker along its path, you'll see where the other birds were when your bird was wherever you have the marker. You can also use the calendar to see where all the birds were on a given date.

Go to Individual Bios

Udates:

15 November

Blackie appears to be another victim of a traffic accident. He finally moved south from his holdout on the Raritan River to another stretch of the river. Sadly, his last transmissions were on 5 October and the GPS fixes were right next to a busy 4-lane highway. We don't know that he got hit by a car, but it's a good bet. Major bummer.

Flow started his migration in baby steps--mostly fits, starts, and retreats (which seems to be a theme this year). After a short stay on St. Jerome Creek on the western shore of Chesapeake Bay, just south of Patuxent, MD, he moved south about 70 miles (114 km) but then turned around around went straight back to St. Jerome Creek! He's now on the move. He made a very "pro" move across the Georgia Bight, leaving North Carolina and making landfall in northern Florida--just like lots of adults do. Compare his path (yellow) to Bridget (orange) and Clyde (blue) to see the difference between adult and juvenile tracks. He's in Cuba now, apparently settled down for the winter. He may move again--juveniles often do, but by the second half of November, I'd be really surprised to see Flow make a big move southeast to Hispaniola or, even more of a stretch, on to South America.

Donovan (adult male from NH) made it to Haiti on 1 Oct. He worked his way east across the Dominican Republic. Once again, he missed the turn to the south that almost all adults make around the Haiti-D.R. border. This gets them to Cabo Beata--the starting point for the shortest route across the Caribbean. Last year Donovan went all the way to the Virgin Islands before heading south. This year he skipped the extra trip to the VIs and is now in Venezuela, back on his wintering area. His trip, roost-to-roost, was 3.058 miles (4,922 km), accomplished in 21 migration and 4 stopover days. A better measure of the distance traveled (connecting hourly GPS fixes) was 3,325 miles (5.351 km).

Bridget (juvenile female from central NH) is another bird with a bit of a problem figuring out which way south is. She got to Florida after a spin out over the Atlantic and the Bahamas. When she got to Florida's east coast, she flew 60 miles (100 km) north to Vero Beach, where she's been since the 26th of September. She was photographed not long ago by Libby Corbin, a New Hampshire photographer, who happened to be in the area. It's really beginning to look like this may be her wintering spot, but I'm not ready to close out the books on her fall migration. I've had a young spend over a month in Florida, apparently settled down for the long haul, kick back into migration mode and migrate all the way to the Amazon! But he did that in late October.

If this indeed is Bridget's whole migration, her roost-to-roost distance traveled was an economical 1,511 miles (2,432 km). Her full track, including all GPS locations, measured 1.596 miles (2,568 km). She settled down 38 days after leaving her nest area, but 26 of those days were an extended layover in southern Connecticut, so the actual days migrating were only 12.

DJ (adult male from Martha's Vineyard) finally left his territory on Martha's Vineyard on October 2nd. On the 5th, he passed right over the Cape May hawk watch platform, but was heading north! He had started out over the water, heading for Cape Henlopen, DE, but changed his mind and retreated back to terra firme, passing over the platform in the process. After confusing the hawk watchers, he spent two days there, and then got back on track. Our last signals were from central Florida on 17 October. Last year he was already on his wintering area in northern Venezuela by October 5th, but he was in Florida on 19 September, so he's really not late yet, compared to last year.

Belle (tagged as a juvenile on Martha's Vineyard in 2010) has completed her 4th trip south--a record for our juveniles. She made her obligatory stop at Lake Azuei in Haiti, where she always stops heading north and sometimes visits on her way south. She's now safely back at her winter home on the Rio Madeira. Amazingly, as she passed through the Venezuelan llanos, she was very close (some 10s of miles) to North Fork Bob, our other bird tagged in 2010 that's still on the air. Her four trips show us a lot about how juveniles learn the adult migration path. Belle's radio sputtered a bit, failing to update a couple of times earlier in the fall. This is not unexpected after 4 years on the job. It's what happened to Sr. Bones' transmitter last fall. His radio went silent last fall, but he showed up at his nest this spring--still wearing his radio.

Snowy has settled down in the llanos of northern Venezuela as she did on her first trip south back in 2011. After wandering a bit, she found exactly the same spot where she spent 18 months in 2011-2012 in La Guarandinga. She hadn't been there since spring of 2012.

North Fork Bob (an adult male tagged on Long Island in 2010) is on his record-setting 5th trip south with one of our transmitters. After a few days in the D.R. at Lago Enriquillo--the sister lake to Azuei, where Belle always stops (Uncas was there as well) he crossed the Caribbean and is now in northern Venezuela--very close to Belle! He's missed a couple of radio check-ins, which is not unexpected with a 4-yr old radio. Sr. Bones' radio did the same thing last year, and then went silent permanently. Belle's radio skipped a couple of uploads as well, but both Bob and Belle are back on the air. Bob is now making his way up into the highlands of the Guianan Shield in southern Venezuela after a brief stay in the llanos, just like in previous years.

Clyde (this year's juvenile tagged on Long Island's North Fork) is hanging out near the mouth of Lake Maracaibo in western Venezuela. It's still way too early to call this his winter spot. Juveniles will usually make some exploratory moves through the first few months after they arrive in S.A.

Uncas (adult male from the Connecticut River) had been hanging out around Lake Enriquillo in the southwestern Dominican Republic since the 23rd. This made me nervous as we had a young bird shot here a few years back. On the 4th he went down to Cabo Beata, the launching pad for adult Ospreys en route to S.A. But he changed his mind for some reason and retreated to Enriquillo. We haven't heard from his since October 6th, which doesn't mean much with cell-tower birds.

Roger Tory (adult male from the Connecticut River) left Connecticut on September 22nd, and then went off the air after checking in near Lake Okeechobee in southern Florida on the 4th of October. We didn't hear from him until the 13th, when he reported in from western Haiti. No word since then. He's a first timer with a transmitter, so we don't know where he's going.

Gerry (adult male from the Connecticut River) has been off the radar screens (i.e. out of reach of cell towers) since September 20th, 10 days into his first migration with a transmitter. His last signal was southwest of Lake Okeechobee, FL. This is pretty typical of cell-tower birds. Because this is his first year with a transmitter, we have no idea where he's going, and he may not appear again until spring. Most of our cell tower birds do check in again somewhere along the route or even where they settle down for the winter--there are more and more cell towers spread across South America--so it's a little worrisome that we haven't heard from him. Nothing to do at this point but hope he shows up in the spring.

Charlie (newly tagged adult male from Fishers Island, NY) seems to have found his winter home in northern Colombia. His trip, beginning on the 12th of September, was 19 days of migration and 5 of stopovers. His roost-to-roost distance covered was 2,816 miles (4,531 km). The full trip (all GPS locations) covered 3,551 miles (5,715 km).

Edwin (adult male tagged in 2013 on Fishers Island, NY) is probably at his wintering spot on the Amazon by now. He got an early start (18 August) and made an unexceptional trip to South America. He was last heard from on 1 September, just east of Lake Maracaibo. We don't expect to hear from him until next spring. This is very similar to what he did last year. His wintering area is on the Amazon River, west of Manaus, and not near any cell tower.

...............

Updates from here on are in chronological order.

3 September:

Donovan, our adult male from central New Hampshire, got started on on the 18th--just a day after he started last year. His son Tilton, who left home way back on Aug 19th, is stalled in Cape May, where he's been for more than 3 weeks. Donovan flew through Tilton's airspace as he passed over Cape May on the 19th. He's now in Georgia moving down the coast.

Our other NH youngster, Bridget, like her neighbor Tilton, got an early start to her migration on the 20th of August, but then put migration on hold for almost a month while she fished the Housatonic River in southern Connecticut. The big cold front that moved in on the 18th got Bridget (and a bunch of other birds) moving. On the 21st she left North Carolina's Outer Banks behind and headed out over the Georgia Bight. She got to Grand Abraco Island in the Bahamas the next morning.

Blackie, one of our northeastern Massachusetts youngsters, started migrating on Sep 4th, but has been stalled in northern New Jersey, just west of Edison, ever since. Flow, from the Cape Ann region, is also doing his migration on the installment plan. He passed through Cape May and then moved up to southern Pennsylvania. He then started south again, getting to the Rappahannock River, where he turned around and went north a bit up the western shore of Chesapeake Bay. He's settled down for a spell again.

Down on the Vineyard, Snowy, who we've decided is probably a female after another very early start to her migration, got to the spot in Cuba where she spent last winter and settled down. I was sure she'd be there for another winter. Wrong again. She left that spot and went back to Venezuela, where she spent her first 18 months overseas back in 2011-12.

Belle, once again started migration late in September (the 19th), making us think that maybe we should be calling this bird "Billy" instead of "Belle"! He/she is going inland this year. On the 21st, she was in Virginia west of DC. Three days later, she was on the South Carolina coast.

Over on Long Island, Clyde, a young male tagged in August on the North Fork, had a pretty wild ride across lots of open water over the Atlantic and is our first young to make it to South America. He got to Colombia 9 days after leaving home.

North Fork Bob, now quite a celebrity in eastern Long Island, started his record-breaking (for us) 5th migration south with one of our transmitters. He's always been a late starter, and this year was no exception. He left on the 19th, 4 days earlier than last year, if memory serves. Five days later, he was in North Carolina just south of Wilmington.

Across Long Island Sound at the mouth of the Connecticut River, Roger Tory finally got going on the 22nd of September. On the 23rd he was on the outskirts of Baltimore. His neighbors Gerry and Uncas headed south on Sep 10th and 3rd, respectively. Gerry was in southern Florida on the 20th and Uncas, after dodging cell-towers for a couple of weeks, just showed up in Haiti. It's the first year for these two birds, so we don't know where they're going.

Our Fishers Island birds are now both on the move. Edwin left on the 18th of August. He and Snowy had quite a race down the eastern U.S. (watch it on the Fall New England migration map). He got to South America on the 31st. We got a signal from him near Lake Maracaibo, and then he went dark--just like last year. He winters down on the Amazon in an area without cell-tower coverage.

Charlie left quite a bit later, on 12 Sep. He got to southern Florida on 18 Sep and then went off the air. So he's somewhere between the Keys and South America. This is his first migration with a transmitter, so we don't know where he's going. He may show up again soon, or we might only hear from him next spring. Based on last year's experience, there's a decent chance that he'll show up somewhere in northern South America. It's amazing how many cell towers there are scattered across the landscape down there.

...............

13-15 September:

A cold front has gotten a few birds moving. Clyde made a bit of a false start on 10 Sept, moving west to Long Island's south. He went back home to Southold, and then took off out over the Atlantic about 11AM on Sept. 12th. He got to the Virginia portion of the Delmarva Peninsula sometime before 10PM. This is our first juvenile to migrate from Long Island, and the route is similar to some of our Martha's Vineyard birds who leave the southern shore of Martha's Vineyard and head across the Atlantic all the way to the Bahamas. In Clyde's case, he was apparently close enough to shore to head for it to spend the night on land, rather than flying south through the night.

Charlie also took off on the 12th. This is the first time we're following him, so we don't know where he's going. He has a cell-tower transmitter, so we may lose contact with him as he gets south of Florida.

...............

25 September:

Quin down in the Chesapeake, who are both vying for the "Last one out turn out the lights award," all the birds have initiated their migration.

Donovan, our adult male from central New Hampshire, got started on on the 18th--just a day after he started last year. His son Tilton, who left home way back on Aug 19th, is stalled in Cape May, where he's been for more than 3 weeks. Donovan flew through Tilton's airspace as he passed over Cape May on the 19th. He's now in Georgia moving down the coast.

Our other NH youngster, Bridget, like her neighbor Tilton, got an early start to her migration on the 20th of August, but then put migration on hold for almost a month while she fished the Housatonic River in southern Connecticut. The big cold front that moved in on the 18th got Bridget (and a bunch of other birds) moving. On the 21st she left North Carolina's Outer Banks behind and headed out over the Georgia Bight. She got to Grand Abraco Island in the Bahamas the next morning.

Blackie, one of our northeastern Massachusetts youngsters, started migrating on Sep 4th, but has been stalled in northern New Jersey, just west of Edison, ever since. Flow, from the Cape Ann region, is also doing his migration on the installment plan. He passed through Cape May and then moved up to southern Pennsylvania. He then started south again, getting to the Rappahannock River, where he turned around and went north a bit up the western shore of Chesapeake Bay. He's settled down for a spell again.

Down on the Vineyard, Snowy, who we've decided is probably a female after another very early start to her migration, got to the spot in Cuba where she spent last winter and settled down. I was sure she'd be there for another winter. Wrong again. She left that spot and went back to Venezuela, where she spent her first 18 months overseas back in 2011-12.

Belle, once again started migration late in September (the 19th), making us think that maybe we should be calling this bird "Billy" instead of "Belle"! He/she is going inland this year. On the 21st, she was in Virginia west of DC. Three days later, she was on the South Carolina coast.

Over on Long Island, Clyde, a young male tagged in August on the North Fork, had a pretty wild ride across lots of open water over the Atlantic and is our first young to make it to South America. He got to Colombia 9 days after leaving home.

...............

3 October:

Blackie (a young male from the Merrimack River in NE Mass) has been on the Raritan River in northern NJ since 8 Sept.

Flow has settled down on St. Jerome Creek on the western shore of Chesapeake Bay, just south of Patuxent. He's been there since 14 Sept.

Tilton, a young male from Tilton, NH, died of unknown causes on the 26th. A couple of searches for the body were unsuccessful. The last signals were on a marsh on the Delaware Bay side of the Cape May Peninsula. It's a scavenger-rich environment--lots of gulls flying around and plenty of raccoon footprints in the marsh--so something probably carried the body away. We may find the transmitter if it somehow turns over and recharges the battery. This has happened a couple of times when a radio came back on the air after as long as 3 weeks of silence.

Donovan (adult male from NH) made it to Haiti on 1 Oct.

DJ (adult male from Martha's Vineyard) finally left his territory on Martha's Vineyard and is now on Long Island. Pretty sure he's broken the record for late departure in adults.

Belle (tagged as a juvenile on Martha's Vineyard in 2010) is on her 4th trip south. She was in Cuba just east of Carmarguey on the 29th and on Hispaniola on the 3rd.

Snowy seems to have settled down in the llanos of northern Venezuela as she did on her first trip south back in 2011. After wandering a bit, she found exactly the same spot where she spent 18 months in 2011-2012 in La Guarandinga. She hadn't been there since spring of 2012.

North Fork Bob (an adult male tagged on Long Island in 2010) is on his record-setting 5th trip south with one of our transmitters. He's just behind Belle in central Cuba.

Clyde (this year's juvenile tagged on Long Island's North Fork) is hanging out near the mouth of Lake Maracaibo in western Venezuela.

Uncas (adult male from the Connecticut River) has been hanging out at Lake Enriquillo in the southwestern Dominican Republic since the 23rd. This makes me nervous as we had a young bird shot here a few years back.

Roger Tory (adult male from the Connecticut River) was just west of my old hometown of Charlotte, NC, on the 1st.

Gerry (adult male from the Connecticut River) has off the radar screens (i.e. out of reach of cell towers) since the 20th. His last signal was southwest of Lake Okeechobee, FL. This is pretty typical of cell-tower birds. This is his first year with a transmitter, so we have no idea where he's going and he may not appear again until spring, but most of our cell tower birds do check in again somewhere along the route or even where they settle down for the winter. There are more and more cell towers spread across South America.

Charlie (newly tagged adult male from Fishers Island, NY) was last recorded just north of Lake Okeechobee on September 18th. Same scenario applies to him as to Gerry -- Of course as soon as I uploaded this update, Charlie found a cell tower and checked in from Haiti, where he arrived at 1 AM this (Oct 2) morning.

Edwin (adult male tagged in 2013 on Fishers Island, NY) is probably at his wintering spot on the Amazon by now. We don't expect to hear from him until next spring.

...............

10 October:

Flow is doing his migration in baby steps--mostly fits, starts, and retreats (which seems to be a theme this year). After a short stay on St. Jerome Creek on the western shore of Chesapeake Bay, just south of Patuxent, MD, he moved south about 70 miles (114 km) but then turned around around went straight back to St. Jerome Creek!

DJ (adult male from Martha's Vineyard) finally left his territory on Martha's Vineyard and had been hanging around Cape May, NJ. He passed right over the hawk watch platform, but was heading north! He had started out over the water, heading for Cape Henlopen, DE, but changed his mind and retreated. After confusing the hawk watchers, he spent a few days there, but is now back on track. Our last signals were from South Carolina, just north of Savannah, GA.

Belle (tagged as a juvenile on Martha's Vineyard in 2010) is on her 4th trip south--a record for our juveniles. She made her obligatory stop at Lake Azuei in Haiti, where she always stops heading north and sometimes visits on her way south. She's now safely across the Caribbean in northwestern Venezuela. She still has to fly across the whole Amazon Basin to get back to her winter home on the Rio Madeira. Amazingly, she's very close (some 10s of miles) to North Fork Bob, our other bird tagged in 2010 that's still on the air.

Uncas (adult male from the Connecticut River) had been hanging out around Lake Enriquillo in the southwestern Dominican Republic since the 23rd. This makes me nervous as we had a young bird shot here a few years back. On the 4th he went down to Cabo Beata, the launching pad for adult Ospreys en route to S.A. But he changed his mind for some reason and retreated to Enriquillo.

Roger Tory (adult male from the Connecticut River) was just east of Lake Okeechobee in southern Florida on the 4th. We haven't heard from him since, which most likely means he's somewhere in Cuba, where cell towers are few and far between.

Gerry (adult male from the Connecticut River) has been off the radar screens (i.e. out of reach of cell towers) since the 20th. His last signal was southwest of Lake Okeechobee, FL. This is pretty typical of cell-tower birds. This is his first year with a transmitter, so we have no idea where he's going and he may not appear again until spring, but most of our cell tower birds do check in again somewhere along the route or even where they settle down for the winter. There are more and more cell towers spread across South America.

Charlie (newly tagged adult male from Fishers Island, NY) seems to have found his winter home in northern Colombia.

Edwin (adult male tagged in 2013 on Fishers Island, NY) is probably at his wintering spot on the Amazon by now. We don't expect to hear from him until next spring.

...............

20 October:

Blackie may be another victim of a traffic accident. He finally moved south from his holdout on the Raritan River to another stretch of the river. Sadly, his last transmissions were on 5 October and the GPS fixes were right next to a busy 4-lane highway. We don't know that he got hit by a car, but it's a good bet. Major bummer.

Bridget (juvenile female from central NH) is another bird with a bit of a problem figuring out which way south is. She got to Florida after a spin out over the Atlantic and the Bahamas. When she got to Florida's east coast, she flew 60 miles (100 km) north to Vero Beach, where she's been since the 26th. She was photographed not long ago by Libby Corbin, a New Hampshire photographer, who happened to be in the area. This may be where she winters. We've had a couple of juveniles winter in the southeast, but we've also had on settle down in Florida for over a month before getting back into migration mode and moving all the way down to the Amazon.

Belle (tagged as a juvenile on Martha's Vineyard in 2010) is on her 4th trip south--a record for our juveniles. She made her obligatory stop at Lake Azuei in Haiti, where she always stops heading north and sometimes visits on her way south. She's now safely across the Caribbean, Venezuela, and about half of the Amazon rainforest. She still has to fly across the other half of the Amazon Basin to get back to her winter home on the Rio Madeira. Amazingly, as she passed through the Venezuelan llanos, she was very close (some 10s of miles) to North Fork Bob, our other bird tagged in 2010 that's still on the air. Her four trips show us a lot about how juveniles learn the adult migration path. See her map pages for details.

Uncas (adult male from the Connecticut River) had been hanging out around Lake Enriquillo in the southwestern Dominican Republic since the 23rd. This made me nervous as we had a young bird shot here a few years back. On the 4th he went down to Cabo Beata, the launching pad for adult Ospreys en route to S.A. But he changed his mind for some reason and retreated to Enriquillo. We haven't heard from his since the 6th, which doesn't mean much with cell-tower birds.

Roger Tory (adult male from the Connecticut River) went off the air for a while after checking in near Lake Okeechobee in southern Florida on the 4th. We didn't hear from him until the 13th, when he reported in from western Haiti. Then he showed up near Higuey, in the eastern D.R., quite close to where Meadow was shot some years ago.

Gerry (adult male from the Connecticut River) has been off the radar screens (i.e. out of reach of cell towers) since the 20th of September. His last signal was southwest of Lake Okeechobee, FL. This is pretty typical of cell-tower birds. This is his first year with a transmitter, so we have no idea where he's going and he may not appear again until spring, but most of our cell tower birds do check in again somewhere along the route or even where they settle down for the winter. There are more and more cell towers spread across South America.

Charlie (newly tagged adult male from Fishers Island, NY) seems to have found his winter home in northern Colombia.

Edwin (adult male tagged in 2013 on Fishers Island, NY) is probably at his wintering spot on the Amazon by now. We don't expect to hear from him until next spring.