Whimbrel
This is not a very good photo, but it is a very good bird – the Whimbrel (Numenius phaeopus). If you live near any coastal areas you should keep an eye and an ear open to watch and listen for them migrating by right now, as this bird was doing. It was really moving, and being an able and swift flier is something you need to do when you are cruising between continents and hemispheres…
Read MoreSpotted Sandpiper
The Spotted Sandpiper (Actitis macularius) is one of our easier to identify shorebirds from any distance, and their unique behaviors make them a stand out from the crowd – literally. While you may run into large flocks of shorebirds numbering in the dozens, hundreds, or even thousands heading south in the summer along lakes, in marshes, or on the Atlantic coast, you will very likely find only one or two or a handful of Spotted Sandpipers at a time. Even if multiple Spotteds are present in one place they will probably be on different flocks, not bumping into one another or seeking the...
Read MoreThe Big Dipper
Can you spot the Big Dipper just above the horizon between the trees? It can be hard to believe in the midsummer heat but birds are already migrating south for the winter both during the day (various swallows to Eastern Kingbirds to Blue-gray Gnatcatchers) and the night (Red-eyed Vireos to Indigo Buntings to Black-billed Cuckoos). Those nocturnal species use various methods to help them move around our planet – some may use a coastline, others the Earth’s magnetic field, and like people, certain birds gaze at the stars. Various species take in the night sky as a map, just as we...
Read MoreRuby-throated Hummingbird (Archilochus colubris)
There is nothing like seeing the Ruby-throated Hummingbird (Archilochus colubris) fly near you, turning ever so slightly to reveal a flash of light under its throat. When this bird caught the right light on its gorget it was almost a blinding beam of red. Photographed for the Meet Your Neighbours global biodiversity project in Connecticut while on assignment for The Roger Tory Peterson Institute of Natural History. Sean Graesser RTPI Affiliate
Read MoreCommon Ravens
Common Ravens (Corvus corax) are known to be incredible fliers, soaring high in the sky and almost floating among the clouds, drifting and banking and turning and flipping with an endless array of aerial acrobatics. If you spend enough time hawk watching you will undoubtedly see them looking like a sizable raptor until fanning out that tail, showing off that bill and letting you hone in on that all black body. I watched these two Common Ravens interacting from afar as they dropped in altitude over a few minutes, croaking out their calls and interacting in every aerial maneuver one could...
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