We’ve had more than our share of beastly weather recently, which put the brakes on both bird migration and birding activity. But with a run of exquisite spring days last week and into this past weekend, the birding season has bounded ahead. Grackles and red-winged blackbirds are ubiquitous around the Island; robins, song sparrows and Carolina wrens are in full voice; and in general, the world is growing rapidly birdier. This makes me happy.

The pulse of warm weather, predictably, put a lot of birds of prey into motion. Lanny McDowell turned up an unusual raptor at Quenames on March 19: a dark-morph rough-legged hawk. Once a regular winter resident on the Vineyard, this species has grown deplorably scarce in recent years, and Lanny’s bird, a briskly moving migrant, was a welcome find. An immature northern goshawk was noted over Barnes Road in Oak Bluffs on the same day, also apparently on its way north. Turkey vultures, which are present through most or all of the winter these days, have been more in evidence lately; Cole Powers photographed a probable turkey vulture in flight on Sunday near the intersection of North Road and Old Farm Road in Chilmark, and Suzan Bellincampi noted “TVs” (as well as a Cooper’s hawk and the obligatory red-tails) at Felix Neck on March 18. Suzan also passed along the welcome news that the Felix Neck barn owls are incubating a half dozen eggs.

The much-anticipated first ospreys have arrived on the Vineyard, an event that informally marks the beginning of spring for Vineyard birders. Lanny noted a “fish hawk” over Town Cove, West Tisbury, last Friday, and Donald Beaton spotted one, quite likely a different bird, in Aquinnah on the same day. In a call to the Vineyard Bird Line (508-627-4922), Gus Ben David passed along word of an osprey arrival in Falmouth, also on Friday.

Among our earliest songbird migrants is the eastern phoebe, that hardy flycatcher with drab plumage and famously sneezy song. I found one singing at the Nature Conservancy’s Hoft Farm Preserve in West Tisbury last Friday. At the time, I was unsure whether this bird was a recent arrival: phoebes often attempt to winter in the area, sometimes availing themselves of mealworms put out by a nearby resident, and while I’ve never felt certain that one survived the entire season, it wouldn’t surprise me much if one did. But a couple of phoebes reported from the mainland on the same day were almost certainly incoming migrants. And then, on Sunday, Happy Spongberg reported two phoebes from the area around her Chilmark home. The pattern suggests the arrival of a modest wave of phoebes at the end of last week, of which my bird was probably one.

In contrast, a hermit thrush I found on the same day at Cranberry Acres surely wintered here; it’s too early for this species to be moving. The wet thickets on the back side of the pond there offer perfect wintering habitat for hermit thrushes, which happily consume everything from berries to sow bugs to salamanders, and I saw hermit thrushes there on a couple of occasions during this past winter. This bird and I studied each other quite carefully; I have no idea what it made of me, but I thought it looked quite fine: plump, alert and well-feathered.

While their numbers are thinning out as wintering birds depart, waterfowl remain plentiful around the Vineyard, and some northbound migrants can be found. Rob Culbert noted the continuation of unusual numbers of common eider in Menemsha Pond (eider typically prefer open ocean to ponds). A few ring-necked ducks still linger in the ponds along Lambert’s Cove Road and at Wiggy’s Pond in Oak Bluffs. And on March 21, Lanny McDowell noted a few greater scaup on the inside of Norton Point Beach at Katama. Last Friday there were drake wood ducks at both Cranberry Acres and the Hoft Farm.

Finally, incoming shorebirds have begun to join the dunlins, sanderlings and black-bellied plovers that wintered here. Piping plovers, among the earliest of shorebird migrants, are in (Liz Baldwin reported a pair at Lobsterville). American oystercatchers arrived about a week ago: Rob Culbert noted two on Sarson’s Island on March 17, and Suzan Bellincampi reported what may have been the same birds from Felix Neck the next day. On Monday, Liz Baldwin also noted oystercatchers at Sengekontacket, finding others at Little Beach (Edgartown) and on the Lagoon. By March 23, oystercatchers were in at Norton Point, too, according to Lanny, who also found a Wilson’s snipe at Black Point Pond last Friday.

The coming weeks will see a steady replacement of winter residents with migrants and arriving breeders. Migration is an endlessly amazing phenomenon: get out there and don’t miss the show.

Please report your bird sightings to the Martha’s Vineyard Bird Hotline at 508-627-4922 or e-mail to birds@mvgazette.com.