Lanny McDowell, famed artist and photographer, whose photographs of birds have graced the pages of the Vineyard Gazette, and in particular the Bird News, is in the hospital in Tucson, Ariz. Lan suffered an abdominal aneurism, from which few survive, while birding in the mountains of Arizona with birding friend Porter Turnbull. Lanny is a survivor. His experience is similar to that of the Vineyard’s ospreys. Close to extinction, the ospreys rebounded thanks to the efforts of a team of Vineyarders who erected osprey poles and scientists who helped ban the use of DDT.

Lanny survived thanks to the fast and professional help from birding buddy Porter Turnbull, who coordinated Lan’s transport off the mountain and into the hands of excellent medical attention at the University of Arizona Medical Center in Tucson. Lanny is okay and is recuperating. People with Vineyard connections in the Tucson area are visiting Lanny and assisting in any way they can. We thank everyone for their assistance.

Bird Sightings:

This is the time of year that I call migration mania. I do not understand how the birds deal with this twice a year! Well, they don’t have to pack clothes, computers, bird books, binoculars, scopes, cameras and tons of other odds and ends — they just take off. Oh, if it were that easy!

Birds are streaming onto the Island from every direction. It is a great time of year to get outside with binoculars. Take a break from gardening and give your back a break.

The most exotic bird of late is a western tanager that showed up at Dick Burt and Nancy Cramer’s suet feeder off Music street in West Tisbury on April 25. The next day it moved over to Sue Hruby’s feeder, where she and Jared Hull spotted it. This rare transient has only been seen 14 times on Island and only one other time in the spring — May 25, 1986 by Eleanor Waldron also in West Tisbury. The tanager moved back to Dick and Nancy’s suet feeder where it remained until April 30.

Nat Woodruff wins the award for the most bizarre bird sighting of the week. On April 28 while looking out on her back deck she saw what she believed to be a traumatic and tragic scene. It was a black-capped chickadee flopping around, legless, on a tennis ball. On closer observation Nat discovered the bird had both legs and the chickadee’s feet were firmly gripping the old tennis ball trying desperately to pull fabric from the cover of same. The ball was rolling, as it has wont to do, and thus the appearance of a legless bird flopping around. The chickadee finally pulled out some yellow fabric and disappeared to an unknown nesting site. This is when the battery in your video camera should be charged — mine never is!

Ruby-throated hummingbirds have arrived which, as Sue Craver notes, along with ants in the kitchen and asparagus, is a true sign of spring. Sue saw her first hummingbird on April 27 off Tea Lane in Chilmark, followed by Ronnee and Heidi Schultz who saw theirs on April 28 in West Tisbury. Jon and Jan Wightman had their first ruby-throated hummingbird on May 2 in Aquinnah, on May 3 Tim and Sheila Baird’s hummer arrived in their Edgartown yard, and Penny Uhlendorf and Scott Stephens’ in their Pilot Hill yard. Penny and Scott are also enjoying the breeding song of the brown creepers which “are so melodic compared to their single note call.”

There has been an invasion of Baltimore orioles. Felix Neck had their first Baltimore oriole arrive on April 30. Ronnee and Heidi Schultz put up an orange and on May Day (1st) the oriole arrived and set to feasting on the fruit. Eloise Boales of Aquinnah watched a Baltimore oriole on her back deck on May 2. Tim and Sheila Baird’s first Baltimore oriole of the season arrived at their Edgartown yard on May 3 as did ours at Quenames.

Tim and Sheila Baird saw their first brown thrasher in their Edgartown yard on April 30. Their gray catbird arrived on May 2 and ours at Quenames on May 1. The barn and tree swallow returned to Quenames on April 30, and the Bairds’ barn swallows the first of May.

We had a new yard bird for our Quenames feeder on May 1, a first spring male orchard oriole. Peter Kramer was pleased that his breeding pair of eastern bluebirds returned to his Quansoo yard on May 2.

Great crested-flycatchers have returned. Penny Uhlendorf and Scott Stephens spotted two on May 2 in Northern Pines in Tisbury and one at Pilot Hill Farm.

Warblers are arriving. Rob Culbert entertained many of the notables from the Water Is Life Festival last weekend. On May 1 by his Tisbury house he had a northern parula. That afternoon at Great Rock Bight, Rob and guests spotted American redstarts along with gray catbirds and eastern towhees. The following day near Farm Pond Rob and guests had pine and yellow warblers and common yellowthroat. Rob heard his first great-crested flycatchers at his Tisbury house on May 2.

On May 1 Rob Culbert, Bob Woodruff, Flip Harrington and I spotted chimney swifts over the Bunch of Grapes Bookstore and Katharine Cornell Theatre in Tisbury.

Suzan Bellincampi had an ovenbird strike her window on May 3. The same day Margaret Curtin and her son, Patrick, were at Menemsha Hills and saw and heard an American redstart, northern parula and ovenbird. They also heard great crested flycatchers.

Luanne Johnson spotted an ovenbird and black and white and prairie warblers as well as great-crested flycatcher at Menemsha Hills on May 2. The same day at Moshup Trail in Aquinnah she heard and spotted least terns and Roger Cook heard and spotted least terns at Squibnocket the same day.

Tim and Sheila Baird saw common terns and two willets at Sengekontacket Pond on May 5. The Bairds spotted an eastern kingbird at Katama on May 4, Allan Keith at Turtle Brook Farm in Chilmark and Bert Fischer saw one on West Basin Road in Aquinnah. Bert also watched and photographed over 300 northern gannets dive bombing Devil’s Bridge on May 4.

A pair of rose breasted grosbeaks arrived at Felix Neck on May 3. Suzan spotted two killdeer at Quansoo on May 1 and Flip Harrington and I spotted a killdeer by our Quansoo house the same day. Suzan added that guests at Felix Neck counted seven black-bellied plovers at the Neck on May 4.

Allan Keith counted seven greater yellowlegs on Chilmark Pond on April 29.

Now for a tough call. Margaret Curtin called to say she had heard a strange call in the woods near her house in Tisbury. She and her son, Patrick, went online and listened to many calls and finally determined it was a flycatcher — an olive-sided flycatcher. Nancy Weaver came down and heard the same bird. Unfortunately none of the three ever saw the bird. Although there was a great deal of research done, I have trouble with this decision. All the olive-sided flycatchers I have ever seen are always up front and perched on a snag out in the open. I checked with a few birders and the consensus is that we have to treat this sighting with caution. It was noted that something like a Baltimore oriole partial song (a three note fragment) can fool people.

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

Susan B. Whiting is the co-author of Vineyard Birds and Vineyard Birds 2. Her Web site is vineyardbirds.com.