A species has arrived for the summer season, but its arrival has really been ignored to date. Odd, considering it is now one of the most common species, at least in and around homes and yards. It is also frequently seen flying across the road.
The species is the American robin. The robins we have now are not the ones that have been here through the winter, as our winter resident birds are slightly darker, tend to be in flocks, and have already departed for points north. Now the robins we see are in pairs, in our yards searching for worms and other invertebrate snacks. We can also hear their melodious caroling, as they sing to establish and defend their territory. Our robins are now quite conspicuous. Yet I have not received any reports of their arrival.
This contrasts to how quickly the arrival of our ruby-throated hummingbirds gets reported. Daisy Kimberly observed her first hummer of the season on April 18. Julia Humphreys put up her hummingbird feeder on April 18 and a male hummer was partaking of the sugar water on April 20. She found one at her feeder on April 21. Many others report putting their feeders out although they are still waiting for their first hummers. Remember that you do not need to have red dye, or other food coloring, in the sugar-water mixture (home-made one part white sugar to four parts water); the hummers are attracted to red flowers (feeders) rather than the color of the sugar water.
Bird Sightings
At least one of the bald eagles was still around, as Dan Townes spotted one off Meetinghouse Road in Edgartown on April 16.
Matt Pelikan heard and saw a purple finch in the Manuel F. Correllus State Forest on April 18. The purple’s song is recognizably different from the song of the much more common house finch; the former is much more musical, the latter has more of a buzzy quality to its song. While this individual could yet move north to its breeding grounds, in some years we have one or two breeding pairs in the eastern (Edgartown) portion of the state forest. They used to be a common breeding species.
Nora Papian, Penny Uhlendorf, Matt Pelikan and Charlie Kernick also report hearing and seeing chipping sparrows on April 15 at Long Point, Pilot Hill, Tashmoo Farm and West Tisbury, respectively. Allan Keith had them show up at his Chilmark Farm on April 18.
Pine warblers are now present in abundance. Nathalie Woodruff and Holly Mercier both report pine warblers, and I have been hearing them singing across the Island. It is equally difficult to separate songs of the house and purple finches as it is to distinguish between chipping sparrows and pine warblers. The chippies’ song is more mechanical and buzzy while the pine warbler’s is much more musical; with practice they can be distinguished.
On April 19 I heard a warblers singing on Kitts Field Circle in Edgartown, but could not say whether it was a Cape May, black-and-white, or bay-breasted warbler. These three species are quite difficult to identify by song as their songs are quite similar — all variations of a thin, high-pitched seet-seet-seet-seet. I could not find the bird as it was high up in some junipers and pitch pines, and then it stopped singing. I’ll never know which species it was.
Also on April 19, Robert Cassidy found a merlin in West Tisbury. He has also observed osprey, turkey vultures and northern harriers at the Martha’s Vineyard Airport.
In the late afternoon on April 19 I observed two eastern phoebes in Brightwood Park acting like sparrows. They were hopping around on the ground, scratching at the leaf litter, and presumably catching some of the bugs hiding there. They flew up to a perch as I approached, wagged their tails a couple of times, then quickly returned to the ground after I walked past. I do not recall observing this behavior before!
Christy Edwards and Daisy Kimberly report their first Eastern towhees of the season on April 19, and Matt Pelikan has observed them in the state forest. I heard a fair number of them singing in the woods around Katama on April 19, although I have not heard them yet in the woods near my house in Vineyard Haven.
Great egrets have finally made an appearance, at a pond on Allan Keith’s farm on April 21. It seems late for them to be arriving, but everything else seems to be late too.
Finally, there are lots of birds around, so please get out looking for them, and be sure to report your bird sightings to birds@mvgazette.com.
Robert Culbert leads guided birding tours and is an ecological consultant living in Vineyard Haven.
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