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View day list of other species seen on 9-22-97 at
Hazel Bazemore NEW!
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Rpt Date: September 22, 1997
Site: Hazel Bazemore
County Park
Corpus Christi, Nueces County, TX
27 deg. 51.936"
97 deg. 38.560"
Reports: Patty Beasley (pbeasley@electrotex.com)
Counter: Joel Simon & Glenn Swartz
(Hawk Watch Int'l)
(site manned 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. Aug 15-Nov 15)
Sponsors: Hawk Watch International
Support: Hawk Migration Association of
North America
Audubon Outdoor Club of Corpus Christi
Species
9/22 Season
Black vulture 0
51
Turkey vulture 0
1
Osprey
2 18
Swallow-tail kite 0 7
White-tail kite 0
1
Miss. kite
36 2,706
Northern harrier 0
6
Sharp-shin hawk 5
29
Cooper's hawk 3
33
Harris' hawk 0
1
Red-shoulder hawk 0 18
Broadwing hawk 4,188 38,551
Swainson's hawk 3
123
White-tail hawk 0
2
Red-tail hawk 0
3
Amer. kestrel 1
7
Merlin
1 4
Peregrine falcon 0
7
Unk accipiter 2
19
Unk. buteo
1 14
Unk. falcon 0
2
Unk. raptor 2
74
Total:
4,244 41,676
NOTES:
Let me tell you a story about intrepid birders! After a thorough soaking yesterday (but we finally did get some birds), we all got up this morning to check the radar, only to find the mother of all thunderstorms and all her children headed our way. We all hit the bluff anyway, and darn if the skies didn't go and start clearing on us! Finally, between 1 and 2, the kettles started coming in. Visitors from Tennessee, Delaware and various and sundry points in Texas all came out again, too, and stuck it out with us. Our Delaware couple received an extra bonus when another fellow Delaware birding friend arrived at the site, each not knowing the other was going to be at Hazel for the hawk watch! Welcome also to Karen Loke, Television News Producer of the Texas Parks & Wildlife News & Information Branch, who also stuck out the incredibly high humidity and subsequent hordes of insects until the sun and heat and hundreds of swallows drove them under cover.
While storms all along the Texas coast and points inland kept many migrating hawks grounded and under cover, enough came through to keep us jumping for most of the afternoon. Very good day, considering the weather; not as good as normal averages wihtout the rains.
By the end of the day, we probably had over 5,000 swallows pass overhead; we've had tons every day of the watch, but today was heavier than usual. So were the insects after the rains; those swallows got a feast. I also neglected on a previous report to mention the several million bees that massed and moved across the bluff in one gigantic ball on Thursday morning, Sept. 18th; the mass came in from the north, and was headed south at last sight.
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Hazel Bazemore County Park has been the site of raptor migration
counts
since the 1970's. Beginning in 1990, the Hawk Migration Association
of
North America began conducting 10-day standardized counts for fall
raptor
migration. In 1997, Hawk Watch International sponsored the first
3-month
standardized count for the fall raptor migration. The tiny county
park was
once the best-kept raptor migration secret in the country, but
is rapidly
gaining recognition as the having the highest concentration of
migrating
raptors of any one location in the continental United States. Peak
fall
migration days bring well over 100,000 raptors in one day through
the
Nueces River basin and bluff located within the park boundaries.
Season
totals can run well over as high as half a million. Funneling actions
of
fall weather systems aid in the consolidation over the park of
migrating
raptors from both the Central and Eastern flyways, and on occasion,
we
suspect, some Western flyway incursions.
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To find Hazel Bazemore Park take FM624 west from SH77 for about
1 mile to
the road on the right with a park sign marking it. The park road
is just on
the west side of the water canal that crosses FM624. For more information,
see the Hazel
Bazemore page on the Audubon Outdoor Club web site.
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To go to the hawk watch site, go in the park entrance, make a left
as soon
as you get across the speed bump, and follow the winding road to
the crest
of the hill (past the restrooms, a covered picnic pavilion and
around the next bend).
Where the road makes a bend to the left is where we park, and sit
under the trees
(up against the 17th tee box to the golf course behind the park).
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