ISS blitz shorebird report for Boston spots, August 9

[Soheil Zendeh]

Folks,

Manomet, which sponsors International Shorebird Surveys (ISS), scheduled
this past week for its first ever coordinated shorbird blitz. I helped
coordinate the Boston area counts and have some preliminary numbers to
report. A more general, statewide report will be forthcoming from ISS within
a short time.

The period chosen for the blitz was August 5 to August 11. Manomet stated
that its goal was "to gather a snapshot of how shorebirds use the
Massachusetts coastline during peak southbound migration." Of course
shorebirds don't pay attention to our schedules and dates when they migrate.
Some higher counts than the ones you'll see below were obtained in the week
before the blitz. In any case, for Boston we selected the evening high tide
(6:15 pm) of Wednesday August 9. We had voluntreers posted to a dozen or so
sites to count high tide roosting shorebirds. Some counts, such as Nahant /
Lynn Beach, were truly disappointing. Others such as Winthrop Beach were
average or above average of the expected counts.

Here is a partial report for Wednesday's counts from Boston:

Nahant Long Beach: Jim McCoy and Laura Markley
Note: Beach all cleaned of all wrack by DCR. No food for birds
Sanderling 1
Yellowlegs 4 (flyover)

Nahant Short Beach: Linda Ferraresso, Linda Pivacek
Semipalmated Sandpipers 94

Revere Rumney South: Lisa Schibley and Soheil Zendeh
Semipalmated Sandpiper 110
Leasts Sandpiper 11
Greater Yellowlegs 3
Lesser Yellowlegs 15
https://ebird.org/checklist/S146907105

Revere Point of Pines: Maury Hall
Semipalmated Plover 94
https://ebird.org/checklist/S146917610

East Boston Belle Isle: Dave Williams, Lis Kernan
Pectoral Sandpiper 1
Dowitchers 0!
Greater Yellowlegs 21
Lesser Yellowlegs 9
https://ebird.org/checklist/S146871583

Winthrop Beach: Michael Hochstetler, Paul Bain
Piping Plover 1
Semipalmated Plover 150
Semipalmated Sandpiper 420
https://ebird.org/checklist/S146865262

Winthrop Fishermans Bend: Lisa Schibley, Soheil Zendeh
Western Willet (not confirmed yet, still there today)
AmOystercatcher 13
Black-bellied PLover 59
Ruddy Turnstone 18
https://ebird.org/checklist/S146907109

Boston Harbor Islands: Sebastian Jones, Carol Lynn Trocki, Rachel Vincent
Ruddy Turnstone 1
Peep
AmOystercatcher many

Squantum marshes, Vin Zollo:
American Oystercatcher 3
Least Sandpiper 11
Semipalmated Sanspiper 9
Short-billed Dowitcher 1
Greater Yellowlegs 21
Willet 4
Lesser Yellowlegs 7
https://ebird.org/checklist/S146872487

Total of 13 species and perhaps 1000 birds. Most of the birds are still
adults but juveniles are also starting to show up.

The variety of migrant shorebirds will increase throughout August and later,
peaking in late September.

Soheil Zendeh
Lexington, MA 02421

[Cliff Cook]

Same here!

Cliff Cook

Watertown

On Fri, Aug 11, 2023 at 1:26 PM <markgh...@gmail.com> wrote:

Very interesting - would have liked to be able to contribute, while I did not know about this until now
Best
Mark

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Cliff >> cco...@gmail.com