May 26th, 2014

Last night's migration

Greetings all,

My sincerest apologies for the lack of a report last night. I had a family gathering of sorts that went a little later than expected, and sadly, not even the birds migrating over us could keep me awake. And there were birds over our heads last night, though it depends on where you are. Looking at the radar from the peak of last night, it shows that in most places throughout the state--save northern IL where migration was moderate--migration was ultimately light. This is in spite of the favorable southerly winds we were experiencing.

Tonight's winds

Looking at tonight, we again have favorable southerly flow. And again, in spite of this, migration has followed a similar pattern with light concentrations throughout the state. This could be because the birds aren't favoring the relatively high pressure over us, but if earlier this spring is any evidence of the contrary, I have another hypothesis.

Dare a say migration in winding down?

Though late spring migrants are still passing through, the bulk of the spring migrants we all observed are far north of us by now, busy with the deliberation of territories and the selection of mates. They passed by us in an exciting flash of color and sound, and now many of them are gone...for now.

Tonight's migration

But we'll save the season's sentimental wrap-up for later. For now, tomorrow may still see some influx in your area amongst the now greater variety of breeding birds. This interaction between species still migrating and species beginning their breeding season is always fascinating, and I encourage you all to get out there and be your own bird ethologists!

Looking ahead into the crystal ball of wind forecasting (N & Cent. IL wind forecast: http://bit.ly/1gqPFCAv, S IL wind forecast: http://bit.ly/124R3WX), we see that in the current high pressure, winds are forecast to remain weak and confusedly southerly-based at least through Wednesday, taking on a more westerly component by then as well. We'll see what that brings us.

But for now, here's the eBird frequency chart. And with that, I bid you all a goodnight!