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Conditions in the West were more unfavorable than favorable this week, with only light movements early in the weekend and late in the work week, while localized light to moderate movements in the Great Plains and Texas and parts of the southeast were there highlights of migration in the East.

Early migrants will be on the move in the West and the East. Favorable conditions this weekend and at the end of the coming week will see light to moderate movements scattered across the West, while a pulse of unseasonably warm air will inspire widespread light to moderate flights over the weekend in the Great Plains and for the first half of the work week in much of the East. Read on to find out what species will be on the move in your region!

We posted previously on the exceptional movements of Franklin’s Gulls and Cave Swallows that occurred around 13 November 2015. The first post set the stage for how these species appeared so far out of range, and we follow with this…

November 13 saw an epic Franklin’s Gull and Cave Swallow flight to the East Coast of the United States, the likes of which have not been previously recorded. Here, we describe in the first of a three part series how and why this unprecedented event occurred.

Some seriously anomalous displays of displacement, entrainment, diversion, and irruption, highlighted the birding landscape of 2012. Of particular note was the unprecedented invasion of Razorbills in the southeastern US and the Gulf of Mexico. BirdCast spent some time chronicling these events and begins a discussion of whether 2015 might see a similar occurrence.

A late period arrival of favorable conditions will see light to moderate movements, primarily waterfowl, in the West, while the first half of the period in the East will see moderate flights scattered across the region.

A quiet late season week in the West saw primarily scattered light movements, while a wild post-frontal passage ride of Franklin’s Gulls and Cave Swallows in the Northeast highlighted the period’s primarily localized light to moderate flights.

Welcome to our latest installment of the traffic report describing northeast US nocturnal bird migration traffic rates, as calculated from a completely automated pipeline of algorithms. The images you see in Traffic Reports present the migration traffic rate (MTR), direction of…

Mid to late period conditions will be favorable for scattered light to moderate pulses of movements featuring American Wigeon, Cooper’s Hawk, Golden Eagle, American Coot, Snowy Owl, and Red-winged Blackbird in the West, while a strong frontal passage early in the weekend brings moderate to heavy flights of Mallard, Snow Goose, Hooded Merganser, Common Merganser, Purple Sandpiper, Bonaparte’s Gull, and American Robin to the East.

A generally quiet week in the West featured isolated light and moderate flights of Greater White-fronted Goose, Northern Pintail, Bufflehead, Common Goldeneye, Western Bluebird, and Yellow-rumped Warbler, while moderate flights of Red-breasted Merganser, White-winged Scoter, Franklin’s Gull, American Robin, Savannah Sparrow, and American Tree Sparrow graced the East early and late in the period.

A relatively quiet week of scattered light migration featuring Brant, Common Goldeneye, Barrow’s Goldeneye, California Gull, Chestnut-collared Longspur, and Golden-crowned Sparrow is in store for this late migration period in the West, while the passage of two strong cold fronts spawn the season’s last major moderate to heavy flights featuring Lesser Scaup, Long-tailed Duck, Bufflehead, Hooded Merganser, Great Cormorant, Purple Sandpiper, and Rusty Blackbird in the East.

A quiet late season week in the West saw primarily light movements west of the Rockies featuring Brant, Red-breasted Merganser, Pacific Loon, Mew Gull, Bohemian Waxwing, Chestnut-collared Longspur, Grasshopper Sparrow, and Clay-colored Sparrow, while early and late period movements of moderate to heavy intensity in the East featured numerous waterfowl, Rough-legged Hawk, Northern Shrike, Cedar Waxwing, American Tree Sparrow, and Fox Sparrow.