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Every year for the last 15 years, Ron Pittaway of Ontario Field Ornithologists publishes a forecast for the movements of winter finches in the upcoming winter. Team BirdCast loves this. This forecast focuses specifically on the movements of Ontario populations of these species, but many across…

Many species are on the move as we officially cross the vernal equinox threshold into the realm of Northern Hemisphere spring.

With regular arrivals of spring migrants occurring daily, or nearly so, throughout the US, Team BirdCast returns with species on the move spotlights. This week, we highlight some on-time, early and late arrivals in the BirdCast West region.

During Fall 2020 a “superflight of finches” occurred in the eastern US, featuring the biggest Evening Grosbeak migration in more than 20 years, redpolls undergoing their largest movement in perhaps a decade, and Pine Siskins irrupting in their best numbers since 2008. These ‘Finch Superflights’, which are defined as southern flights of all eight eastern irruptive finches, are rare, and this year, conditions have aligned and all species have moved in numbers, including the rarest of irruptives, the Pine Grosbeak.

Migration is well under way across the globe, and Team BirdCast is highlighting a few species in interactive maps made with eBird data. Check out how the progression of migration for the group of species has changed over the last 30 days.

We’ve created a new tool to update us as species advance through their arrivals in each region. We assign each species to four possible categories, and we look for transitions between categories to tell us how each species is progressing through these stages. Most of the action is happening in the southeast, as we expect for this time of year. But this will not be true for long!

Species on the move this week features birds that are catching up on their schedules, exploding on to the scene, and falling out.

Eastern Phoebes finally began to arrive in large numbers in the Northeast, effectively erasing delays in arrivals experienced…

Here’s a brief review of some species that showed substantial changes in reporting on eBird this past weekend.

Hooded Orioles have been on the move in the last week, appearing in slightly more reports than the last decade’s average.

Bullock’s Oriole, however,…

The last several days have seen significant movements of birds in the US. Here are the highlights:

On March 20th, we predicted a big influx of Scissor-tailed Flycatchers:

We can now report that they have indeed delivered! The proportion of eBird checklists…

Species currently on the move in the United States include:

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Here’s a brief recap of of some species that showed substantial changes in reporting on eBird this past weekend.

From the Great Lakes and Northeast region, several species took advantage of favorable conditions, especially in the early part of the weekend. Tree…

This weekend’s species on the move highlights movements in the West. Several species are right on time in the West, following the last decade’s patterns of reporting. These include Spotted Sandpiper, Swainson’s Thrush, Yellow Warbler, Western Tanager, and Black-headed Grosbeak.

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