Hi Richard,

I thought that last night might be a good night becuase the winds shifted to
northwest - a preferred direction for birds migrating southward (a tailwind
is much better than a headwind for a small bird). This northwestly wind
followed several days (I don't know how many days of southerly breezes we've
had since I spent the last 2 1/2 weeks travelling). Growing up 35 miles
north of Cape May, New Jersey on the East Coast has made me look forward to
northwest winds in the Fall since that usually means birds. It seems to
hold true here too. As far as the radar is concerned, I am still trying to
figure out correlations between what I hear outside and what the radar
imagery is showing. Last night, the bluish blob of dots on the radar were
not moving east - more like they were ocillating slightly from East to
West. Interestingly, it did not show as much activity to the West of me as
it did to the East (placement of the radar or placement of the birds?). Does
this mean that there are many more migrants over the hills East of Battle
Ground? Who knows - I've never planted myself over there for a morning
listen - maybe this weekend. However, I won't have the ability to compare a
vocal flight directly to the radar there since where I'm thinking would be a
good spot is out of cell range.

Still learning.

Jim
--
Jim Danzenbaker
Battle Ground, WA
360-723-0345
jdanzenbaker at gmail.com

On Fri, Aug 21, 2009 at 11:05 AM, Richard Carlson <rccarl at pacbell.net>wrote:

> Jim etal:
>
> Any tips on when to listen and how to interpret those radar images -- which
> look like they are moving NE with the cloud bands.
>
> Richard Carlson
> Full-time Birder, Biker and Rotarian
> Part-time Economist
> Tucson, AZ, Lake Tahoe, CA, & Kirkland, WA
> rccarl at pacbell.net
> Tucson 520-760-4935
> Tahoe 530-581-0624
> Kirkland 425-828-3819
> Cell 650-280-2965
>
> ------------------------------
> *From:* Jim Danzenbaker <jdanzenbaker at gmail.com>
> *To:* tweeters tweeters <tweeters at u.washington.edu>
> *Sent:* Friday, August 21, 2009 7:30:23 AM
> *Subject:* [Tweeters] Battle Ground Night Flight and Crows
>
> Hi Tweeters,
>
> I was glad to hear a flood of nocturnal migrants flying over my house in
> Battle Ground, Clark County this morning. I estimated about 5 birds per
> minute at 4:45am which built to about 15 birds per minute from 5:10am until
> about 5:45am and then it dropped off completely after 6am. Interestingly,
> this coincided with the National Weather Service Radar from Portland which
> showed lots of blue (presumed migrants) which dropped off at around 6:06am.
> The site for the radar imagery is
> http://radar.weather.gov/radar_lite.php?rid=rtx&product=NCR&loop=yes. I
> estimated the following numbers:
>
> Swainson's Thrush 400
> Yellow Warbler 1
> Orange-crowned Warbler (I think) 1
>
> This flight was not unpredictable since the winds turned northwest
> yesterday evening for the first time in several days and there was a fairly
> low cloud deck. However, this is the earliest that I've had a big flight.
> It usually starts around August 25th.
>
> On a completely different note, the local American Crow roost which usually
> holds about 45 crows during 10 months of the year and swelled to a previous
> high of 225 birds at this time of year was rocking this morning. I counted
> a total of *800* leaving the roost today! Unfortunately, every one of
> them had something to say to the other 799 crows so it was pretty noisy.
> Keep your eyes and ears skyward.
>
> Jim
> --
> Jim Danzenbaker
> Battle Ground, WA
> 360-723-0345
> jdanzenbaker at gmail.com
>
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