This is an area for Inaturalist Birders and Birdwatchers to ask questions or talk.
Are there many birds arriving in your area for the winter yet?
I live in a great area for migrants but I’ve been laid up with bronchitis and likely missed the peak of the migration
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Northern Australia here so in our Buildup heading into our Wet Season which is overlapping with Spring. On the East Asian-Australasian Flyway and our Northern birds are currently here to escape the Siberian winter and fatten up. Good spot to see the Far Eastern Curlew.
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@donna165. Very interesting. I live in the United States, West Virginia. The birds are heading south for the winter. But some birds that are from Canada are land in in my state. This time of the year is exciting because you might have a chance to see a rare bird heading south.
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Is there many people down south seeing many migrating birds?
I’m in the NE, SE PA, and snowbirds have finally made it down. Unfortunately it’s been unseasonably warm here and very dry, hopefully it won’t throw the birds off.
My yard has been planted with plenty of natives and I’ve been seeing even Ruby throated kinglets visiting some of the dead plants for seed I’m assuming? Unless they are looking for bugs in the plant stems.
Also saw the yellow-rumped warbler getting the poison ivy berries in my woods.
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I live in Maine, so birds leave the area for winter.
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I changed the title to “Birding Discussion Topic” because this is a topic on a forum, not a forum itself.
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@tiwane. Ok thanks!
The forum is specifically not a place to promote projects, so I hid your post.
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One of my neighbors in the Dominican Republic is from Quebec. He remarked once that he was surprised that the birds in the Dominican Republic were not colorful – that the birds in Quebec were more colorful.
Well, I suppose that depends on which birds you see. It is true that the most conspicuous birds, especially in open countryside, are black like the Smooth-billed Ani and Greater Antillean Grackle or patterned in shades of brown like the Palmchat. Even the hummingbirds could seem uncolorful to someone who is used to the Ruby-throated Hummingbird of eastern North America – the male Hispaniolan Mango appears mostly black, without a bright gorget, and the female is typical of most female hummingbirds. Yellow-faced Grassquits are the brightest bird in grassy areas, and even in those, the yellow areas are small on a mostly olive-colored bird.
To see more colorful birds than these, I find I usually need to go into shade-cacao groves or similarly wooded places. There, the Broad-billed Tody – a Coraciiform from a family endemic to the Greater Antilles – has the “Ruby-throated Hummingbird” color scheme. Wood warblers overwintering from North America, such as the American Redstart and Northern Parula, also frequent the wooded places, and I normally see the Yellow Warbler in mangroves.
One exception is the Bananaquit, a bird ubiquitous in the Neotropics because of its penchant for gardens, even in towns. That is the one colorful bird likely to be seen in a regular backyard.
I can sympathize with my Quebecois neighbor, because the biota of the Islands took some getting used to for me, too. When I dreamed of a life in the tropics, I thought of toucans, manakins, and antbirds, none of which occur in the Islands. As Bond, author of Birds of the West Indies, commented, “On the other hand, it is remarkable that jays are absent from this region, for they abound in North and Central America.” Learning to appreciate this avifauna has meant learning to appreciate the unique evolutionary trajectory of the Islands as separate from the mainland, which is visually more subtle.
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@tiwane. Thanks I’m still learning how to use INatForum. I’m fortunate to have people like you to teach me.
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Many White-throated Sparrows are arriving in West Virginia. It is very neat thing to see. I also saw a Swamp sparrow yesterday,which was cool!
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I’ve been trying to see a new species for every month of the year. September this year was really close, but I eventually heard the Magnolia Warbler! So far, I have one for each month except October. I imagine November will be harder. I want to find better places for waterfowl near me, and see something like a Blue-winged Teal or Common Golden-eye (Both of which I have yet to find, despite living in an area that would, in theory, be great for both of these species) December, I’ll probably see lots of new birds as I’m going to Florida then.
Does anyone else like to give themselves challenges like this?
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@giannamaria. I like to challenge myself when it comes to birding.
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Are there any Ebird users here?
No, i prefer iNat… I have an account, but i dont really use it anymore.
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