some brief updates as the season winds down

Didn't sign up for any August shifts -- too much other stuff going on -- so no first hand report from me today. Last official word I heard was that the official total of piping plover chicks fledged is 40. That's a good number given the wash-overs from extreme high tides and the normal amount of predation.

The least terns have left the beach. I haven't seen any data on them, but it didn't seem like a good year for them.

In other bird news, the swallows are doing their massive flocking thing and are a sight to behold. The swallows staging for migration is one of PRNWR's most amazing phenomena.

July 27, 2018
AM Shift North
Coffee of the Day: Ethiopian Yrgacheffe
Bird of the Day: semipalmated sandpiper
Butterfly of the Day: monarch
Weird Wrack Item of the Week: a sock -- don't know if it's the mate to the one from 2 weeks ago or merely a similar-looking sock
Invisi-bird Status: Official: 40 chicks have fledged from 18 nests, 7 chicks remaining from 3 nests. Number actually seen by me: 4 adults who seemed to be new arrivals migrating through.

Looking South

Didn't have a lot of visitor questions or trespassers and such, so I got a little time to check out the shorebird migration, which is definitely in progress. In addition to a group of 4 piping plovers who arrived from somewhere north of this beach (Seabrook? Hampton? Somewhere in Maine?) to chow down at the water line,  there were multiple flocks of semipalmated sandpipers landing on the beach  for awhile then taking off southward.  A few common terns and a few least terns were still around.

Weird Sock of the Week

This week I spotted even more monarchs on the beach. Also loads of cabbage whites -- but it was thrilling to see so many monarchs.

The surfers have largely been replaced by standup paddleboarders.  None of them landed on the beach or got caught in any rip currents -- placid paddleboarding all around.

Paddleboarders

July 20, 2018

Coffee of the Day: I dunno. Did I even have coffee today? Too much going on in too many places. Anyway, I wasn't at PICR so definitely don't know what their dark roast of the day was.
Not at PRNWR today because of the aforementioned too many things in too many places. Hence, no piping plovers were actually seen by me and no weird wrack items were photographed by me.

Invisi-bird Status: Official Report: 19 fledglings from 7 nests, 27 chicks from 13 nests, 1 nest yet to hatch.  Least tern status: Bio staff reports seeing 1 least tern chick.