April 4 - Central Park

This morning was my first AMNH Central Park bird walk of the 2018 spring season. For the first time the walk was done starting at 9:00 am instead of 7:00 as it has been done for many years. This is a change the Museum is trying out this spring. Also this spring Central Park is doing restoration work on the Belvedere Castle so we will not be able to include that in our route as we have in most recent migrations. This also makes it harder to get to Turtle Pond and we did not get there today. An additional problem this morning was the weather. While it was not actually raining for the walk there was a heavy fog until the last few minutes of the walk with the sun trying to break through just before 11:00 am. Nevertheless, we did manage to find a total of thirty species during the walk. Nothing was out of the ordinary, but it was nice to see signs of spring. Besides early spring migrants, the Forsythia was in bloom. The total bird follows.

Canada Goose - 18
Mallard - 5
Herring Gull - 2 (overhead in fog)
Rock Pigeon
Mourning Dove
Red-bellied Woodpecker - 4
Yellow-bellied Sapsucker - 2
Downy Woodpecker - 4 (most heard)
Northern Flicker - 3
Eastern Phoebe - 3
Blue Jay
Brown Creeper - 2 (one of the highlights)
Golden-crowned Kinglet - 4
Ruby-crowned Kinglet - 1
Hermit Thrush - 1
American Robin - 10 (minimum)
European Starling
Chipping Sparrow - 3
Fox Sparrow - 1
Song Sparrow
Swamp Sparrow - 2
White-throated Sparrow
Dark-eyed Junco
Northern Cardinal
Red-winged Blackbird
Common Grackle
Brown-headed Cowbird - 3 (females at feeders)
House Finch
American Goldfinch - 4 (at feeders)
House Sparrow