Wednesday, March 27, 2013

Hawk migration in Honduras

Broad-winged Hawk

These last few days, hawk migration, especially that of Broad-winged Hawks, has been evident here in (southern) Honduras. Most of the time, the wind here comes from the north, but when the weather switches to light south winds late March - early April, migration of broadwings can be expected. We saw this last year also, although a week later.

our wintering Merlin, still around

Roselvy and I first noticed hawk migration this week on Saturday, when we were treated to 11 raptor species (not counting vultures) at our local patch, Laguna Villa Royal. That list included residents such as Common Black-Hawk and Red-tailed Hawk and local winter visitors such as American Kestrel and Merlin. Raptors observed actively migrating included Osprey (3), Mississippi Kite (1), Sharp-shinned Hawk (1), Cooper's Hawk (1), Broad-winged Hawk (111), Swainson's Hawk (1), and Peregrine Falcon (2). Sunday, we observed hawk migration at three different locations along CA-5, the highway that runs from Tegucigalpa south to the Pacific lowlands, for a total of nearly 900 broadwings. Yesterday, the wind shifted to north and picked up in strength, and early morning a few remaining broadwings could be seen struggling in the wind.

No comments: