Weekly Updates
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June 10 - 12, 2005
June 16 - 18, 2005
June 30 - July 7, 2005
July 8 - 17, 2005
July 21, 2005
June 10 -12, 2005
New York City Audubon
Harbor Herons Monitoring Program Weekly Update
Week 1: June 10 – 12, 2005
Dear Volunteers,
This was the first week of our 2005 monitoring season. We surveyed the following islands:
Friday, June 10th, 6pm – 7:30pm: Canarsie Pol (from Kingsborough College boat)
Saturday, June 11th, 5:30pm – 7:30pm: Goose Island (from Co-op City Building 29A)
Sunday, June 12th, 6:45pm – 7:30pm: Brothers Islands (from Urban Divers boat)
Despite bad weather and limited monitoring time, we observed 78 wading birds flying to and from the various colonies.
Our first two boat trips ever occurred on Friday and Sunday. These trips, particularly at Brothers Islands, show how important observing all sides of the islands is. For example, last year’s data suggested that the vast majority of movement at Brothers Islands occurs to the west, down the East River. However, from the boat (on the far side of the island) we observed 17 birds moving east in less than 45 minutes.
This week also included our first ever session at Goose Island, from atop a 26 story apartment building. This position allowed the best view of any colony yet, because every side of the island could be seen, and birds could be observed from much farther away than at any other site. Once again, the 360 degree view allowed us to see birds moving in many directions, rather than the one or two often suggested by data collected from limited-view observation points. Of course, it is still very early in the season, and solid conclusions cannot be drawn yet.
Canarsie Pol (6/10/05)
Our monitoring position for this island was limited by the depth of the channel; ideally we would have been to the east of the island to observe birds heading in that direction, but there is no way for a boat to enter the shallow waters there. We attempted to get a look at the east side of the colony by positioning ourselves to the northeast. However, low visibility limited our view. Still, we were able to view a number of black-crowned night herons, snowy egrets, and great egrets. In the future we might redirect these trips to Hoffman Island, or possibly attempt an approach from the south.
Goose Island (6/11/05)
As stated above, our monitoring position is truly ideal at this site. It’s possible to detect every bird in every direction. It’s quite a hike, but I urge everyone to come to this island at least once. We were able to zoom in on a few egret nests to watch the parent feed their nestlings. Our session was cut short by a thunder storm, but we were able to observe 28 birds (of 3 species) entering/leaving the colony. There does not seem to be a selection for any particular direction at this point, nor did there seem to be a tendency regarding whether the birds were entering or leaving the colony (16 birds leaving, 12 birds returning).
Brothers Islands (6/12/05)
During this session, we spent most of our time on the east side of the two islands, in the channel running between the two islands. There was some excitement as we dodged some much larger boats, and a few small waves came over the side. We had rather limited time on the water, but in the 45 minutes we observed, there were a number of birds seen heading east, which was unexpected. We were also able to see some of the west side of the island, and no birds were observed heading this way. The majority of birds were black-crowned night herons (after cormorants, of course). There didn’t seem to be a tendency for birds to be coming to or leaving from the colony. Overall, it was a quiet day, but I’m looking forward to being out during a busy day, to see if, in fact, most birds tend to head west (which was the indication last year), or will our new vantage point show us that the east side of the island is equally as popular.
We also counted over 100 double-crested cormorants. This may not be surprising, but this year we are attempting to quantify the relative cormorant abundance of each colony, to see if cormorant abundance is correlated with wading bird activities.
As more data comes in, I’ll be able to point out any patterns I find in the data. I’ve added in a few pictures I took during our session at the bottom of the report.
Lastly, I would like to thank all of our volunteers and boat crews this week: Margarida Correia, Sasha Stim, Sandra Paci, Scott Wiley, Dr. Dave Rosane, Valerie Rosane, Tim Duffy, Michelle Osorio, Kathleen McCarthy, Ludger and crew at Urban Divers, and Captain Rob, Mike and Zach at KCC.
Thanks everyone,
Chris Nagy
2005 Harbor Herons Monitoring Coordinator
New York City Audubon
June 16 - 18, 2005
New York City Audubon
Harbor Herons Monitoring Program Weekly Update
Week 2: June 16 – 18, 2005
Dear Volunteers,
Our second week of monitoring is now completed. This week we had three sessions:
Thursday, June 16, 5:45pm – 7:00pm: Hoffman Island (from Cpt. Joe Costa’s boat)
Friday, June 17th, 5:30pm – 7:40pm: Brothers Island (from Castle Oil)
Saturday, June 18th, 8:30am – 10:00 am: Hoffman Island (from Seaview Ave pier)
We observed a total of 118 birds in these three sessions. We had one boat trip this weekend, at Hoffman island. We observed from the east side of the island, and once again observed birds flying east and south over the open water. Saturday on the shore, again at Hoffman, we saw a larger number of birds going west towards Staten Island. There were certainly more birds coming west, but the boat session showed some new flight lines. It’s possible that these birds are making the longer trek south to Sandy Hook or east to Jamaica Bay.
We also had our first shore session at Brothers Islands, from Castle Oil’s waterfront porch. As with last year, most of the birds traveled southwest along the river, but we were able to see a few birds fly along Riker’s Island to the east.
Hoffman Island
As said above, we did two trips to Hoffman this week. On Friday evening we observed 24 birds from the far side of the island, and on Saturday morning we got 37. During the boat trip we were beset by a large rain storm. It’s still early, but considering the weather, it seems like we’re getting similar numbers on both sides of the island (the times spent at each location were about the same).
Brothers
Similarly to Hoffman, the results from the shore at Brothers are comparable to the boat results last week. We only observed 18 birds last week on the boat, but the session was only 45 minutes long. This week we had 57 birds after 2 hours; obviously that’s many more birds seen from the shore, but with time taken into account, we saw 0.4 birds/minute from the boat and 0.47 birds/minute from the shore. It’s a pretty crude calculation, but it suggests that similar numbers are going east and west.
Sorry, no pictures this week. I’ll take extra next time. Thank you to this week’s volunteers: Leah Rugiero, Catherine Barron, Tim Duffy, Michelle Osorio, Peter Greenberg, Scott Wiley, Brendan Gilmartin, and Joe Costa.
Thanks everyone,
Chris Nagy
2005 Harbor Herons Monitoring Coordinator
New York City Audubon