we did not see gabe leidy at headlands beach state park this morning - he must have caught the fourth or fifth huge wave of blackpoll warblers which inundated headlands. as one of my birding friends said  "these birds are on a mission", fly in, feed in the canopy, and fly out.  jerry talkington, suzanne wagner, and i experienced wave after wave of blackpoll warblers hurredly flitting about the tops of the trees in the picnic area, the north coast guard road, and in the trees along the west breakwall.  two or three times we just stood still and watched upwards of 50 blackpoll warblers stream from the tops of the trees as they headed for destinations unknown.  most of the birds moved from west to east.  our count (probably a very conservative estimate) was 200+ blackpoll warblers.  we then headed for mentor lagoons and just sat by a little woodland pool which attracted veery, gray-cheeked and swainson's thrushes, red-breasted nuthatches, and a male american redstart.  near the end of our walk we encountered another group of blackpoll warblers high in the trees - another 50 or so birds.  we left mentor lagoons with the realization the we had witnessed the best  one day passage of blackpoll warblers within the boundaries of the park that any of us had ever witnessed.  
other good birds of the day were a male merlin that has been faithful at mentor lagoons since the end of august, a banded peregrine falcon over the dunes preserve area, and, as gabe reported, several cape may warblers if fine fall plumage.  only jerry got to see a female golden-winged warbler early in the morning.

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