Sent from my iPhone Begin forwarded message: > From: Betsy MacMillan <[log in to unmask]> > Date: August 26, 2016 at 8:43:47 PM EDT > To: Bill Whan <[log in to unmask]> > Cc: [log in to unmask] > Subject: Re: [Ohio-birds] Nighthawk numbers > > After reading about nighthawk migration, we went to our back deck tonight to see if they were > in our northeast Ohio suburban location. (Summit Couty) > Results in 30 minutes: > 2 common nighthawks > 2 northern cardinals > 3 American goldfinches > 4 chimney swifts > 740 American robins!! > All birds were flying northeast over my house and neighbors' yards > Thanks for the tip on the nighthawks! > Betsy Mac > > Sent from my iPhone > >> On Aug 26, 2016, at 1:22 PM, Bill Whan <[log in to unmask]> wrote: >> >> Like other reporters, I have only a dribble of nighthawks to report. >> I can recall climbing onto the roof of my house on an early evening >> in the 80s to estimate ~600 nighthawks passing maybe 20 feet overhead. A >> couple of years later I was still able to find 300+ in the neighborhood, >> but three-digit numbers are no more. Here in town, Lawrence Hicks >> counted 1200 on 8/26/37, not an unusual number at the time. Kirk >> Alexander had 800 in town on 8/27/1987, and Bruce Stehling reported 400 >> here on 9/20/1975 and 500 on 9/9/1980. These numbers obviously >> represented just those counted in limited areas by single observers on >> certain evenings. >> This species has been estimated (Cornell Lab) to have diminished by >> ~61% since the mid-60s, killed off by pesticides and habitat >> degradation; I wonder if this is an underestimation. The Cornell site >> relates that one banded in Ohio was the oldest known, at nine years of >> age. Little is known about their South American wintering grounds. >> Various experts blame the loss of their numbers on human controls of >> mosquitoes and other insects; this seems unlikely, given the large part >> of their lengthy migration undertaken in rural areas where such controls >> are less often undertaken. Others blame new roof treatments, but of >> course these too seem trivial over their range. I can't explain why, but >> I am looking for fewer and fewer of these birds as time passes. >> Bill Whan >> >> ______________________________________________________________________ >> >> Ohio-birds mailing list, a service of the Ohio Ornithological Society. >> Please consider joining our Society, at www.ohiobirds.org/site/membership.php. >> Our thanks to Miami University for hosting this mailing list. >> >> >> You can join or leave the list, or change your options, at: >> listserv.miamioh.edu/scripts/wa.exe?LIST=OHIO-BIRDS >> Send questions or comments about the list to: [log in to unmask] ______________________________________________________________________ Ohio-birds mailing list, a service of the Ohio Ornithological Society. Please consider joining our Society, at www.ohiobirds.org/site/membership.php. Our thanks to Miami University for hosting this mailing list. You can join or leave the list, or change your options, at: listserv.miamioh.edu/scripts/wa.exe?LIST=OHIO-BIRDS Send questions or comments about the list to: [log in to unmask]