Bake Oven Knob 2 miles North of Germansville, Pennsylvania, USA Daily Raptor Counts: Nov 02, 2025 -------------------------------------------------------------------
Observation start time: 07:45:00 Observation end time: 16:15:00 Total observation time: 8.5 hours
Official Counter: Rick Morrissey
Observers: Joe Farkas, Kathie Romano, Wendy Bailey
Visitors: We had 181 visitors today including our three volunteer observers. Many families, families with children of all ages, it was a great time to conduct the count on the South Lookout.
A highlight for me today was catching up with two longtime volunteer observers, with the end of the count fast approaching at the end of the month, it was good to see Joe Farkas and Kathie Romano. Wish their were more birds, yet it left us time to catch up. Also joining our observer team today was 'eagle eye' Wendy Bailey, doing what she usually does, pointing out afternoon raptors before the multi-colored Asian took their toll.
Getting back to our visitors, an early standout was the Lundquist family with their four kiddos and 'Dunkin' their dog. The Lundquists are an amazing nature and sports oriented family, who are frequent 'flyers' at BOK. The told me a great story where they met folks visiting from Germany right before Thanksgiving. These wayward travelers were at the knob after visiting Germansville thinking it was going to be a village reminding them of their homeland. After some discussions, the Lundquists invited the German travelers to their family Thanksgiving dinner. A pretty cool BOK story that I am now glad to submit to the 'LGNC story vault.'
OK, did you ever want a subject matter expert to fully explain the main topic of discussion at a party, or in this case in the afternoon on the knob, "all of the freakin invading lady beetles adorning our bodies!" Enter William and Suzanne to explain everything. Suzanne, aka of Bug Lady Consulting, she just held an improntu class teaching us all about Farmscaping and Insectary Plantings in particular as she consults agriculture corporations all over the country. Turns out Harmonia axyridis is beneficial to crops such as soybeans as a biocontrol predator for invasive aphids. Who knew?
So the moral here, like this report somehow needs moral guidelines, is be kind to German tourists who arrive in Germansville looking for hospitality and also be kind to multi-colored non-native Lady bird beetles because they actually are just looking for a meal as well.
Weather: Plentiful sunshine 'pillar to post,' with light afternoon cloud cover ranging from 5-15%. The low temperature was 44F and a high temperature of 57F was recorded at 1500 EST. A beautiful day for our visitors at the BOK South Hawkwatch, yet variable winds in the morning ranging from 0-2 mph, and 1-3 mph SW/WSW winds in the afternoon greatly limited today's migration.
Raptor Observations: The Observation Point today was from the South Lookout. For the first three hours even the vulture count was lacking with a sunshine filled sky. Our morning drama was if and when our high vulture count would surpass two Turkey Vultures.
Then very low, approaching the North side of the 'hump', a long tailed gray buteo sized raptor tried to sneak by our observers. Luckily before it flew behind the trees of the North Lookout, the 'white rump diaper' of this raptor gave us every indication that we had seen a male Northern Harrier. It was not until the noon hour that we started to see some high flying Redtailed Hawks (6) and a pretty good look at an adult Red-shouldered Hawk. A regular three hour flight of Redtailed Hawks ensued, yet on a slow day that tally was just 13, plus just two accipiters rounding out the afternoon flight. In the 1500 EST hour, after all of the observers called it a day, a very close not so high adult Bald Eagle was lit up by the setting sun. This was the second week in a row that I described the final migrating raptor with the same words. There were over 20 visitors still at the lookout, so it was a privilege to draw attention to what many would say is a rare event. A pretty nice 'gig' indeed.
Bald Eagles (2) - 1243 (Adult); 1545 (Adult)
I was going to end the count 1600, yet the late Bald Eagle had me 'quigged' to now stay 30 minutes longer to 1615 EST. The 'Qiugg' rule is a long standing unwritten code of BOK hawk counters that I have always followed. Not sure what the penalty is for not following a 'rule' that hawk counter from twenty years ago made up, maybe as a joke. His name was/is Gallus Quigley, come to think of it, not sure he even followed it!
Non-raptor Observations: The talk of 'Knob' today, once the rocks warmed up, was the Insecta class genus 'Harmonia axyridis' ladybird (beetle) known as the multicolored Asian Lady Beetle. The phones were 'alive' with searches like 'what's this yellow goop on the beetle, is it a fungus? Early on we observed some Downy WP's, some chickadees, later Ravens, but the 'Lady Birds' ruled. So much so, we lost two observers because of these rampant body rovers. This is November, correct?
Predictions: Partly sunny with high temperatures around 60F. Southwest winds 5 to 10 mph. ======================================================================== Report submitted by Lehigh Gap Nature Center (<mail...>) Bake Oven Knob information may be found at: www.lgnc.org
