Date: 11/5/26 6:19 pm From: Yaukey, Peter via ALbirds <pyaukey...> Subject: [ALbirds] morning flight in Arlington Park in Mobile today
ALBirders:
As I have mentioned in earlier posts, I have been commuting a couple times a week between Pensacola and New Orleans across southern AL and MS.
I am a fan of morning flight (continuation of nocturnal migration into the early morning hours), and I have been trying to investigate whether concentrated movements of this sort occur on the shores of water bodies along the Gulf Coast. This usually is most evident after cold fronts (of which we have had especially few this fall!), and I can normally only squeeze out brief stops during my commute.
I have targeted spots on the east and west shores of Mobile Bay, and also a few places in Pensacola when I am there.
As I posted previously, after a cold front in mid October, I had a large flight dominated by Indigo Buntings moving north along the western shore of Mobile Bay, at Arlington Park near the Mobile Downtown Airport. In my brief visit the sky was filled with hundreds of birds moving north.
A visit to the southeast corner of the bay system of Pensacola (at Navarre) after the next front a bit later in Oct, produced 1500 or so birds moving up the bayshore, dominated by Yellowrumps.
After last night's front, a 15 min stop at Arlington Park in Mobile again this morning again produced a sky filled with birds, 600+, dominated by Yellowrumps but also with 110 Robins and a handful of waxwings, all moving north. This pace extrapolates to c. 7000 per hour, if sustained.
Flush with excitement from Arlington Park this morning, I made another brief stop, on the west side of the Pascagoula River Marsh in Mississippi, scanning from the I-10 rest area. Birds were also moving north there, 210 passing north in a 7 min timed observation. The birds were to the east, over the water. They were small, my guess would be Yellowrumps. I was standing next to the parked trucks, it could be there is better viewing from the marsh interface in the eastern end of that rest area. By this time I was pushing the hour when a flight would normally taper off, so it possible it was even stronger earlier in the AM.
Birders at South Pt in New Orleans, another morning flight spot on the shore of Lake Pontchartrain, reported 6000 birds engaged in morning flight over the course of a few hours while I was visiting the sites along I-10 this morning. Surprisingly, they had unusually large numbers of kinglets (both species) mixed in with the Yellowrumps, so it may not be safe to assume all the small birds at Arlington and Pascagoula were Yellowrumps. And of course, Pines etc can mix with them as well.
I find all this very exciting, but there is only so much I can figure out with brief 10 minute stops during my commute! If anyone feels the inclination to visit Arlington Park or the rest stop on the west shore of Pascagoula River Marsh on the mornings after cold fronts that come later this month (including this weekend), I would very much like to hear what you see!
