Birds of Sunset Park: The rite of spring migration

This month, it seems apt to keep things very simple. The reason? It’s May, and spring migration is in full swing, so below I’m delivering a quick primer on this magical time for birders, so that you can go out there and get the most out of it.

Let’s start with the basics: every year, there are two periods of mass songbird migration, one in the spring and one in the fall. In the spring, birds who’ve spent their winter in the tropics head north on balmy south winds, ready to pair up and breed over the summer in cooler climes. In the fall, we see those same birds returning southward, along with their offspring.

Both spring and fall migrations are periods of deep joy for birders, as the number of bird species spikes precipitously, along with the sheer volume of birds in our midst. (When the winds are just right, sometimes more than a million migratory birds will fly over Brooklyn in a single night!) These songbird migration periods are like Christmas, Eid, Holi and Rumspringa, all lumped into one. There is a feeling of building excitement, of abundance, of wonder at the beauty of nature, of immense possibility. With the huge numbers of birds on the move, you very well might pick out a rare bird among the new arrivals at your local birding spot. Or the ground could be carpeted with hundreds of the same species, as can happen when one type of warbler or sparrow moves en masse on a particular night.

A truth that must be acknowledged is that spring and fall migrations are not equal. Fall is monthslong and kinda languid and relaxed, while spring migration is shorter and more intense. There’s a sense of urgency and a genuine magic to spring migration. These birds are on a mission! They are in gorgeous, boldly colored breeding plumage. They are singing and displaying and squabbling with each other, as they ready themselves to find a mate and successfully make babies, thus fulfilling their biological need to sustain their species into the future.

As New York City is on the Atlantic Flyway, it’s a major stopping-off point for migratory songbirds, meaning they descend on the five boroughs in their millions to voraciously refuel before continuing northward to their breeding grounds. As an NYC birder, to wake up on a spring morning during peak migration is to be ushered into a realm rich with birdsong, where the trees are teeming with warblers, tanagers, orioles and vireos, where thrushes are digging around for worms, flycatchers are sallying forth from their favored perches in pursuit of tasty bugs, hummingbirds are zipping around, swallows and swifts are arcing through the skies. In the early afternoon, hawks soar through on thermals (columns of rising warm air that allow them to preserve their energy in flight), and then in the late afternoon, nighthawks start coursing overhead. It’s a cornucopia, a festival, a celebration fueled by the powerful, irresistible desire to create life and survive. It’s a whole circus of avian life that performs every day in our backyard, that every non-birder is oblivious to. However, once you enter the birding dimension and see all the wonders everyone else is missing, a remarkable spectacle hiding in plain sight, there’s no going back.

If any of this sounds like it might be for you, grab a pair of binoculars, download the Merlin app (which is basically Shazam for birdsong), and head to your local green space. The wondrous world of spring migration awaits you!