Fall is an active time for migratory birds, and for birdwatchers too.
There’s plenty of information on the Web to plan a trip anywhere in the country–from the East Coast, where hundreds gather to watch hawks and other birds land on their way south, to the Pacific, where you can see sea birds and also migratory mammals making their annual trek.
For New England wildlife, check out the Allens Pond Wildlife Sanctuary on the southern coast of Massachusetts. Get onto the Massachusetts Audubon Web site––and then go to the “Jump to a Sanctuary” link. Allens Pond is a well-managed salt marsh with a half-mile stretch of beach where more than 300 bird species have been recorded. The Mass Audubon Web site lists a host of upcoming programs and volunteer opportunities for bird-lovers.
Farther south is the famed Cape May on the New Jersey shore, where hundreds of thousands of birds pass by in the fall–including hawks, eagles, and osprey. The Cape May Times has plenty of information for birdwatchers on its site––including weekly bird sighting reports from the Cape May Bird Observatory Hotline and a listing of birding cruises.
Birdwatching comes in all styles. Some birders like organized tours where someone else handles the details and gets them to the birds. But if climbing mountains is your thing, check out the year-round Hawk Mountain Sanctuary in east-central Pennsylvania at . Nearly 20,000 hawks, eagles and falcons pass by the sanctuary each fall. The sanctuary has eight miles of trails. The site has a bird count that’s updated daily and has been recording raptor counts since it was founded in 1934.
Still heading south, you come to the Outer Banks of North Carolina, where the local business-sponsored site steers visitors to tours at places like the Pea Island National Wildlife Refuge on Hatteras Island. The site has an updated bird count. And it highlights the group’s annual birding festival in November, which will offer seminars on things like photography and decoy-carving and lots and lots of birding tours by foot or kayak.
Out West, birds nest in cactuses, not salt marshes. To find them, get into Birding Sites Around the World, found at . It leads visitors to birdwatching Web sites in every state. The Arizona site, for example, lists some birding facts (it says Arizona has 94 of the 246 species endemic to North America) and several birding Web sites from around Arizona. Madera Canyon in southern Arizona is known for its hummingbirds; see them also at another general birding destination, .
Two Monterey Bay sites offer a good introduction for birders who are heading for the Pacific Coast. Visit to see examples of the wildlife that live around the 6,000-foot-deep underwater canyon under the bay. It’s too late for Monterey Bay’s September birding festival, but don’t worry; the site says more than 400 species of shorebirds, ducks, geese, seabirds and songbirds spend the entire winter along the California coast.
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