bird species

There’s a spot on the boardwalk next to the Town Hall in Duck, N.C., that everyone knows is famous for doughnuts. This morning dozens of customers wait in line for up to half an hour, and the fall menu boasts flavors like Pumpkin Streusel, Pumpkin Roll and Maple Bacon.

A.Chestnut-sided Warbler, one of the many warblers passing through the Duck boardwalk region. Photos by Anders Gyllenhaal.

Only a few yards away there’s another place that should be famous, but very few people have ever heard of it. Here, atop the live oaks and the willows is a different fall menu — the Chestnut-sided, Black-throated Green, Black-and-White, Prairie, Palm, Black-throated Blue and Northern Parula warblers.

Doughnuts are my weakness — oh the lengths I will go and the calories I’m willing to trade. Today at the donut shop there’s a deliciously wicked autumn confection called Caramel Apple Pie (apple glaze with salted caramel drizzle), and my stomach is growing.

These flavors won’t be around for long, but neither will the fall warblers – hands down my favorite birds.

Many of them have flown in from their nesting grounds in Canada and the Northeast, touching down on the Outer Banks only long enough to fatten up for the next leg of a journey to the Gulf of Mexico, then across the waves to their wintering grounds in Latin America. According to eBird, there’s a darn good chance of spotting 15 types of warblers and a “reasonable” chance of seeing 11 others along the boardwalk today between the Methodist Chapel and the Duck Donuts shop. That’s almost a third of all the warblers found in the U.S.

Here’s a video of a Black-throated Green Warbler, frantically collecting fuel for its migration:

We spent many hours during the last spring migration at the crest of Washington D.C.’s Rock Creek Park, hanging out with some of the area’s most experienced birders waiting to see what species would appear next.

When the mornings were slow, the conversation sometimes turned to how unpredictable the migration has become: Some days would be as quiet as July, and others suddenly filled with a flurry of unexpected migrants flying through.

Species in today’s study include many warblers, songbirds and wading birds, such as this Whimbrel. Photo from Cornell Lab by Kyle Horton. Cover photo of Long-billed Curlew is by Nick Saunders.

For years, birders around the country have watched the evidence gather that the bird world has been disrupted.

But this fall, three scientific reports in succession, including a major study released today, have fundamentally altered the picture of what’s happening. Modern technologies are enabling a new level of research about birds, migration, breeding and populations with a precision not possible just a few years ago.

Today’s study is the first to document how birds are starting their spring migration journeys a great deal earlier to keep up with climate change. And while migratory birds are trying to adjust, the research based on 24 years of weather radar data suggests that the intricate balance of when plants flower, insects arrive and birds start breeding are falling out of sync for some of these species.

“How bird populations respond in an era of such rapid and extreme changes in climate has been a black box,” said Andrew Farnsworth, a co-author of the migration study and researcher at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology. “Capturing scales and magnitudes of migration change over time has been impossible until recently.”

How is a warbler like an apple-glazed donut? Both are impossible to resist.

Third major report in succession establishes a new era of bird research

Here are some of the Cornell Lab photos of species that are part of the migration research: