This essay is about finding no migrants in Cape May.
I lied. Make that miscalculated. Make that misspoke or miswrote….
Fact is there were migrants as I write this on June 16th. I fully intended to write a piece about how I did my regular Monday morning walk and found nothing but Cape May’s breeding birds. Problem was there were migrants, too. 
So I had to change my theme and my plans.
Fact is that June 16th is just about the bottom of the year when it comes to finding migrants. Spring migration begins in January and ends about the tenth of June. The first southbound shorebirds don’t usually reach Cape May before July 20 or 21 and fall migration extends into January. The third week in June is usually the only week of the year when a person might not expect to see migrating birds.
Then on my June 16th Monday morning walk, we traversed South Cape May Meadows, the Nature Conservancy preserve on Sunset Blvd. We recorded 54 species of birds in just 2 hours. Five of them were migrants. These included:
A flock of twelve Double-crested Cormorants. They came in off the water. They headed north up the peninsula. Sure they were all second year birds; nonbreeders. But cormorants don’t breed here and the flock kept on moving.
This makes them migrants.
Also in the “just passing through” category was the Black-bellied Plover that called and kept going. Which way? North. And Black-bellied Plovers rank among the last of the northbound migrants to pass through Cape May airspace in the spring. This one was a straggler.
And then there was the female Orchard Oriole that materialized. It flew in. Flew about. Flew away. This behavior is not in keeping with that of a bird on territory. It is in keeping with a bird that was migrating last night. Came in on the southerly winds. Hit South Cape May. And being new in town, was just checking things out, looking for a place to hang out for a bit.
Same with the female Indigo Bunting that was buzzing around the dunes. It wasn’t in good habitat for breeding. It moved about then moved out. Sure looked like a migrant to me.
The most intriguing sighting was the Bank Swallow. It came in from the east. Sped down the dunes, heading west. It…
Looked and behaved like any number of other migrating Bank Swallows that I’ve seen in exactly this same spot.
But in mid-July. When Bank Swallows migrate through in numbers. This bird was about one month early. Unless it was five weeks late.
Heads or tails. Call it in the air.
Me? I think it was southbound. Which gives us a total of four northbound species and one southbound species. All at a time of year in which you expect nothing but nesting species.
What’s my point? Simple. One of reasons people come to Cape May to go birding is possibility. There is never a day you can go outside and not anticipate finding something new. New birds appear here 365 days a year. What most people think of as fall migration or spring migration is, in reality, just rush hour on the pan-hemispheric migration route.
How about that! Spring migration and fall migration at the same time and at a time when you least expect it.
Ain’t Cape May grand?