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Writer's pictureJohn J King II

Monomoy in Autumn: Shorebirds in Motion

Updated: Oct 29

As the colors of nature mellow and the weather patterns change from the warm and steady southwest sea breezes of summer into the cooler more easterly flow here on the Outer Cape one is aware of the change of season.


Monomoy NWR - Powderhole looking SW

Semipalmated sandpipers gathering

 

This year we have had some pretty fierce low pressure systems deliver the message that winter is coming to the Northwest Atlantic. In September we even had a full on Nor’easter which delivered nearly 10 inches of rain to our little town while a strong and steady surf pounded our outer beaches hard for several days even changing the slim channels we had mapped out to transit the Chatham Bar all summer. Still when the conditions allow it is a wonder to get out onto the Atlantic side of our outer beach and witness the changing of the guard of many bird species terns, shorebirds, egrets, osprey and others that pack up and leave heading to warmer climes for our winter returning in the late spring. These beauties are replaced by the arrival of the vast fleets of sea ducks consisting of common eiders and scoters that return to Cape Cod waters by the 10s of thousands from the Arctic to feed on shellfish in the waters of the Cape and Islands for the winter. Other ducks and waterfowl including mergansers, long tailed ducks, buffleheads and even the largest seabird in the NW Atlantic, the northern gannet all return to the Cape and Islands at this autumn time for the winter.


Magnificent Long Tailed ducks arriving

Eiders and Scoters returning to the Outer Cape in late October



In particular I love to watch the passage of shorebirds through our region. They are so tiny and their migration paths are so vast. It is an annual extraordinary feat that these birds which include sandpipers, plovers, red knots, yellow legs, willets, oyster catchers and many other species, travel sometimes nearly 10,000 miles in one direction to get to their winter feeding grounds from their breeding grounds in the arctic! And then they return the next year!

 


One place near Chatham which is a reliable observation area for migrating shorebirds is the Monomoy National Wildlife Refuge. Recently I made the pilgrimage down to the southern end of the refuge – a place locals refer to as “Powderhole”. It is a tidal area of brackish waters covering sand and mud and rich with the small crustaceans that shorebirds crave and feed on voraciously as they fuel up for their onward flights south. It can be found at near the southern tip of what is now known as South Monomoy Island. But you need a boat to get there.


Taking a day off from the white shark research program and joined by fellow shark skipper Josh Higgins and spotter pilot Wayne Davis we ventured down Monomoy for a surgical strike in the rising tide at mid day on the Aleutian Dream.

The AWSC white shark team off duty, birding on Monomoy

JJK on a mission (Josh Higgins photo)

Spotter pilot Wayne Davis on his day off birding at Powderhole

Yellowlegs takes off

Whimbrel in flight

Various species of peeps with a young Common tern

Black-bellied plovers

Oystercatchers among semipalmated sandpipers

Least sandpiper

Red knot heading south to Argentina soon

Sanderling

Pectoral sandpipers

Semipalmated sandpipers

Hudsonian Godwit looking sharp

Dunlins

Hudsonian Godwit

Short-billed dowither

Red knot (left) with Short-billed dowitchers

Wayne Davis photo

Black bellied plover (left) among Dunlins and possibly other species

Peregrine taking off at MNWR

Hudsonian godwit

Dunlins huddle at high tide.

Peregrine on the hunt

Ponds at the Powderhole on MNWR - Wayne Davis Photo

Wayne Davis Photo - MNWR South end

Photo by Wayne Davis - Notice GWS at bottom. Semipalmated sandpipers in flight in Shark Cove.


Monomoy NWR - October 2024 (Wayne Davis Photo)


This video celebrates the seven generations of descendants including Edwin Frank Lewis and his friend Joseph Shattuck who first came to Chatham to hunt birds in the early 1880's. Their children, Joseph Shattuck IV (1871-1917) and Fannie Boyden Lewis (1874 - 1970) married in 1895. We are their Legacy.

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