The first Common Nighthawk I’ve seen this spring was sleeping on a willow-tree branch when I discovered it late last week. It could be a local nester; it could be a migrant. It breeds throughout North America with the exception of high-Arctic areas. Nighthawk might be its name, but it is most active at dawn and dusk. Spring migrants are most often seen alone. In the fall, the bird become gregarious, seen in flocks of dozens or hundreds from July into September as it moves south. Listen for its “peent” call above shopping-center parking lots this summer as it hawks insects attracted by lot lamps. It’s short bill opens to a gape to sweep insects out of the air.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, May 27th, 2009 at 1:03 pm and is filed under Bird biology, Bird identification, Bird migration. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.