28. April 2026

Conditions look good for a big coastal flight tonight (Apr 28-29) after midnight

A dry cold front is forecast to enter the northern region of western NY tonight by 2am. Winds will shift from out of the southwest to northerly across western Lake Ontario and shut down cross-lake migration. Winds will have been out of the southwest and favorable for migration across western NY and western Lake Ontario through midnight, conditions favorable for nocturnal bird migration. The weak frontal system will cause light northerly winds at the western end of the acoustic monitoring transect and shift to stronger out of the west toward Rochester - as shown in the Apr 29 2am forecast map from Windy.com below..

Below is the live wind map from Windy.com at 11pm.

And below are the warbler & sparrow calling totals across the array from 9pm-11pm.

All stations had higher calling totals from 10-11 than they did from 9-10. Braddock Bay had nearly 150 calls between 10-11 which on the Z scale is Z1.5. We are on track or a big night... expecting calling to increase further as the front sags southward.

Just past midnight and calling at the Braddock Bay station has continued to increase, reaching Z2.2 last hour (220 calls). First night White-throated Sparrow has dominated.

Below is the wind from Windy.com at 1am on the 29th. The Braddock Bay station maintained Z2.1 calling rate between midnight and 1am.

Below is the final 9pm - 5am warbler & sparrow call tally from across the transect. 8 stations reported calls in near real-time, one station the internet is down, two stations have unknown issues, and the Hilton School District station is not operational yet.

In the jargon I use, the Braddock Bay Station had a Z2 megaflight, which translates to an average of 200 calls per hour over the 8-hour sampling window. In the three hours from 1am to 4am reached z3.levels.as seen in the hourly calling chart below.