I’ve described before the massive movement of birds in both spring and fall. Note that the fall migration is larger than the spring one, with juvenile birds increasing the birds’ numbers.

Most of the smaller birds (passerine birds) will have quietly flown over our heads at night, with most of them well south of the Times News region by the time you read this column.

Today, I’d like to give you a short report of what I’ve seen, what the official hawk counters have logged, and most important, what you can still expect.

You’ve noticed, I’m sure, that your backyard robins have disappeared. Well, they may not have gone too far, with most moving into some wooded areas in post-breeding dispersal.

However, I’ll note that when I lived in the Ashfield area, I often pulled out a folding chair, and just before sunset I would watch small flocks of robins seeming to just mysteriously appear. Eight or 10, then another group, later a bigger flock, all taking flight to migrate after dark.

Late risers, blue jays, will take off from those same forests and woodlots, but in the daylight hours. It is particularly neat if you sit on a ridge top and watch them fly a hundred yards, alight on the top of a tall oak, and then 30 seconds later join their friends in a scattered flock of sometimes 15 or maybe even dozens of birds. The jays’ peak migration time is now in full swing.

Blackbirds, in particular the grackles, left your neighborhood spruce trees by early July, but now huge flocks are massing and getting ready to move to the harvested grain fields of Delaware and Maryland.

On the morning of Sept. 23, in the Franklin Township woods, my Merlin app helped alert me to grackles. Soon after, the trees near me seemed to explode with birds. I observed a huge flock, almost entirely grackles, flying just over the treetops for seven minutes. Impossible to count, but certainly, a few thousand birds.

This is another reason I love being “out there,” because you just never know what nature spectacle or sighting you will have. It’s TOT and RPRT (time on task and right place, right time). You won’t see them everywhere, but if you see a flock, stop and enjoy the sheer numbers that might impress you, too.

Some of the birds from their northern breeding grounds have arrived. I noted the first northern junco on my big grackle day, and the white-throated sparrows have returned, too.

Think small, and you may locate the diminutive ruby-crowned and golden-crowned kinglets here, too. The latter will feed here in the hemlock woods until early April, while the ruby-crowns may only be seen for a few more weeks until they move a little farther south. They’ll grace the woods again in April when they move north again.

I was pleasantly surprised to see a nice movement of monarch butterflies one evening in late September, when between 5:15 and 6:45 p.m. I watched nearly a hundred fluttering their way southward while I was seated atop the Blue Mountain. I hope that is a sign of a small population spike. Look for them until the first really cold nights arrive later.

Hawk counters at the Hawk Mountain Sanctuary hawk watch recorded nearly 11,500 broad-winged hawks this September. Now only one or two stragglers will drift by, with most of the East Coast population probably massing somewhere along the Texas coast. Through mid-October, the sharp-shinned hawks will be the bulk of raptors migrating along the ridge.

Get out there and sit for just bit and catch a few migrants still moving through our neck of the woods.

Test Your Outdoor Knowledge: Which of these raptors will dominate the hawk counts in late October and November. A. ospreys; B. bald eagles; C. golden eagles; D. red-tailed hawks.

Last Week’s Trivia Answer: Witch hazel flowers appear as they begin losing their leaves each autumn.

Email Barry Reed at breed71@gmail.com