- Peak spring bird migration in Mississippi starts in late April for southern counties and continues into mid-May for central and northern areas.
- BirdCast provides real-time migration maps and alerts, showing millions of birds in flight across the state.
- Residents can help migrating birds by turning off nonessential lights overnight and making glass safer.
- Several species, including warblers, orioles and grosbeaks, are migrating through Mississippi during this period.
Millions of birds will be in the skies near you this week. Late April starts peak spring bird migration for South Mississippi, and areas in the north of the state will see heavy traffic through the middle of May.
Be on the lookout as flocks head north, mostly overnight. The pattern will be over by early summer but start again in just a few months when they start back south for winter.
Cornell University's Bird lab hosts gives daily summaries of radar-based nighttime bird migration. With it,you can watch the progress of birdsas they move across the nation, plan birding near you and eventrack how many flew over your countythe evening before.
The system uses radar because most species migrate at night, some at altitudes as high as 15,000 feet, and aren't visible to the naked eye.
Here's what you need to know in Mississippi about when the most birds will be migrating this spring, what species you might be able to see in your backyard and how to help make your property bird-friendly to help them get where they need to go safely.
When is peak bird migration?
In Mississippi, peak migration can be expected from April 21 through the first of May for the southern counties. Central and north Mississippi can see heavy traffic from about April 24 into mid-May.
In the contiguous United States, peak spring bird migration runs approximately between March 1 and June 15, though some species migrate earlier or later. Fall migration is generally between Aug. 1 and Nov. 30.
Peak migration is defined by the seasonal window during which about 50% of nocturnal bird migration traffic passes through an area.On a map you can see a wave of peak migrationmove up from the southernmost United States to the far north as temperatures slowly rise over the course of the spring.
BirdCast developed peak migration forecasts for 1,000 U.S. cities. In Mississippi:
- Jackson: April 24-May 11.
- Hattiesburg: April 24-May 10.
- Gulfport: April 24-May 10.
- Biloxi: April 21-May 11.
- Meridian: April 24-May 11.
- Southaven: April 27-May 14.
What to know about bird migration maps
BirdCast has live, local bird migration alerts so you can see who's flying through your area at any time.
The BirdCast maps predict traffic for three hours after sunset. Colorado State University and Cornell update the maps every six hours. Check online for the latest each day at birdcast.info.
The site also offer migration alerts for your city so you can get advance warning. For example, the migration forecast over Jackson, Hattiesburg, Starkville and Biloxi are high for April 23-25. It's only a medium for Oxford most of those four days, but there's a spike to high on Thursday, April 24. It's still medium level in Southaven, but peak migration is still coming for the northernmost parts of the state.
Who is migrating near me?
BirdCast offers local migration dashboards for specific states and counties too at birdcast.info/migration-tools/migration-dashboard/.
About 14.7 million birds crossed Mississippi from 7:40 a.m. Tuesday, April 22 until 6:30 a.m. April 23. About 19.6 million birds are estimated to be in flight over the state. (All birds don't cross in a single evening.)
An estimated 2.5 million birds crossed over Hinds County Tuesday night, and about 2.3 million swept over Rankin County.
Species moving over the Magnolia State about this time of year include:
- Great crested flycatcher.
- Ruby-crowned kinglet.
- Yellow-rumped warbler.
- Blue grosbeak.
- Wood thrush.
- Orchard oriole.
- Yellow-breasted chat.
- Eastern Kingbird.
- Yellow warbler.
- Kentucky warbler.
- Tennessee warbler.
- Scarlet tanager.
- Swamp sparrow.
- Easter wood-pewee.
Other kinds migrating close to the Jackson area also include:
- Indigo bunting.
- Rose-breasted grosbeak.
- White-throated sparrow.
- Baltimore oriole.
- Yellow-throated vireo.
- Summer tanager.
- Cedar waxwing.
- White-eyed vireo.
- Yellow-throated warbler.
- Forster's Tern.
Why do birds migrate?
In North America, birds typically fly south for the winter before food is less available during the colder months, then back north in the spring to take advantage of growing insect populations, budding plants and good nesting locations.
Come winter, those same birds will fly south again to escape the cold and find better food sources.
There are five types to look for, with larger birds tending to make longer trips.
◾Permanent residents: These are birds who don't always migrate, sometimes because there's enough food where they live. They can include the the American crow, the common raven, mourning doves, wild turkeys and in Florida many types of herons.
◾Altitudinal migrants: These are birds who change altitude, not location, generally up or down a mountain. Think of the Rocky Mountains and birds such as Clark's nutcracker, the mountain chickadee and rosy finches. Whether higher elevation birds move depends on local conditions.
◾Short-distance migrants: These can include the eastern phoebe, the yellow-bellied sapsucker and the song sparrow.
◾Medium-distance migrants: These are birds that migrate a few hundred miles. They might breed in the Northeastern U.S. and winter in the Southeast. Some breed in the eastern deciduous forests and migrate to Central and South America or the Caribbean. These are often shorebirds. Species include many types of warblers, the western tanager and the snow bunting.
◾Long-distance migrants: These birds fly thousands of miles, often from the northern United States and Canada to wintering grounds in Central and South America, sometimes as far as 8,000 miles. These areoften shorebirds, including birds that breed on the tundra and winter in southern South America. Some species include the arctic tern, Hudsonian godwit, long-tailed jaeger and the bobolink. The blackpoll warbler songbird can fly as far from Alaska to the Amazon.
Exactly how birds know where and when to migrate, especially those that have never made the flight before, is still something of a mystery. Research shows that the length of the day, smell, the location of the sun and the stars and even sensing Earth's magnetic field are all involved.
Changes to when plants first bud and insects become available due to a warming planet are wreaking havoc with some species' migration patterns.The mismatch of their migration with food sourcesputs them out of sync with what's available, leaving them hungry just when they need to eat so they can breed.
How can you make your home, backyard friendly for birds?
To aid birds as they migrate, ornithologists urge Americans to turn off nonessential lighting from 11 p.m. to 6 a.m. during peak migration periods. Bright lights can attract and disorient birds that migrate at night, potentially causing fatal collisions with buildings.
Researchers suggest going lights out overnight for the full migration period from Feb. 1 to June 15. But that's not always doable.
Still, BirdCast recommends dimming lights in the busiest three weeks of migration near you. That's how long it takes about half of all the avian nomads to get past the region.
You can also make glass safter during the day by applying film treatments or vertical lines to break up the flat surface visually. Otherwise, birds can fly into a window at full speed, which can cause hurt them or kill them.
Could spring migration spread bird flu?
Elizabeth Weise is a national correspondent for USA TODAY based in San Francisco. Email her at eweise@usatoday.com.
Bonnie Bolden is the Deep South Connect reporter for Mississippi with Gannett/USA Today. Email her atbbolden@gannett.com.
