1907
May 8
  Early morning cloudy & showery. Remainder of day
sunny and warm with light S.W. wind.
  Although the weather conditions were much more
favourable for bird migration than they have been for
a week past I did not note a single arrival today.
What is still more surprising there seemed to be a
dearth of all kinds of birds, even of those that have been
here for weeks, and most surprising of all but few of the
birds which I did see sang at all, even in the early
morning. Even the Song Sparrows and Field Sparrows were
almost silent. A Thrasher was singing in the late
afternoon and two Robins gave me a fine concert at
evening. Robins, by the way, are almost as scarce here
now as they were in Cambridge when I left there last
week. Partridges are even scarcer comparatively. I doubt if
there are more than three or four on the whole place.
The drumming station on the old wall in the Barrett Run
is deserted this year for the first time since I have known it.
  As twilight was gathering this evening I heard a
Woodcock peeping in the direction of the Berry Pasture.
Going there at once I found he was beyond my boundary
wall in Mr. Howe's pastures. He sang a dozen times or
more at short intervals while I was there. I watched
him through the whole of one flight & most of another.
On both occasions as he was making the series of
short downward plunges at the height of his song I
saw him tilt first on one side then on the other, with
first one wing & then the other pointing straight upward
while its fellow pointed directly earthward. In other