Magee Marsh Field Report and Photos 2026-05-04

My goal this year is to get up to Magee Marsh once a week for the entire spring migration. Here are my notes from this visit.

Field Notes

Monday, May 4, (May the fourth be with you...)

Finally got some good weather (70°F and Sunny) but a slow day for birds. But not for birders! Now that it's May, people are here in force. After the last few weeks of solitude, it was a shock to have traffic jams on the boardwalk again. And this is just the warmup - next week is the peak migration, and The Biggest Week In American Birding festival.

Rose-Breasted Grosbeak, Magee Marsh Ohio — Rose-Breasted Grosbeak

In spite of all the birders to add extra sets of eyes, I actually saw less warblers than last week, and not many more total birds. It really doesn't feel like migration has kicked in yet.

Grey Catbirds are showing up, as are Warbling Vireos, and the Yellow Warblers are here in force - four of them were fighting over territory in a running battle along the Goose Haven Trail. (Goose Haven Trail is the trail that runs behind the boardwalk - I've been calling it the Estuary trail. Goose Haven and Estuary connect, but they're separate trails.)

I saw a couple of lonely Yellow-rumps - where are they all? I'm usually sick of them, now I'm desperate to see them. I did get a good shot of a Northern Waterthrush at the West Tower, and the Rose-Breasted Grosbeak above was hanging out across the street from the east entrance to the Goose Havens trail.

I'm going back tomorrow (Tuesday) because today was so slow.

Warblers

Nashville
Northern Waterthrush
Palm
Pine
Protonotary
Northern Yellow
Yellow-Rumped

Pictures Gallery

Gear

I was asked in an email, so, here's my gear list:

Sony A1 ii with battery grip
Sony 400-800mm f/6.8-8 G lens (almost always at 800mm)
Blackrapid Sport X strap
Shimoda Explore v2 35L with Large DSLR Core Unit v3 (one of the few core units that will fit the 400-800)
I have the A1 ii set for 1/2000 shutter, f/8, Auto-ISO, with a tracking expanded spot and bird subject detection. Pre-capture is set for 0.5 seconds when I half-press the shutter, and shooting is electronic shutter set to 30fps. The 400-800 is always at 800 (unless a bird gets so close that I can't focus on it at 800).