I’ve no idea whether the smoke may affect the migration of the raptors that usually pass over Hawk Ridge. The internet and search engines yielded this assessment of the effects of smoke on raptors, but nothing on migration disruption. The Audubon Society has an assessment of how wildfires affect birds. If there’s still smoke plumes in northern Minnesota, it would be wise to protect your own lungs and wait until 2022 when we hope conditions will improve.
Taking an optimistic view that the wildfires soon will be contained and the smoke will dissipate, here’s a timeline we photographed several years ago at Hawk Ridge.
Hawk Ridge primary migration timing
Photo by J. Harrington
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The current count for this year has been dominated by songbirds and nighthawks, although some raptors have been seen. If you follow the link on the raptor count, and check last year’s dates, you might be able to get a sense of when the migration peaked.
Evening Hawk
From plane of light to plane, wings dipping throughGeometries and orchids that the sunset builds,Out of the peak's black angularity of shadow, ridingThe last tumultuous avalanche ofLight above pines and the guttural gorge,The hawk comes.His wingScythes down another day, his motionIs that of the honed steel-edge, we hearThe crashless fall of stalks of Time.The head of each stalk is heavy with the gold of our error.Look! Look! he is climbing the last lightWho knows neither Time nor error, and underWhose eye, unforgiving, the world, unforgiven, swingsInto shadow.Long now,The last thrush is still, the last batNow cruises in his sharp hieroglyphics. His wisdomIs ancient, too, and immense. The starIs steady, like Plato, over the mountain.If there were no wind we might, we think, hearThe earth grind on its axis, or historyDrip in darkness like a leaking pipe in the cellar.
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