Today's report brings news from Chincoteague National Wildlife Refuge, one of the hawk migration hotspots along the Atlantic seaboard. However, this is not the only route Raptors take on their journey south. This map shows some of the best places in North America for watching raptor migration during the fall. For the viewer, these sites work like a magnifying glass, concentrating the hawks and bringing them into view. In most other locations, the birds are spread out over great distances and are harder to see.
Many raptors follow lake shores, mountain chains and ridges during migration.
Depending on the weather, hawk traffic varies at these sites from day to day and from year to year. This fall, a peregrine was tracked by satllite telemetry from Alberta, Canada to Veracruz, Mexico. As shown on this map, Chincoteague National Wildlife Refuge is located on the eastern shore of Virginia, between 2 major peninsulas. At Chincoteague National Wildlife Refuge, our fifth stop on our national wildlife refuge tour, wildlife biologist Irvin Ailes cranes his binoculars to the sky. To the naked eye, all you can see are hundreds of tiny dots, souring and circling overhead.