And lo, it was May all of a sudden...

...and it was good.

The weather and fates conspired just so last night, to cause a fine fall-out of the little feathered crack-vials known as Wood Warblers on this incredibly improbable and wrong-facing location known as Cape May Point.

No fewer than 23 Parulid species got tallied by me in four hours covering a stretch I can usually do in two, tops. Four Vireos, both eastern tanagers, ditto for orioles, Wood Thrushes, Veery, Blue and Rose-breasted Grosbeaks (Now there is a bird- what a fine, fine thing is a male Rose-breasted Grosbeak-good lord), smart black Bobolinks overflowing with bubbling burble coming from the hay, and everywhere the eye-searing blue and ultimately cheerfully paired pharases of Indigo Buntings (sweet-sweet, dear-dear, see-see, here-here)

Birds were everywhere. Summer tanagers so pumped on hormones that me imitating "Picky-tck" back at them caused an investigation of my face at 3 yards; yamaka donning Wilson's Warblers singing their doppler-effect Chimney Swift-esque song; Parulas buzzing every and anywhere; fire-throated Blackburnians singing so far up the chromatic scale they attracted the attention of dogs, and plump little wide-eyed Nashvilles peering around oak blossoms all the while singing their big schizophrenic song. And the ultimate as far as I am concerned, Audubon's "Black and Yellow Warbler" the perfection that is a Magnolia. No Bird-of-Paradise, nor Andean Tangara, nor alpine Sunbird has anything on a male Maggie in May. To paraphrase a certain brit- The creator was having a particularly good morning when he dreamt up Magnolia Warblers. Had his Wheaties, got a little lovin and a good night's sleep the night prior to be sure.

It was a good morning.

And birds were just a part of it. There are still far too many Red Admirals and American Ladies around the Cape May peninsula to be considered normal.

And mercifully, everything's gone green. The saltmarsh, the freshwater marshes, and the forest. Easy on the eyes, viscerally comforting, energizing, green. With a capital "G".

May Apples under the American Holly understory deep in the back of Higbee's Beach

Round-leaved Sundew (Drosera rotundifolia) a fascinating insect-eating  carnivorous plant that most birders trample at Higbee's

One never knows what lurks around a corner in May

This tom was thoroughly nonplussed by my presence

Until I gobbled at him. Then he forgot the object of his attention and checked me out.

And there, as soon as she showed herself, he turned tail and followed. Apologies-these were thru a handy little point-n-shoot zoomed up as far as it could. But you get the idea.

Red Admirals are still everywhere one gazes in Cape May, many tattered as this

And the even further tattered remnants of many litter the beaches and roads

Questionmarks are likewise easy to see. This one was strangely cooperative for the usually athletic and wary butterfly

Red Admirals ar eliterally everywhere one's eyes rest- and most are not that tattered at all really

American Ladies too are far too abundant right now

And anyone who disputes that a May Laughing Gull is not one of the most handsome creatures in the Western Hemisphere clearly has no soul, and must be a replicant in need of having a Blade Runner hunt down his/her sorry ass.