Gray Flycatcher in Pennsylvania! ~ November 24, 2023

On Thanksgiving Day, Amish birders Christopher Yoder and Ivan Byler along with Jay Zook discovered a Gray Flycatcher, an Empidonax flycatcher that is normally found in areas of sagebrush in western states! The bird was on their farm in Mifflin County, about a 2 hour and 45 minute drive from home. I checked around to see who was interested in going in the early morning on Friday. Jason couldn't go and Rick was in Cape May, so I texted Mike & Corinne Schall to see if they were thinking about going. Mike was going to wait for Adam to get out of work in the morning. I wanted to be there around sunrise, so I ended up going by myself.

I left around 4:00 AM and got there just before sunrise. More birders began arriving and we spread out around the area looking for the bird. There was still no sign of it as of 11:00, so the possibility that it had moved on looked more and more likely. A good number of birders left. I decided to go to the car and eat one of my sandwiches while warming up a little at the same time. Around 11:30, Kurt Engstrom came to his car, which has parked behind mine, and said that the bird was on the white fence! I jumped out the car, grabbed my gear, and headed down there. By then, the bird had flown and disappeared. One of the few remaining birders spotted it on the back side of the patch of scrubby trees next to the fence by the house. Soon after, I spotted it between two of the trees, got several birders on it, and began taking photos. Unfortunately, the bird was terribly backlit, but I was able to get one photo showing the dark tip on the orangish lower mandible, its short primary projection, and longish tail with white edgings.

A poor photo showing the bill, short primaries, and longish tail of the Gray Flycatcher.

Soon after, the bird flew to the back (west) edge of the scrubby area and was lost again. A few of us walked the treeline along that back edge but couldn't refind it. It wasn't until over two hours later that someone spotted the bird back at the original spot by the fence. Again, the lighting wasn't that great and many branches blocked views of it, so I decided to walk back over to the treeline where the lighting was much better. Thankfully, the bird eventually returned to that area and perched up in full view near me. That's when I got these photos of it.

Note the long, thin bill showing a yellow-orange lower mandible with a dark tip, the white around the eye running through the lores and across the top of the bill on a grayish head, two wingbars, and whitish throat with a yellowish wash on the belly.

It moved to another perch that was mostly open where I got more photos of different angles of it.

Note the grayish head slightly contrasting with the olive-washed back, the bold white edgings on the short primaries, and the white edging on the tail, in addition to the previously mentioned identification points.

Other birds seen there while looking for the flycatcher included 2 Black Vultures, a Northern Harrier, a Cooper's Hawk, 2 Bald Eagles, 3 Common Ravens, 5 Eastern Bluebirds, 8 American Goldfinches, 4 White-crowneds, 3 Field, 2 White-throateds, and a Savannah Sparrow among the Songs, and this nice Red-headed Woodpecker that I only managed to get poor photos of.

Red-headed Woodpecker

If accepted, this would be a 1st Pennsylvania record and a bird only previously recorded in six eastern states! Many thanks goes to the landowners for allowing access to their property, giving many birders the chance to see this historical record.

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