Cape May Spring Birding: What Arrives in April vs. May

There are few places in North America which have been birded longer or have more birding advocates than Cape May, New Jersey, one of the planet's most celebrated migratory junctions. Most birders know Cape May for its fall migration, when the numbers are largest and the hawk count is legendary. But spring at Cape May operates on a different calendar and produces experiences that fall cannot replicate: the warbler peak in early May, the Red Knot and Horseshoe Crab spectacle on Delaware Bay beaches in late May, and a seawatch-to-hawkwatch-to-passerine daily sequence that is, for a single day of spring birding, difficult to surpass anywhere in eastern North America.

This guide is built around the question the keyword demands: what is happening in April versus what is happening in May, and what should you do differently in each window.

Why Cape May Works in Spring: The Geographic Trap

It is Cape May's unique location, situated on a south-facing peninsula where the Atlantic seaboard meets the Delaware Bay, that makes it a geographic migrant trap. Birds, both land and sea flyers, sometimes by the thousands, follow the coastline north and once they cross Delaware Bay find themselves in the forests, fields, salt marshes, and wetlands of Cape May, the perfect spot to stop and fuel up before heading to their breeding grounds.

The mechanism is elegantly simple. Birds moving north along the Atlantic coast hit the tip of the Cape May Peninsula and must cross Delaware Bay to continue. Many stop, feed, and rest at the cape before making that crossing. The result is a concentration effect that makes Cape May's seven-kilometer-wide tip hold more migrating birds per square kilometer than almost any other mainland site in the east.

Cape May has been a destination point for birds and birdwatchers for over two centuries thanks to its tremendous variety of habitats: salt marshes, swamp or wet woods, fresh water marshes and ponds, pine forest, saltwater, grasslands, and open fields.

April at Cape May: Seaducks, Early Warblers, and the First Shorebirds

April is the underappreciated month at Cape May. The crowds are smaller, the prices are lower, and the birding is genuinely excellent for a different suite of species than the warbler-focused May peak.

Shore birds arrive a few at a time until they flood the salt marsh like a spring tide in April and May. Black-bellied Plovers (Pluvialis squatarola), Dunlins (Calidris alpina), and Greater Yellowlegs (Tringa melanoleuca) arrive first, advancing with the season, followed by dowitchers, Whimbrels (Numenius phaeopus), Lesser Yellowlegs (Tringa flavipes), knot, Least, Semipalmated and White-rumped Sandpipers.

Staging Red-throated Loons (Gavia stellata) in April are one of the signature experiences of the month. The waters off Cape May Point and along the Avalon seawatch corridor can hold hundreds of Red-throated Loons moving north in April, an understated spectacle that few birders outside the seawatch community know about.

April species highlights: Red-throated Loon, Common Loon (Gavia immer), Red-necked Grebe (Podiceps grisegena), scoters (all three species), Long-tailed Duck (Clangula hyemalis), Osprey (Pandion haliaetus) arriving from mid-March onward, early warblers including Yellow-rumped (Setophaga coronata), Pine (Setophaga pinus), and Palm (Setophaga palmarum), American Kestrel (Falco sparverius), early shorebirds including Black-bellied Plover, Dunlin, and Greater Yellowlegs.

Northbound passerines, warblers, vireos, and the like accelerate through April, peak in early May, and gradually dwindle as the season progresses. An April visit to Higbee Beach and the South Cape May Meadows will produce early warblers in numbers that most birders associate with May elsewhere in their range.

The Avalon Seawatch: April's Signature Experience

The Avalon Seawatch, established in 1993, is one of the country's longest-running seabird counting sites. Located at the north end of Avalon, 20 minutes north of Cape May Point, the seawatch runs counts during the spring seabird movement that peaks in April.

The Avalon Seawatch operates from a sheltered platform with a clear view northeast over the Atlantic. The seawatch records all birds passing the point: loons, grebes, gannets, scoters, Long-tailed Ducks (Clangula hyemalis), mergansers, and occasional alcids. On strong April mornings with northeast winds, the movement can involve thousands of birds per hour.

For a birder oriented to the full Cape May experience, the Avalon Seawatch is the dawn-start that precedes a day at Cape May Point State Park and Higbee Beach. Leave Avalon by 9 AM as the seabird movement quiets, and be at the hawk watch platform for the mid-morning raptor window.

The Cape May Point Hawk Watch: Spring's Different Character

The Cape May Point State Park Hawk Watch Platform is the most famous hawkwatch in North America. The hawk viewing platform at Cape May Point State Park regularly hosts 100,000 visitors each season.

Spring hawkwatching at Cape May is fundamentally different from fall. The numbers are lower, the concentration effect is less dramatic, and the species composition shifts toward species moving purposefully rather than drifting south. But spring has compensations: birds are in full breeding plumage, the light is better in the morning, and certain species like Broad-winged Hawk (Buteo platypterus) produce genuine spectacles on the right late April days.

Migrating raptors in spring include Cooper's Hawks (Accipiter cooperii), Sharp-shinned Hawks (Accipiter striatus), Northern Harrier (Circus hudsonius), Bald Eagle (Haliaeetus leucocephalus), American Kestrel, Peregrine Falcon (Falco peregrinus), and Merlin (Falco columbarius).

The hawk watch platform also serves as an elevated vantage for seabirds moving along the coast and for scanning the meadows below. On a good spring morning, the platform produces raptors overhead, passerines in the surrounding vegetation, and terns and shorebirds visible from the elevation below. It is the single best multi-species vantage point at the cape.

Higbee Beach: The Morning Flight

At dawn on a good day, legendary Higbee Beach offers front-row seats to a feathered fashion show: a steady procession flies by, each bird intent on finding a place to rest as it encounters the natural barrier of Delaware Bay. With a little luck, you can see 20 species of warblers, each in its own colorful costume.

The Higbee Beach morning flight is distinct from the passerine birding in the adjacent fields and woods. The Morning Flight Songbird Count, established in 2003, is an ongoing morning watch and count of returning migrants that were pushed out to sea on their evening migration. This is a chance to see hundreds, if not thousands, of warblers and other passerines making their way back to land.

The morning flight is visible from the dune ridge at Higbee Beach: birds flying low, purposefully northeast, coming in off Delaware Bay at first light. The species mix reflects what migrated the previous night. By 8 AM the flight is largely over and the attention shifts to the fields and woodland edges of Higbee Beach WMA where the same birds are now feeding.

Higbee Beach WMA, with its many fields and deciduous forests just adjacent to Delaware Bay, is often the first stop for exhausted and hungry migrating songbirds and raptors.

May at Cape May: The Warbler Peak and the World Series

Many birders descend upon the Cape May area every spring to witness the spectacle of migration. To some, May is the best month for birding at Cape May, when migrating and resident songbirds, shorebirds, raptors, waders, and seabirds all add to the excitement of birding in this relatively small area. It is no accident that the World Series of Birding is held this month.

The World Series of Birding is held annually in mid-May and challenges birders to count as many species as possible in a 24-hour period, organized by the Cape May Bird Observatory. The event draws teams from across North America and produces the most intensive single-day species counts in North American birding.

May species highlights: The full eastern warbler suite is present: American Redstart (Setophaga ruticilla), Blackpoll Warbler (Setophaga striata), Bay-breasted Warbler (Setophaga castanea), Canada Warbler (Cardellina canadensis), Wilson's Warbler (Cardellina pusilla), plus the resident Prothonotary Warbler (Protonotaria citrea) breeding in appropriate habitat along Bayshore Road. The thickets along here also concentrate Pectoral (Calidris melanotos), Solitary (Tringa solitaria), and Spotted Sandpipers (Actitis macularius) at shallow pools.

Scarlet Tanager (Piranga olivacea), Rose-breasted Grosbeak (Pheucticus ludovicianus), Baltimore Oriole (Icterus galbula), Indigo Bunting (Passerina cyanea), and Ruby-throated Hummingbird (Archilochus colubris) all peak in May. The fields and hedgerows at Higbee Beach host nesting Prairie Warblers (Setophaga discolor), Yellow-breasted Chats (Icteria virens), Indigo Buntings, and Blue Grosbeaks (Passerina caerulea), with Ruby-throated Hummingbirds and Scarlet Tanagers also breeding.

The Red Knot and Horseshoe Crab Spectacle: Late May's Extraordinary Event

This is the experience that separates late May at Delaware Bay from every other spring birding event in North America.

Horseshoe crabs begin laying eggs along the bay beaches in May, bringing millions of birds including Ruddy Terns and Red Knots to the area to feed on the eggs before their long journey north.

Red Knots (Calidris canutus rufa), Semipalmated Sandpipers (Calidris pusilla), and Ruddy Turnstones (Arenaria interpres) feast on recently laid horseshoe crab eggs. These birds need to double their body weight in just a few days to successfully continue their migration north to reach their breeding grounds in peak condition. Their migration north is intricately timed with the horseshoe crab egg-laying.

The Red Knot migrating through Delaware Bay in late May is one of the most conservation-significant spectacles in North American birding. This subspecies winters at the tip of South America in Tierra del Fuego and breeds in the Canadian Arctic. The Delaware Bay stopover is the single most critical fueling event of the entire annual cycle: the birds arrive thin after crossing the Atlantic from South America and must double their body weight in 10 to 14 days. When horseshoe crab egg availability is low due to over-harvesting, the knots arrive thin and depart thin, and breeding success collapses.

The watching sites are the Delaware Bay shoreline beaches north of Cape May: Cooks Beach, Norbury's Landing, Reeds Beach, and Kimbles Beach. The timing is the last two weeks of May, coinciding with the horseshoe crab spawning peak on the high tides closest to the full moon.

Standing at Cooks Beach at high tide in late May, watching tens of thousands of shorebirds swirling over the water and pouring onto the beach to feed, is one of the defining experiences in North American ornithology.

South Cape May Meadows: The All-Season Complement

The Nature Conservancy's Cape May Migratory Bird Refuge is one of the most successful beach habitat restorations on the Atlantic seaboard. South Cape May Meadows is a freshwater wetland and beach system immediately adjacent to Cape May Point State Park, and it functions as the shorebird and wading bird complement to the passerine-focused Higbee Beach and hawk watch.

The Meadows in spring produces shorebirds in the freshwater impoundments including Semipalmated Plover (Charadrius semipalmatus), both yellowlegs, and peeps. Nesting American Oystercatcher (Haematopus palliatus) and the endangered Piping Plover (Charadrius melodus) are present on the beach. Barn Swallows (Hirundo rustica) and Tree Swallows (Tachycineta bicolor) course over the water in spring. And on good migration days, the thickets at the eastern end of the preserve can hold warblers as productive as any spot in the cape.

The Complete Spring Day at Cape May

The day structure that gets the most from Cape May in spring, from the seawatch through the hawk watch to the passerines:

Dawn: Higbee Beach dune ridge for the morning flight. First light, northeast breeze, warblers streaming in off Delaware Bay. Stay until the flight ends around 8 AM, then drop into the Higbee Beach fields and woodland for the feeding migrants.

Mid-morning: Cape May Point State Park hawk watch platform for the raptor window, which builds from 9 AM onward as thermals develop. Scan simultaneously for seabirds along the coast and passerines in the surrounding vegetation.

Midday: South Cape May Meadows for shorebirds and wading birds. The freshwater pools in the preserve are most active in the two hours around high tide.

Afternoon: Return to Higbee Beach for the late afternoon feeding session, or drive north to the Delaware Bay shoreline to scope for loons and scoters moving north. In late May, the afternoon window at Cooks Beach for the Red Knot spectacle replaces all other afternoon activities.

Check eBird throughout: The Cape May region is so thoroughly birded that eBird reports from the morning are available within an hour. If something exceptional has been found at a specific location, you will know about it before you arrive.

Practical Logistics

Location: Cape May is at the southern tip of New Jersey, approximately 90 minutes south of Philadelphia via the Garden State Parkway.

Cape May Bird Observatory: The CMBO headquarters at 701 East Lake Drive, Cape May Point, is the starting point for any Cape May birding visit. Staff naturalists post daily sightings, run workshops, and can direct you to whatever is currently active in the area. Visit the NJ Audubon Cape May Bird Observatory website for current programming and sightings.

World Series of Birding 2026: Held annually in mid-May. Check the NJ Audubon CMBO website for 2026 dates and registration.

Delaware Bay shorebird beaches: Cooks Beach, Norbury's Landing, and Reeds Beach are all on the Delaware Bay shore northwest of Cape May, reached via County Road 641. No admission fee but limited parking. Peak timing is the last 10 to 14 days of May coinciding with the full moon high tides.

Weather and BirdCast: Southwest winds at Cape May in spring produce the best passerine concentration as birds cross the bay and stack up at the cape. Northwest winds after a frontal passage produce the best hawk watch conditions. For the full weather decision system, see our guide on how to read weather radar for bird migration.

The Short Version

April at Cape May means seaducks and loons at Avalon, early warblers at Higbee Beach, and shorebirds beginning to build at South Cape May Meadows. May means the full warbler peak, the hawk watch at its spring best, the World Series of Birding, and the Red Knot and Horseshoe Crab spectacle on Delaware Bay in the last two weeks of the month. Migrants pour through all month and many interesting nesting species are present.

The day structure is the same in both months: dawn at the Higbee Beach morning flight, mid-morning at the hawk watch, midday at South Cape May Meadows, afternoon at the Delaware Bay shore. The species change month by month. The experience remains extraordinary throughout.