Lees et al (2024) speculated that the occurrence of high numbers Nearctic landbirds in Britain and Ireland in September 2023 may have been caused by birds that were migrating south and southeast into the Atlantic being pushed north and east by the offshore storm, subsequently becoming entrained in a storm system that carried them rapidly across the ocean to Europe. While the remnants of Hurricane Lee obviously resulted in the phenomenal events of late September 2023, I wonder whether the notion of migration to sea, and accidental entrainment in rapidly moving storm systems, is the only plausible explanation for vagrancy to Europe by Nearctic landbirds.
Are vagrant Nearctic landbirds mere victims of the weather?
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