PEEPS

Hooded Crane - Tennessee

On 13 December Phyllis and Sutton Deal found what has been identified as a Hooded Crane (Grus monacha) at the Hiwassee Wildlife Refuge in Meigs County, Tennessee.  Also present for comparison was one Whooping Crane and many Sandhills.  There are no accepted records of this species from the ABA Area.  The Hooded Crane from near Carey Lake WMA, Idaho, 25 April 2010 is not on the Idaho or on the ABA Bird Checklists. Another (same as the Idaho bird?) was reported on 25 March 2011 near Grand Island, Nebraska, associating with thousands of Sandhill Cranes.

On its breeding grounds in southeast Russia and northern China, Hooded Cranes occupy isolated bogs and high elevation forest wetlands making it more secure than other rare endemic eastern Asian cranes.  They spend the winter primarily in Japan with some in South Korea and central and eastern China.  During the winter, 80% of the world population of ~10,000 birds is artificially fed at Izumi on the island of Kyushu, Japan.  A captive breeding program in the world zoo community has 100+ individuals but there have been no releases from this population into the wild (Handbook of the Birds of the World, Volume 3).  The world population of Hooded Cranes is the highest it has been since the 1920s since the artificial feeding program begun in 1952.  This species is held in high regard in both Japan and in South Korea were the bird was named as a National Monument in 1972!

Pink-footed Goose - Massachusetts

On 13 December Marshall Iliff, one of the eBird project leaders, and Ryan Schain photographed an ABA Code-4, adult Pink-footed Goose (Anser brachyrhynchus).  The bird was feeding in the fields of Barry Park at the intersection of Waterford and Woodman streets, Lynn, Massachusetts.  If accepted by the state records’ committee it would become the 5th state record.

As mentioned previously in PEEPS, most ABA-area records of Pink-footed Goose have occurred in the past 25 years, occurring here in both spring and fall.  The breeding population in Greenland and Iceland was estimated at 10,000 pairs in 1989 but had increased to approximately 270,000 by 2005 as reported in Wetlands International’s Waterfowl Population Estimates, 4^th edition.

Pink-footed Goose has a small range.  Besides breeding in Iceland and southeastern Greenland, there is a population on Svalbard (Spitzbergen).  Birds breeding in Greenland and Iceland winter mostly in Scotland and in northern and eastern England (Handbook of the Birds of the World, Volume 1).

Dusky Thrush - Anchorage area, Alaska

On 10 December former star Attu Island guide, Thede Tobish, found an ABA Code-4 Dusky Thrush (Turdus naumanni) at his feeders in Turnagain, southwestern Anchorage, Alaska, associating with a big flock of American Robins.

Dusky Thrush breeds in northern Mongolia, Siberia, and across the Russian Far East to the Anadyr River region to Kamchatka.  They winter in Japan, Taiwan, eastern and southern China, and in the Himalayan region west to northern Pakistan.  In the ABA Area, the majority of reports come from the western Aleutians during May-June and from September-November. Outside of Alaska, one was in Whitehorse, Yukon, in late November; one was at Langley, British Colombia, January-March; one was at Lander, British Colombia, in late November 1994. In the Lower 48, one was reported from Mount Vernon, Washington, in late June 2002. Most, but not all sightings in the ABA Area are attributable to the northern subspecies, T. n. eunomus (ABA Checklist, Seventh Edition, Pranty et al.).

Falcated Duck - California

On 8 December Dan Tankersley found an ABA Code-4 Falcated Duck (Anas falcata), formerly called Facated Teal, at the Colusa NWR, California.  The refuge is located between Williams and the town of Colusa about 70 miles northwest of Sacramento.

Falcated Duck breeds in northeastern Asia on freshwater lakes, rivers, ponds, lagoons, often in wooded country (Handbook of the Birds of the World, Volume 1).  They winter in their breeding areas south to northern regions of Southeast Asia.  South of Alaska, where it is intermittent in spring in the central and western Aleutian Islands, Falcated Duck has been at Tofino, Vancouver Island, British Columbia, where it spent three winters, 1994-1996.  One was collected at Naselle River, Washington (1979); one was photographed and it returned to Coburg, Oregon, for four winters, 2004-2007.  In California, there was one photographed at Upper Newport Bay in the winter of 1969, and one was inland at Honey Lake Wildlife Area, Lassen County, in early spring 2002, returning 2 January-11 March 2003 (ABA Checklist, Seventh Edition, Pranty et al.).  There also have been reports of Falcated Duck from Ohio, Ontario, and Maryland, these birds of unknown origin. 

 They are hunted in large numbers in China for food and for feathers.

Rufous-capped Warbler - Southeast Arizona

On 7 December Laurens Halsey reported an ABA Code-3 Rufous-capped Warbler (Basileuterus rufifrons) below the Florida Canyon dam in the Arizona Santa Rita Mountains.

The Basileuterus warblers are stripe-headed, yellow-bellied, and olive-backed birds of the understory, all with light-colored feet.  Rufous-capped Warbler is often a ground dweller, usually seen with its tailed cocked at a 45 degree angle.  This species is most often found in brush-chocked canyons.  In the core of its range, the Sierra Madre Occidental of western Mexico south to northern Colombia and western Venezuela, pairs maintain a territory throughout the year (Birds of Northern South America, Restall et al.).

Arizona birds, with the pale reddish-brown auricular and with yellow extending to mid-breast, are of the subspecies B. r. caudatus,  compared to Texas birds, subspecies B. r. jouyi, with  rich reddish-brown auriculars and less extensive yellow on the underparts (The Stokes Field Guide to the Birds of North America, Donald and Lillian Stokes). 

Red-flanked Bluetail - California

On 6 December Jethro Runco found and photographed an ABA Code-4 Red-flanked Bluetail (Tarsiger cyanurus) on San Clemente Island, California. The island is not accessible to the public.  If you have an eBird account you may view photographs of the San Clemente bird at (combine both lines of URL):

 

http://ebird.org/ebird/view/checklist/email?subID=

S9289038

This species is called Orange-flanked Bush-robin in Handbook of the Birds of the World, Volume 10, and placed there in the Turdidae, the thrush family, but in the 2011 updates to the Clements Checklist of Birds of the World, they are placed in the Muscicapidae, the Old World flycatcher family.

 Red-flanked Bluetail is found in Finland (very rare) and northwest Russia to northern Japan and from Afghanistan to Nepal. They winter to south China, the Greater Sundas, Myanmar, Thailand, and Laos. In Siberia they breed in taiga in old growth mossy spruce forest with fallen trees and sparse undergrowth.  In winter, they can be found in dense broadleaf evergreen forests where they forage on the ground.  Both subspecies are migratory.  The nominate subspecies is common in much of its range.  They are common to abundant as autumn migrants at Beidaihe, northeastern China (Handbook of the Birds of the World, Volume 10).

Slaty-backed Gull - Niagara River, New York

On 3 December, an adult, ABA Code-3, Slaty-backed Gull (Larus schistisagus) was  found by Kevin McLaughlin at the control gates at Chippewa above Niagara Falls, New York. The sighting was part of a 12 gull day there.  Jean Iron’s photographs of the bird can be viewed here:

www.jeaniron.ca/Gulls/2011/slatybacked.htm                                                

Also in the area was a Purple Sandpiper (Calidris maritima) on a rock above the big electrical building. 

Slaty-backed Gull is a North Pacific species breeding from northeastern Siberia, from Cape Navarin and Kamchatka south to Hoikkaido, northeast Honshu, and Vladivostok.  In the ABA Area, they have bred in a Glaucous Gull colony at Cape Romanzof, western Alaska, and they may nest on occasion in the western Aleutians.  They winter south to Taiwan (Handbook of the Birds of the World, Volume 3). In the ABA Area,non-breeding birds are rare in spring, summer, and fall on Bering and Chukchi coasts and on offshore islands in the Bering Sea.  They are locally uncommon on Alaska's Seward Peninsula and on St. Lawrence Island in fall. In other parts of North America, they have occurred from the Yukon, British Colombia, California, the Great Lakes region and southern Quebec, Newfoundland, Colorado, south to south Texas and even to south Florida (Gulls of the Americas, Howell and Dunn).

Brown Jays - South Texas

Cheryl Longton maintains the feeding stations in Salineno, Texas. On 3 December she reported and adult and a first year ABA Code-3 Brown Jay (Cyanocorax morio).

 

Also on the 3rd in Zapata, Texas, Herine Winas found a male and female ABA Code-3 White-collared Seedeater (Sporophila torqueola) at the edge of the pond at the City Park off of 9th Avenue.

 

 In the ABA Area, Brown Jay was first sighted in June 1972 at Falcon Dam, Texas, by Wally Summer (Birding 5:10) and first confirmed by photographic evidence in June 1974.  It is a (former) resident from the Lower Rio Grande Valley (between Rio Grande City and San Ygnacio) south to western Panama (TOS Handbook of Texas Birds, Lockwood and Freeman).  In their range, Brown Jays occur in two morphs that seem to be random in occurrence, a white-tipped form mostly from arid regions and a brown-tailed form from more humid areas.  The white-tipped morph was formerly treated as a separate species, C. mexicanus.  Flocks of Brown Jays are known to occupy the same range for long periods of time, then they scatter and join different flocks (Handbook of the Birds of the World, Volume 14).  This might be a good explanation as to why Brown Jays are irregular in south Texas.  This is one of the species that has benefited from forest fragmentation and is currently expanding its range in Panama and Costa Rica.

Ruddy Ground-Dove - Southeast Arizona

On 30 November Richard Webster found three ABA Code-3 Ruddy Ground-Doves (Columbina talpacoti) at the San Bernardino NWR/Slaughter Ranch, feeding in the corral/pasture just southeast of the Slaughter Ranch office.

In addition, an ABA Code-3 Rufous-backed Robin (Turdus rufopalliatus) was near the southeast corner of the main pond (House Pond) at Slaughter Ranch in the location named the “Blue Mockingbird thicket”.

In the ABA Area prior to 1978, there were only five records of Ruddy Ground-Dove (all from south Texas). Ruddy Ground-Dove is now found from Southern California to south Texas, mainly from mid-October to mid-May (ABA Checklist, Fifth Edition, DeBenedictus et al.). 

There are four subspecies of Ruddy Ground-Dove ranging from the Pacific Coast of Mexico, C. t. eluta, south to Uruguay and northern Argentina. The species is thought to be mostly sedentary.  They readily move into cleared forested areas and into cities.  They prefer humid areas with lightly wooded semi-open country (Handbook of the Birds of the World, Volume 4).

Brambling - Oregon

On 25 November Lona Pierce reported finding an ABA Code-3 Brambling (Fringilla montifringilla) on the Crown Z trail outside of Scappoose, Oregon, foraging in blackberries with a mixed species flock of sparrows.

Bramblings breed in the Palearctic regions of northern Eurasia and winter primarily in the Mediterranean region and in southern Asia. While breeding, this species is found in birch woods, mixed deciduous woodlands, and at edges of conifer forests.  In the northern parts of its range, it is found in dwarf birch and willow scrub (Finches & Sparrows, An Identification Guide, Clement, et al.).  They are known for eating beech mast and in years when this crop is abundant, as many as 80 million birds have been estimated to congregate. 

In the ABA Area outside of Alaska, Brambling has been recorded from British Columbia, Manitoba, Nova Scotia, Ontario, California, Colorado, Indiana, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Montana, Nevada, New Jersey, New York, North Dakota, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Utah, Washington, and Wyoming (ABA Checklist, Fourth Edition, DeBenedictis et al.).