ABA Blog

Little Things Can Be Big

We all know that bigger is not necessarily better, but still many people strive for big houses, luxurious cars, grand vacations, high-paying jobs, and the like, as if we could not be satisfied with anything smaller. A few of us, a bit more removed from the mainstream, instead of striving for larger material things, work for large life-lists of birds, or bigger big days or big years. Also, while most birders say that we really like little birds as much as big ones, it’s hard not to become more  excited when we view a Great Horned Owl or a Sandhill Crane than when we view a Screech-Owl or a rail (unless it’s a Rufous-necked Wood-Rail) or a wren. I know that some of my delight in large birds is because they are usually much easier to find and to see.

Sometimes, finding a very small bird can bring much pleasure, however, even if it is not rare. Of course, finding a rare bird is wonderful, no matter whether it is large or small. That is particularly true if we have to work hard to find the bird or if we get a very good look at it.

My thoughts on bird size were set in motion on a recent driving trip that I took in eastern Pennington County, south of Wall. It had been a non-noteworthy drive. I had stopped at my standard viewing areas (the Wall sewage ponds and a lake just north of Quinn), and then headed south across areas with fields and Badland views. The most common birds had been Mourning Doves, Western Meadowlarks, Eastern and Western Kingbirds, Bullock’s Orioles, American Kestrels, Red-headed Woodpeckers, Lark Buntings and Starlings.

A large part of my trip homeward was along Base Line Road, one of the main cross-country roads that heads generally back toward Rapid City from the Wall area. There are miles and miles of grassy, gently rolling golden fields, scattered cows, and very few birds in August along Base Line Road. Nevertheless, I usually drive slowly along the road in any season, windows rolled down, hoping to hear or see something besides grass and cows and meadowlarks. Every now and then, there is an isolated farm house and yard, and periodically, there are picturesque fallen or falling-down old homes and outbuildings, sometimes with a few trees, where I look (usually in vain) for a perched bird. Only a few times are there small ponds or other wet-appearing green areas.

On this particular driving trip, I was wondering whether the Dickcissels had all migrated away already as I approached one such green area. To my delight, I heard a perky little multipart chattery call and of course immediately thought, “Dickcissel” and then immediately realized that it was definitely not a Dickcissel. It was a very unexpected bird, a Sedge Wren!

For those of you not familiar with the normal range of Sedge Wrens, you need to know a couple of things: Pennington County is in far western South Dakota; Birds of South Dakota (Tallman et al., 2002) only shows two sightings west of the Missouri River; the National Geographic Field Guide to the Birds of North America (Dunn et al.) only shows Sedge Wrens in eastern South Dakota; and I had never heard or seen a Sedge Wren in western South Dakota nor talked to anyone else who had. I was ecstatic. The Sedge Wren was singing its head off, hopping up and down in the few low bushes that were out in the… yes… sedges! It was so engrossed in its singing that it ignored me completely as I snapped photos and took videos of the singing bird.

Later that day, after I posted my sighting on the sd-birds listserv, at least a couple of other birders also got to see and hear the singing Sedge Wren.

A Sedge Wren is under five inches long. It is small. But it is one of my biggest sightings for 2013.

So far.

 

“Sharing is Half the Fun of Birding”

That is what one South Dakota birder puts by his signature each time he posts a sighting. Every time I read it, I smile in agreement. Sharing the fun and joys (and sorrows) of birding is why I write in this blog and why I wrote my book, Extreme Birder, and why I just took a trip to Minnesota.

Last winter when I went to the “700 Club” gathering in the Lower Rio Grande Valley of Texas, I met a woman who was interested in my giving a talk about my big year. She is a winter Texan from Minnesota. Eventually she worked it out with three southern Minnesota groups for me to tell each group about my big year in three talks to be delivered on August 7-8. I drove over with my computer and projector and box of books for sale, a trip of about 500 miles each way. The Minnesotans did an amazing job of advertising my talks and we had a wonderful turnout. But the best thing of all was that I got to tell a whole bunch of very interested people, some of whom were birders, about some of my big year adventures. I was recovering from a cold and felt a bit under the weather, but I was so energized by the telling that I forgot my sickness entirely.

In my reliving of some of the events of 2008, showing pictures of birds and places seen that year, I hope that the people in the audiences were able to really feel that birding can be good and there is so much of beauty and interesting behavior and excitement that can be found when we get outside and go birding. I always tell people that one main reason for my doing a big year is to give me an excuse to have fun, day after day, for a whole year. A bad day birding is better than a day not birding (usually).

A little over a week ago, I went to a local park when I had a free hour before a meeting. I did not expect to find a new year bird, and I did not. What I found instead was a pack of crows and jays squawking and diving into a tree. When I crept closer I located the source of all their fury, an unhappy worried Great Horned Owl, hugging a large branch. A small slice of nature, now embedded in my memory and captured on film. Something to treasure, and to share.

I encourage those of you who love to bird to be “evangelical” about it – tell others, not just other birders, of what fun can be had out there birding. We aren’t just fussy twitchers making boring lists of birds. We do it because it’s fun, or at least I do, and I want others to share in the fun!

The Elephant in the Room

I have been trying not to think about doing a big year. The days are beautiful, and even a nutty birder like me finds things to do that aren’t birding. So, actual days go by when I don’t think (much) about my current big years, and much of my birding is not looking for big year birds, but participating in local bird surveys and field trips.

There are so few new birds possible right now in Pennington County, even for the big year that I began July 1^st. Every now and then, I wander to the eastern side of the county about 50 miles from my home to the Wall sewage ponds and a farm lake/pond north of Quinn, the only likely spots in the county for shorebirds. Nearly everywhere else  in the county where there was water in the spring is now dry, in spite of our having had a really good early summer for rain, particularly as compared to last year.

I think I’m conserving my strength/gasoline for the hoped-for later shorebird influx. Even though birders in eastern South Dakota have been seeing great hordes of shorebirds for the past few weeks, the early shorebirds this far west in the state have been fairly sparse. It’s too bad that our very elongated Pennington County isn’t even more elongated, but that’s the way it is.

Pennington County goes all the way to the Wyoming border on the west, so at least we have lovely Black Hills birds in Pennington County even though our shorebirds are a bit sparse. My most recent “special” bird in Pennington County was the result of a search in the far western hills of the county. I had heard that sometimes in years past it has been possible to find Clark’s Nutcrackers over there, and there was one recent eBird report too, so on July 18^th I went to an area of the state I had not explored before. On a narrow gravel road, west of most of the hills themselves, I wound my way through piney areas and open flowered meadows, looking and listening.

As I came to an area of mostly pines, I heard a distant raspy call, and then a single Clark’s Nutcracker flew into the top of a nearby pine. In all my South Dakota birding, I had only seen two other Nutcrackers, flying overhead last winter, not in Pennington County. I was delighted to add it both to big year A (begun January 1) and big year B (begun July 1).

But now, I’m trying not to think about big year birding for a while, at least not until later in the week, when I just have to go over to Wall and try again. The elephant comes and goes.

 

Why on Earth?

It’s not easy, but somebody just has to do it.

I think doing overlapping big years is just an extreme example of what all of us, even non-birders, do all the time. We chose to make our lives more complicated than they already are.  At least that’s how what we do is often perceived by others. I often have difficulty in figuring out why I do what I do, so I’m sure that I do not understand others and I’m sure that there are as many reasons for our behavior as there are people. For now, I’m just going to comment on a few reasons why I (and many others) bird so much.

Looking at my bird photographs is one of the best ways for me to begin to understand why I am such an obsessive birder. Each photograph brings back memories of an adventure, a moment of startling beauty, a delightful glimpse of nature.  Although we all know that birding can sometimes be boring or frustrating or too challenging, any time that I spend birding almost always brightens the day and improves my whole outlook on life. While I’m birding and taking my photos, I’m hoarding the memories for a non-birding day (even I have non-birding days).

 

Beginning a big year in the middle of a big year definitely reduces the non-birding days. Just when the summer doldrums have made my first big year (“big year A” begun on January 1) screech to a slow crawl, I now have the pleasure of having the excuse to race around for new birds for my second big year (“big year B” begun on July 1). Just yesterday, I was delighted to add Spotted Sandpiper to my big year B big year. In the last couple of weeks, I’ve delighted in finding my first Burrowing Owl for the new big year (at a nearly abandoned prairie dog town), my first Red-headed Woodpecker (one of many on fence posts in eastern Pennington County), my first Sharp-tailed Grouse (a mother and about 6 chicks along a gravel road) and 112 other species, and 112 others. But who’s counting?

So far, there are 223 species on my big year A list and 115 on my big year B list. But especially in my county big year, it’s not really about the numbers. Really. Each number is short-hand for my adventures and moments of wonder that led to that number, as are my photographic samples. Even now, as I write, I’m eagerly planning where I’ll go next (as soon as possible) to add to both big years. Will it be the Black Hills or one of the few lakes in the county or a drive of the gravel country roads or…? I can hardly wait.

 

 

Double the Pleasure

I've got a trick question: where in the U.S. can you begin a big year, and on day 1 do the following - - begin the first day of the big year hearing a Dickcissel, and follow with Upland Sandpiper, Eastern and Western Kingbirds, Cordilleran Flycatcher, Red-headed Woodpecker and many more species, and end the day with Common Poorwill? 66 species in all. Of course, this is not much of a trick question for those of you who read my blog post two weeks ago. While I don't  think there are many places that all of these birds, or even many of them, can be found on January 1st in the U.S., my most recently begun big year did not begin on January 1st. It began yesterday, July 1st! These birds are birds that I saw on July 1st in Pennington County, SD. I expect that there are quite a few places where all those birds can be found on July 1st.

As you now know, I've done it. I've started another big year - in the middle of an ongoing big year that is a “normal” big year, begun on January 1st. Two big years at once. At least they are in the same geographic area. I do not have to be two places at once.

I know it’s strange though. I've attempted to explain the idea of doing two overlapping big years at once to a couple of other birders and they just stared at me with blank faces. It is true that most birders don't really understand why someone would do any kind of big year, so how could they understand someone doing two simultaneous big years? At least I didn’t start either big year in the middle of a month as Ted Floyd did. I think that there’s only so much confusion I can tolerate.

But for a big year aficionado, why not give it a try to do overlapping big years? The confusing thing for me, however, is how I’m going to keep track of it all. Only one day has gone by, so I still can remember all the birds that I’ve seen in my one-day old big year (which I'm calling "big year B" in an attempt to keep the two big years straight). I know that I will soon run into difficulty trying to remember which birds have been seen in which of these two years, but right now in “big year A” (begun Jan. 1), I’ve seen most of the Pennington County possibilities, so for a couple of weeks until migrants start trickling noticeably through the county, I can probably concentrate on big year B birds that I’ve already seen in big year A but not yet in big year B. Are you lost already?

The whole mental thing about doing two big years at once is perhaps a reason do them both. I have a birding friend, who also learns to sing complicated pieces of music to keep her brain agile, and I have done Jumble and Sudoku puzzles for the same reason. Using the brain on complicated things is supposed to ward off, or at least delay, mental problems as we get older. So doing two years should keep my brain struggling and therefore sharper.

The real reason to start a big year now, however, is that in July it’s great fun to be seeing each bird species as new for the year. Driving down a prairie road yesterday on July 1, the Lark Buntings and Horned Larks and Grasshopper Sparrows were no longer just more of the same that I’d been seeing for weeks. They were new for big year B, and that made me see them and appreciate them all over again. I laughed out loud in delight at the beautiful song of a Western Meadowlark filling my car with notes, and screeched to a halt to see four Common Nighthawks all sleeping on fence posts near each other. Everything seemed bright and new and more exciting than it had the day before. I know, it’s all in my head, but how can it be wrong to be so in love with birds and birding that I want to give myself yet another excuse to spend more time outdoors where the birds are, and to help each day feel newer and brighter?

It’s All So Arbitrary

Ted Floyd’s ABA blog post last week has gotten me thinking, first specifically about the arbitrariness of big year starting dates, and then about all sorts of other arbitrary things, bird-related and otherwise. Below are a few arbitrarily chosen thoughts on the arbitrariness of big year timing, bird species definitions, what birds are “countable”, and birding area definitions.

In Ted’s post (go read it now), he discussed the beginning of his big year that began in June (not January!), and not even on June 1^st but on June 8^th. He also discussed the overall arbitrariness of our calendars beginning on January 1^st, which is clearly an odd thing, but I won’t discuss further.

Why are big years begun at the beginning of the calendar year; why not begin whenever you want? It’s odd that everyone’s birding big years, all of them as far as I know, until Ted, begin on January 1^st. Which date the big year begins shouldn’t make any difference in the final result, except no matter when you begin, you are likely to be more worn out at the end than at the beginning. Being worn out on a snowy dark, cold December day is much different than being worn out on a beautiful, uplifting spring day.  If there are aren’t many likely new year-birds around in December it doesn’t much matter if there is little energy left. But could a weary big year birder at the end of a big year in May do the needed nonstop birding to have a chance of finding a large number of new year-birds? It would be like beginning a career at the end of life, a bigger challenge I think than beginning it in the “prime” of life. But many people do find the energy to make career changes later in life, and I expect one could find sufficient energy to go birding at the end of a big year no matter when it ended. It’s all in the motivation.

A big year birder not only makes an arbitrary choice on when and where to do the big year, but also faces other arbitrariness imposed by others. Normally (with the exception at least of Ted), big year birders try to follow the ABA rules on which birds are “countable” (i.e., wild birds) and how the species are defined. If you really want to consider arbitrariness in a birder’s world, think about speciation. Birds just don’t fit neatly in any type of species definition. Just consider all the back-and-forths of lumping and splitting species – e.g., Northern Oriole, Traill’s Flycatcher, Northern Flicker, etc. that have occurred, and continue to occur.

This lumping and splitting of bird species is not just a plot to get us to buy new bird books – there are real reasons for the uncertainty on where the lines should be drawn. If one were going to start from scratch to delineate bird species, one could easily double or triple the number of species that were defined by using color variations or geographic separation or song differences or…. Alternatively, you could halve or reduce even further the number of species by lumping together anything that has ever interbred. We’d probably have just a couple of gull species in the U.S., which would certainly make life easier for us non-larophiles. When a big year birder arbitrarily chooses a year in which to do the big year, if the birder follows the rules on how the species are defined, the number of possible species for the big year will depend on which year the big year is done, and in particular, on whether any bird species have lately been lumped or split.

The bottom line for all of this is that you’ve got to start somewhere if you are going to do more than just admire the beauty of birds, if you are going to write down birds seen at all. You’ve got to call them something. It’s helpful to be able to discuss these birds with someone, so some type of generally accepted classification system comes in very handy for this. But it’s still very arbitrary.

And if you are going to try to see as many birds as possible in a given time period (i.e., do a big year or big day or big hour…), the time period has to start at some specific time on some specific date, and the area (a county, a state, the ABA area, etc.) needs to be defined in which the big whatever will be done. (I’ve arbitrarily decided not to discuss further the clear arbitrariness of county, state and country borders and the definition of the “ABA area”.) January 1^st is as good as anything as a beginning point for a big year, but, as Ted said, it’s definitely not the only possibility. I really do like his idea of starting on a different date than January 1^st. I also can’t stop thinking about the idea of doing overlapping big years that his post brought to my mind. It’s hard to wrap my brain around what it would be like. For example, what would it be like to be in May of a particular year and have a House Sparrow, an American Robin and a Cliff Swallow be a new year birds for a big year that had begun May 1^st, with only the Cliff Swallow being new for the overlapping big year than had begun four months earlier on January 1^st? And then imagine doing more than two overlapping years at the same time. I have been imagining it, but I’m not sure that even I am a gung-ho enough big-year birder to attempt it. We shall see.

 

Announcing the Big Year Contest Winner

On May 22nd, my Pennington County big year list reached 200 bird species for the year with the sighting of Sanderlings in Wall, SD. That means that my contest for people to guess when I would get to 200 species is over. This was much earlier than I expected it to happen. Most of the people who entered the contest also guessed that the date would be much later in the year than May 22nd.

MADELINE BAUER of Mira Loma, California, however, was very close with her guess of May 25^th and is the winner of the contest. She disclosed to me that she is a statistician, and used the data table that I provided on my previous big years to estimate the date when I would get my 200th bird for the county.  She worried that maybe she had an unfair advantage, but we all know that there are many unpredictable things about birds that just don’t fit into statistics very well. She also used her experience/knowledge about migrants in May. It was an unusual (for west South Dakota) assortment of migrant warblers that made the 200^th species come quicker than I expected.

I sent Madeline her prize of a signed copy of my Extreme Birder book, and asked her to tell us a little about herself and her birding. So, let me introduce you to Madeline Bauer, in her words:

Where she likes to bird:  “Anywhere, everywhere, the birdier the better!”

Why she likes to bird: “The challenge, the puzzles, the solitude, the exercise, the companionship, nature, ... “

Her special birds: “Snowy Owl, White-tailed Kite, Gray Flycatcher, Evening Grosbeak”

How long she’s birded: “I got hooked in 1999 - my brother and I took our step-mom (at 80 a self-taught amateur photographer) to Alaska.  In planning the trip, she said she'd like to see swans and cranes.  In the process of researching where to find those species in Alaska, I got hooked, even before we got to Alaska!”

Whether she’s done any kind of big year: “The closest to a big year is my "local patch" year list, which I started doing in maybe 2008 when I read about some birders starting a "birds by bicycle" list.  So I wanted to see how many I could see on foot.  130+ the first year, not much by Big Year standards!”

Other things about Madeline:  “My birding has had a big change for the better, starting in early January when I got hearing aids!  They have 4 programs, #1 for normal speech, #2 for speech in noisy places like restaurants, leaving #3 and #4 for birding! I met with the audiologist weekly for the first 3 months and he would adjust the programs based on the bird call CDs I took to him and my experiences in the field.  Obviously I birded every minute I could spare! But I couldn't have done it without a great birder friend who went out with me, patiently pointing out the calls and songs that he heard.  If I couldn't hear those, I'd make notes and have the audiologist make adjustments to the programs, enhancing the soft  or faraway sounds and de-emphasizing the loud, close sounds (crows, House Finches, etc).  About 2 weeks after I got them, we went to the mountains to look for Evening Grosbeaks.  A couple of other birders were looking along a road, walking west.  So I started walking east by myself and suddenly I realized the grosbeaks were muttering to themselves in the tall trees above me. Wow!!  A $6000 lifebird!!

Each time I go out, whether in my front yard (17 acres) or the local wildlife areas or even Magee Marsh, I'm excited, anticipating seeing something new.  Maybe a new species (wow!) or learning something new about birds and their behavior, like a House Wren struggling to get a 6 inch stick inside a 2 inch pipe where it must be trying to build a nest! And, now that I have my hearing aids, there's the added excitement to learn new sounds and try to match those sounds with the bird singing/calling!  Always something new!”

Thank you everyone who entered the contest, and congratulations to Madeline Bauer!

Of course, my BIG YEAR CONTINUES, and I am now at 218 species. Some of the best birds seen lately that I also photographed are Red-headed Woodpecker (now fairly easy to find in the county) and Cassin’s Finch (found in the Black Hills, but not common there). Things are becoming very slow, but there still are possible birds that I may find. In my wildest imagination, I think I might reach 235 species for the year, but even that is a bit of a stretch. Stay tuned…

Springing Forward

It doesn't matter where you do your big year. Spring is always a nonstop proposition - if you can handle it.

I thought that doing a county big year would be so much more simple than a state big year, and really tons more simple than an ABA big year. It is true that there is a much smaller area and fewer possible birds in Pennington County than in South Dakota, Texas or the ABA area. But when spring arrives, no matter where you are, there is pandemonium if you are doing a big year. Birds are coming, some to stay and some to pass on through. It's the passing through migrants that are the main challenge. When will they get here? Where will they stop on their way through? How am I going to be where each species is when it is there? What will I do when/if the rains come and turn the gravel roads to slime?

All I know is to keep on going, check the likely warbler spots, which are few and far between in western South Dakota in a drought, check the few large puddles for shorebirds, explore unknown areas to see what might be there and repeat until there are no new birds to be found.

Right now we are in the midst of a few rainy days. After a weekend out of Pennington County at a SDOU meeting (where there were lots of migrants, which of course were not countable for my big year), I came home desperate to get some more warblers for my big year effort. Last year there very few warblers found west-river, especially compared to the numbers seen to the east of here. Things have been better so far this year than last, but it seemed that more birds should be there somewhere.

One of the best places for warblers in Pennington County seems to be Jackson Park in Rapid City. I've been trying to go there nearly every day for the last couple of weeks, and it has been worth it. Recently, Jackson Park has allowed me to add Northern Waterthrush (infrequent here), Palm Warbler (very uncommon here), Ovenbird, Blackpoll Warbler, American Redstart, and Tennessee Warbler as well as Western Tanager to my county year list.

But the very best bird at Jackson Park was a Prothonotary Warbler today (May 20). Last year when doing my South Dakota big year, I learned that I was VERY unlikely to find a Prothonotary Warbler in the state, and I did not find one, nor do I think anyone else did. Today when an orangey-yellow bird with a dark, white-spotted tail dashed across the path though the rain ahead of me I could not believe it. I forced my way through brush and waded out on to the mud at the edge of the tiny trickling creek and there it was, a golden bit of bird working the downed branches in the stream.

In too short a time, all the migrants will have moved on. The breeding birds that haven't already been ticked off for the big year will need to be located before all the birds leave again. Some time before fall migration I'm sure that one could rest, and maybe even sleep. I'm hoping that is more possible in a county big year than in a big year in a bigger area. We shall see.

P.S. The Prothonotary Warbler was bird species #191 for this year in Pennington County. 

 

Open Mic: A Record-breaking Bahamas Big Year

At the Mic: Woody Bracey

Elwood D. Bracey, MD, is a retired physician who now lives in Treasure Cay, Bahamas, where he is very active in the birding community.

--=====-- 

January of 2012 started auspiciously. The early part of the month saw several productive Christmas Bird Counts and some rare birds in The Bahamas. And I watched the film The Big Year. Those circumstances persuaded me to challenge Tony White's single-year record of 198 species, and by the end of January, I was already up to 155, a new monthly record for me.

The Grand Bahama CBC tallied Western Kingbird, Hermit Thrush, Ruby-crowned Kinglet, Louisiana Waterthrush, and White-throated Sparrow, all very rare in The Bahamas.

A rough road trip to Hole in the Wall in southernmost Abaca gave us three Kirtland's Warblers. And the good birds just kept popping up.

All the expected wintering species were joined by a Swainson's Hawk (a first for the Caribbean, well photographed by Bruce Hallett at left) and a Horned Lark. The Horned Lark required a trip to Nassau, where the bird was feeding in the short grass of a golf course with Palm Warblers and Least Sandpipers.

A highly unusual Greater Scaup was well documented on Hobby Horse Lake, and the lone Anhinga on Paradise Island, later photographed by Linda Huber, may have been the last survivor among the birds that once bred there. I also added a Gadwall at Harrold and Wilson Ponds, a female Shiny Cowbird at Rainbow Chicken Farm, and the Cuban Grassquits and Pied Imperial Pigeons of central Nassau; those latter two species, introduced many years ago, are now well established, as is the Caribbean Dove, originally imported from Jamaica for hunting—and smart enough now to spend most of its time hiding in the dense understory of the Bahamas National Trust Botanical Garden.

The free-flying exotic waterfowl kept by Pericles Maillis in the western suburbs of Nassau often attract wild migrants, among them the beautiful male Northern Pintail that joined the Green-winged and Blue-winged Teal and White-cheeked Pintails on the pond.

More controversial was the Caribbean Coot, with its high white frontal shield, found on the abandoned Shark Golf Course; though the AOU recognizes this species, others, including David Sibley, have their doubts. I counted this species, and in fact found another good candidate later in the year on the pond at the Treasure Cay Golf Course; both were photographed by Tony Hepburn. A Black-headed Gull, present as an immature in 2010-2011, returned in 2012 as a handsome adult, molting into its dark-headed breeding plumage during its stay.

Back on Abaco, the Organic Vegetable Farm maintained its status a the best place to see Bahama Yellowthroats (hundreds!). We also had a Chipping Sparrow, a second White-throated Sparrow, American Pipits, and a young male Ruby-throated Hummingbird. Nine Barn Owls crowded into a single large ficus tree overlooking a recently plowed field, attracted by the same mice and rats that kept the Swainson's Hawk there all winter, too.

Several early February deepsea fishing trips turned up Magnificent Frigatebirds and Audubon's Shearwaters, but no Manx, which are possible at that time of year. A favorite spot for sparrows, the Big Bird poulty Farm south of Marsh Harbor produced such good wintertime finds as Lincoln's, Savannah, and Grasshopper Sparrows, along with American Robins, American Pipits, Dickcissel, Blue-headed Vireo, Nashveille Warbler, and a Northern Rough-winged Swallow. Most frustrating was a Swainson's Warbler that popped up for Bruce Hallett to photograph while I, just ten feet away, missed it. Nothing would bring that skulker back out again.

Spring migration can be a non-event in The Bahamas. But 2012 was different. I'd never seen so many migrants, especially thrushes and seed-eating birds. After a cold front with rain on April 24, I counted 20 Veeries, 24 Gray-cheeked Thrushes, and 2 Swainson's Thrushes at Angelfish Point. Later that day I had a Wood Thrush along the Treasure Cay sewage outfall. Four migrant thrush species in one day is a once-in-a-lifetime thing in The Bahamas!

Swallows were numerous, too, including Bank and Cliff among the commoner Tree, Barn, and Bahama Swallows. A lone Chimney Swift was seen high above the coppice, where I found Red-eyed Vireos and Eastern Kingbirds and yet more thrushes along a narrow trail. Our backyard feeder was a riot of color with Painted and Indigo Buntings galore, two Blue Grosbeaks, and a male Rose-breasted Grosbeak. The grosbeak stayed for a week, but a female Ruby-throated Hummingbird was a one-day wonder. That same last week of April saw such summer residents as Gray Kingbird, Black-whiskered Vireo, and Bahama Mockingbird return and set up territories, while Blackpoll Warblers continued to pass through until mid-May.

In early May, Bridled, Sooty, Roseate, and Common Terns followed the Least Terns back to The Bahamas. Then came the White-tailed Tropicbirds, the Antillean Nighthawks, and the Great, Cory's, and Sooty Shearwaters. Finally, on May 12, after hearing the birds deep in the coppice, I saw my first Key West Quail-Dove for the year at Angelfish Point.

June is the month for fishing tournaments and deepsea trips. We continued to see good numbers of pelagic species, including a Black-capped Petrel fifteen miles off Munjack Cay. Most exasperating was the mid-afternoon revelation one day by the mate that he had seen a "Jesus Bird" cross our wake earlier in the day; I never saw a Wilson's Storm-Petrel on a single one of the ten or more deepsea trips I made in 2012.

Abaco was quiet for the rest of the summer, but trips to other islands really helped my list. With the help of Ed Rahming and Lewis Phillips, my late-June adventure on South Andros added Great Lizard Cuckoo, Indian Peafowl, Bahama Oriole, and eleven Cave Swallows. In July, my wife, Betsy, and I added Pearly-eyed Thrasher and Red-footed Booby on San Salvador, where surprises included a Purple Martin, an American Avocet, and lots of Gull-billed Terns.

The expected Snowy Plovers were nowhere to be found, but the endangered subspecies of the West Indian Woodpecker was easy to find along Jake Jones Road. 

A storm in late August brought some unusual fall migrants to New Providence. Most notable were the Arctic Tern and the two Black Terns seen on the stony shores of Lake Killarney by Paul Dean and Tony White and photographed by Tony Hepburn. By the time I got there, two other much-needed birds, a Sandwich Terns and a female Boat-tailed Grackle, had left: I would have to wait 'til later in the year for them.

Back on Abaco, we had the pleasure of the company of a young American Flamingo on Maillis's Pond through the summer.

Unbanded and not yet entirely pink, this was most likely a second-year bird. The flamingo departed at the end of September, but a Wilson's Phalarope, the first for Abaco, appeared on the very same pond October 2, spinning and feeding with several Greater and Lesser Yellowlegs.

At the Poultry Farm we had an Empidonax Flycatcher, an Eastern Wood-Pewee, two Blackburnian Warblers, and a tantalizing thrush. Browner than a Gray-cheeked Thrush, the bird did not vocalize, and though we suspected a Bicknell's Thrush, we did not count it. The farm near Treasure Cay gave us several sightings of a Philadelphia Vireo and a Great Crested Flyatcher, a Blackburnian Warbler, several Tennessee Warblers, and a lone Cedar Waxwing were at Robert's Nursery. Most exceptional was the second Bahamas record of a Warbling Vireo, seen on October 18 near Marsh Harbor with Becky Marvil, who got diagnostic photographs of the bird.

The arrival of Hurricane Sandy on October 26 was much worse than predicted. Three days later, I met Bruce Hallett and Margo Zdravokovic on Grand Bahama to look for birds blown in from the continent. An Eastern Bluebird, perhaps only the second record for The Bahamas, was feeding at West End among the distressed swallows, pipits, and Palm Warblers. The 25 Common Terns at West End Point were exceptional; among them were two Sandwich Terns, the only ones I saw all year. At McClean's Town, on the eastern end of the island, we found two Clay-colored Sparrows, well photographed by Hallett.

Back on Abaco, an Orange-crowned Warbler was in the Avocado Grove at the Big Bird Poultry Farm in mid-November, and a House Wren and a Swamp Sparrow, both extreme rarities, were photographed at the always interesting Cooperstown Dump. The next day I found a Wilson's Warbler at Robert's Nursery, and on November 23 I had a Swainson's Warbler in the exact spot at the poultry farm where Bruce Hallett had photographed the bird in the spring. That same day I watched a seemingly large, silent Myiarchus with a pronounced yellow belly. Brown-crested Flycatcher? Maybe, but it did not call, and I did not count it. 

I thought I'd missed the Chestnut-sided Warbler for the year, but on November 28, one emerged from the deep coppice into plain view. Another miss avoided!

A visit to Great Inagua was essential for several species, so Hallett and I met in Nassau and went on to Matthewtown, the only settlement on the most southerly island of the The Bahamas. It had rained for two weeks straight, roads were flooded, the mosquitoes were ferocious. But we could watch thousands of courting American Flamingos, and we added Roseate Spoonbill, Snowy Plover, Burrowing Owl, and a bonus American Wigeon to my year list. 
The most amazing sight was of a Peregrine Falcon nailing an exceedingly rare Greater Scaup on the ponds; the scaup survived, dazed. We were interested to find a population of Red Jungle Fowl living in the woods far from any human habitation; Warden Henry Nixon told us they had been there for years, but I listed Gallus gallus as an exotic, uncounted species.

Back in Nassau, on November 28 I saw a Caspian Tern from Tony White's deck. Tony, competitive as he is, congratulated me on breaking his Bahamas big year record—a real friend!

The end was in sight, and I made a big push in the last two weeks of the year with three Christmas Bird Counts. First up was South Abaco, where we located another House Wren. Nassau was next, with another Wilson's Phalarope loafing with the Black-bellied Plovers; a female Boat-tailed Grackel flying in front of my vehicle finallly checked off a bird I'd missed several times during the year. Two Bahama Mockingbirds, seen with the CBC compiler Neil McKinney, were also good finds for the early winter.

A sunny Christmas Day was made even more joyous when I saw my first Red-breasted Mergansers in over two years. The Green Turtle Cay mudflats were alive with shorebirds, including 52 Red Knots, an all-time high count for that species anywhere in The Bahamas.

Next morning I flew to Grand Bahama for one last shot at the scarce Brown-headed Nuthatch, which had eluded me three times during the year. On December 27, at our third and final stop, when my friend Bruce Purdy had already got back into the vehicle, I heard the call; not one but two of these little tree creepers came in close to pose for pictures, going up and down and upside-down on the Caribbean pines. What a delight, and what a brilliant end to my big year of 242 species!

New Year's Eve was a welcome end to the frenzy: it was our anniversary, and I promised my wife that she would be a bird widow no longer. Many thanks to her and to all my good birding friends for their help. 

 

Sparrow Time Plus

I haven't always appreciated sparrows. The more colorful birds tend to get more attention and to be more eagerly sought and more easily identified. When I'm doing a very serious big year, sparrows are often more problematic to find than the other birds that I “need” because of their cryptic coloration and often  sneaky habits.

One nice thing that I've found about a county big year is that it makes me look for every possible bird species, including sparrows, but there is more time than in a state or ABA big year to actually look at all the birds.

Right now the sparrows are finally, I think belatedly, arriving in Pennington County. Just as in Texas it seems that the western part of the state is always behind the eastern part of the state.  I've been hearing for way too long about all the "east-river" migrant sparrows. A few of them had trickled into west-river last week, when I found two Lark Sparrows east of Rapid City, and then when I returned home, there was one in the yard along with the Chipping Sparrows that had replaced the wintering American Tree Sparrows. I was delighted to find that today (May 6) was a very nice sparrow day in Pennington County, with newly arrived  sparrows popping up along my county wanderings.

It started at our weekly Canyon Lake survey when we had our first Clay-colored Sparrow joining a small group of White-crowned Sparrows that have only been around a week or so. The Clay-colored Sparrow was a bit shy and we were not certain of its identity until it began buzzing from the brush where it had disappeared. This evening two Clay-colored Sparrows also joined the five White-crowned Sparrows in our yard.

After the Canyon Lake survey, I drove east to Wall by way of a long stretch of gravel roads. My main goal, as had been the case for days, was to get my first Upland Sandpiper, which I did. There were two of them talking to each other after their long journey.

Shortly after the Upland Sandpipers, there was a muddy puddle beneath a bridge that had attracted more White-crowned Sparrows and two other sparrows that at first would not let me get near them. So I stood at the edge of the road and waited and scanned the grassy fields nearby. Eventually the sparrows returned. They were oh so drab. At first I was thinking "Brewer's Sparrow" but they were just too plain. Finally I could see pink beaks and white eye rings and a smudgy rusty crown -- two Field Sparrows, new for the year.

I'm still hoping for Harris's (Fort Worth Audubon's logo bird), and possibly Swamp and Brewer's Sparrows, and Lark Bunting. Of courses, there are also many colorful birds that should arrive soon. It's so much fun looking and finding!

For those who are interested, following is an UPDATE on my big year: as of the end of May 6th, I have seen 150 species in Pennington County (see http://www.lynnbarber.com/id92.html for information on birds seen so far). I'm still a ways from 200 species (about which quite a number of you made guesses as to when the 200^th bird would be added to my list), but right now things are moving along at a nice clip. This coming weekend is the West River Migration Count and I've been assigned some great areas in the portion of the Black Hills that is in Pennington County. Great possibilities coming up... Stay tuned!