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  1. Mysticete

    2024 ABA Checklist update

    https://www.aba.org/aba-clc-report-03-2024/ Of note, is addition of European Goldfinch as a countable ABA Bird, and the addition of three vagrant species: Kentish Plover, Ainley's Storm-Petrel (based upon satellite tracking of tagged birds, not actually seen by anyone in person), and Southern...
  2. Mysticete

    Time calibration and Linnean ranks in birds

    I thought about making this part of making this a part of an existing thread, and it has certainly come up several times. But I think its a distinct enough idea to deserve its own thread, even if a whopping four people care about this stuff here (lolz?) I am a taxonomy nerd. Before I was even a...
  3. Mysticete

    Princeton 75% book sale

    Fellow Bibliophiles! Princeton this month is having a 75% off sale on select books (the books being different whether you are in the US vs the UK) A lot of really good books too! so if you are interested in stocking up, check the link below (I managed to score 8 books for a hundred bucks!)...
  4. Mysticete

    The Hollow Kingdom by Kira Jane Burton

    I know generally most of the discussion here is on non-fiction (and usually field guides), but I just read finished reading this book, which I think folks who are also fans of genre fiction might be interested in. The book itself is set in Seattle in the immediate aftermath of a global zombie...
  5. Mysticete

    Humans May Have Driven Twice as Many Bird Species to Extinction as Previously Thought

    Kind of gives you a sobering number there...~1,200 species is the estimate. Which makes sense if you consider island endemics. It's very likely for instance that the Mediterranean islands had a whole host of really cool endemic birds, that we just don't have evidence for because humans took them...
  6. Mysticete

    21 US species officially declared extinct

    I doubt folks were holding out much hope for Bachman's Warbler or these other birds still being around, but it's been made official https://biologicaldiversity.org/w/news/press-releases/21-us-animals-plants-declared-extinct-2023-10-16/
  7. Mysticete

    Question: Vocalizations and Species limits

    Hey folks, This question has been bugging me for a bit, and I was hoping some folks here might have a better idea of the answer. We know that for many birds vocalizations are important, and are in fact a key trait that limits interbreeding and thus a good indicator for species status. With of...
  8. Mysticete

    AI and rare birds

    Earlier today on Facebook a post was shared to a group I belong to, of some horses on a beach in the outer banks next to a giant sea turtle. It was an awesome image and I can get why it was shared, especially if your knowledge of sea turtles was limited. However, most people quickly came to the...
  9. Mysticete

    Subspecies groups and future splits

    Hey folks, I am in the process, while working on my own checklist project, of trying to compile a better and more consistent list of future splits using the subspecies group concept. So far I have made it through Sandgrouse in my project, but that is a bit to cover so below I will just...
  10. Mysticete

    Taxonomy in-flux updates

    Seems like it might make more sense to have one thread to cover updates to the site, rather than scatter them everywhere, or have to create new threads for groups without existing ones. Anyway, the most recent one: July 25 Loons:There's only one relevant work on Loons, Sprengelmeyer's (2014)...
  11. Mysticete

    Clements 2023 Checklist Update

    Alvaro Jaramillo, on his facebook page, posted a link to a comparison between the 2022 vs the so far unpublished 2023 update. Presumably this isn't a final draft but gives some insights into the next round of changes. Most of the changes reflect recent IOC or NACC updates or are bringing...
  12. Mysticete

    Best place in Europe for a short birding trip in June?

    Hey Folks, I have a conference that I might be potentially attending, next June (Specifically, towards the end of the month) in Belgium. Since I am already going to be across the pond, I figured it might be good to fit in a short birding trip before or after, preferably someplace with a...
  13. Mysticete

    Tapaculo-fest: A week in Northwest Ecuador

    Having just returned from Ecuador yesterday, about time for me to put together a trip report! First, to set things up, NW Ecuador has always been very high on my wishlist of Neotropical birding destinations. For years I have read the tour reports of Tropical Birding and fantasized about...
  14. Mysticete

    How do you keep your lifelist, and what is included?

    Recent threads have made me curious. I know people use a bunch of different systems, from special software to homemade excel lists to physical paper. I also am not sure what exactly is put in by different folks. For me, I assume the bare minimum is a bird name, date seen, and location. I would...
  15. Mysticete

    Birding goals for 2023

    Well it's that time of year! So what are folks plans and goals for the new year, as far as birding and related hobbies (Butterflies, mammals, herps, what have you)? My biggest planned event is a dedicated birding trip to Ecuador in June. Outside of that my plans are more nebulous. There are a...
  16. Mysticete

    The next 10 ABA (North American) splits - 2022

    Hey folks, Sometime this spring I am going to be giving a talk on bird taxonomy to my local birding club, and my idea is to sort of do it as a update to Sibley's original list of what he thought the next ten bird splits would be...
  17. Mysticete

    The Murmuring - Cabinet of Curiosities

    It's rare that my dual interests in horror and birding collide, but I figured folks maybe looking for some Halloween-themed ornithological entertainment might want to check out the 8th episode of Cabinet of Curiosities. Directed by the woman who also directed The Babadook, the episode is a...
  18. Mysticete

    Clements/Ebird 2022 Taxonomy update

    Worth I thought devoting its own thread to: https://www.birds.cornell.edu/clementschecklist/updates-corrections-october-2022/ https://www.birds.cornell.edu/clementschecklist/download/ I don't think with my limited list (and my use of IOC), this suggested anything "new" for me, but does...
  19. Mysticete

    Opinions of Wings or Tropical Birding Tours?

    Hey folks, I am currently thinking of trying to head to Ecuador next summer, and I am considering going on the Mindo Valley tour run by Wings, which is about 8 birding days hitting up the usual sites. This will be my first trip to South America, although a couple of years ago I did bird Panama...
  20. Mysticete

    Parulidae

    I didn't find a generic thread on taxonomic changes for New World Warblers, so I will start one here with this new paper on Wayne's Warbler: Genomic variation in the Black-throated Green Warbler (Setophaga virens) suggests divergence in a disjunct Atlantic Coastal Plain population (S. v...
  21. Mysticete

    Costa Rican Taxonomy

    North American Birds has an interesting article from Steve Howell and Dale Dyer, covering potential splits from Costa Rica; Some of these splits will appear in the upcoming Mexico field guide as well as the in progress Costa Rican book. The article ends in a giant table listing all potential...
  22. Mysticete

    Swamphens, Storms, and Skeeters: Birding South Florida in June

    This summer has proven to be a turbulent one for planning, with various trips planned, only for COVID, inflation, and lack of summer funding to continually hamper plans for more grandiose birding trips this summer. Eventually, with probably less thought than I should have put into it, I settled...
  23. Mysticete

    Prehistoric Planet

    Anyone checking this out? The first episode came out today on Apple TV. Narrated by David Attenborough with a score by Hans Zimmer, the first episode, focusing on the Coasts, is awesome, and has the best CGI I have seen ever applied to an extinct organism Given that birds are just specialized...
  24. Mysticete

    RFI Late May-Early June: South Florida

    So this year has been a bit of a turbulent year for trip planning. Originally, the goal had been to visit Hawaii around this time, only for that trip to run afoul of logistical hurdles and budget hurdles. Than there was a potential for going to Ecuador, but that fell through. Then I thought...
  25. Mysticete

    Condors, Jays, and Plastics

    Hey Folks, I am writing this from sunny and beautiful San Diego, a much needed escape from the brutal Wisconsin winter and a complete trashfire of a semester. Sometime last year, while fantasizing about travel in a mostly pandemic world, I came across the Wildside Birding tours website, and was...
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