100 up on 2003 local list (1 Viewer)

An Arctic Warbler had the honour of being number 100 on my local patch list this year. Actually I never thought I`d get anywhere near my target (ie 100) but an excellent spring migration season put paid to my initial pessismism...........

Actually this May was the best May`s birding I can remember local patch-wise anywhere I`ve ever lived-highlights included full summer plumage Red Flanked Bluetail and Narcissus Flycatcher, thousands of Red Necked Pharalopes offshore, Rhinoceros Auklet, 4 species of Thrush together on a foggy morning at the local cape (Siberian, Dusky, Eye Browed and Brown Thrushes) and oh lots of other stuff......

I doubt if anyone reading this has ever (or will ever) been birding in Hakodate and I`m sure there are equally overlooked sights all over the world.......anyone else been keeping a local list this year?

Stu, as you know, mine's not a local year list, it's just wherever I go in Japan; so this year already includes Tobishima, Choshi, and Ukishima in addition to Tokyo area spots; but I'm only up to 165, so your century sounds pretty impressive. This weekend I'm off to Ukishima again for the spring dawnsong-- it's fantastic! I just stand in the semidark in the nature kiosk, nurse a can of coffee, and listen to the Japanese Reed Buntings, Japanese Marsh Warblers, Oriental Great and Black-browed Reed Warblers, and Sekka-- better than a swamp full of blackbirds!

Stu, citing birds such as Red-flanked Bluetail, Arctic Warbler, Siberian, Dusky, Eye-browed and Brown Thrushes as LOCAL PATCH birds is a shameless piece of showboating. It's like a red rag to a bull to any European birder. How dare you see such interesting birds when all I can offer in return is Redwing and Starling!!! Charles you're not much better yourself! By the way Charles, a can of coffee? Don't they have cups in Japan?

Anyway I'm going to book my flight to Sapporo very soon.....

Yeah....makes my Northern Cardinals, House Finches, and Gray Catbirds sound pretty lame.

The nerve......

Hi Charles-hope you enjoy your dawn birding! I find it difficult to get up so early-sunrise is before 4am here now.....
I don`t know how you can drink those way too sweet cans of coffee here! I can feel my teeth rotting when I drink them.....oh well at least they`ll give you a sugar rush so early in the day!

Hi Edward-yes I know it sounds like I`m showing off but trust me I`m green with envy when I read some of your reports (Snow Bunting singing at the airport car-park indeed!)......if it makes UK birders feel better I`m still waiting for Jay and Goldcrest for my year list and I spent a few hours in early May scouring the harbours here for Black Headed Gull for my year list too. What do you think about Beckham`s moving on and your new Tourettes syndrome goalkeeper by the way?

Hi Beverley-I`d gladly swap your Cardinals (or indeed any bird) for the noisy Brown Eared Bulbuls that wake me up every morning at 4am!

Hi Stu,

Of course you're right about bird lists from other parts of the world. What is commonplace to one man (e.g. Harlequin to me and I guess you too) is a mega-mega in another place. Imagine if I saw a Blue Tit or a Magpie in Iceland for example. That would be a sensation!!

Re footy. Not pleased about Beckham's potential move. He's given everything for United. Ronaldinho is no replacement.

E

I'm not clear as to what a 'patch' is-- I presume, some nearby area that one birds regularly? Are there 'patch rules' posted anywhere?

This is the Land of the Rising Vending Machine, Edward. Canned coffee is pretty bad (one step below Macdonald's), but at 4 a.m. that's all I can manage; it is available in several hundred varieties, with or without milk & sugar, and there are vending machines all up and down the highway and along the country roads. I certainly don't care to make it myself, at that hour.

Can we attach sound to these messages? I'll add Ukishima dawnsong next week if we can.

Im upto 94 in my local patch list for this year.
(Got Whitethroat there this morning)
My target is 100 too.
A good seawatch in the autumn I hope will get me to the ton

Hi Petee

The last time I was in the UK for any length of time I was in 1999 and I was staying with my folks just outside Preston so I could bird my old local patch. I started off in January determined to get 100 (I`d never actively tried before though looking back on my old notes I managed it in 1984!) but I had to come to Japan in June of that year to start working-I was stranded on 88 I remember (at least I got my first local Little Egret/Quail). Before I die I`ll go back to Preston and try to get the 100 again!!!!

Hope you reach the 100 anyway. What are the best ones you`ve had this year?

For up here it is probably the Spoonbill that was here a few months back.

Just to bore you to tears here is the list.

Red-throated Diver ....................Great Northern Diver
Slavonian Grebe.........................Northern Fulmar
Manx Shearwater.......................Northern Gannet
Atlantic Great Cormorant............European Shag
Grey Heron.................................Eurasian Spoonbill
Mute Swan.................................Common Shelduck
Eurasian Wigeon........................Common Teal
Mallard........................................Northern Shoveler
Common Eider.............................Long-tailed Duck
Common Scoter...........................Hen Harrier
Common Kestrel..........................Merlin
Peregrine....................................Common Pheasant
Moorhen.....................................Eurasian Oystercatcher
Ringed Plover.............................European Golden Plover
Grey Plover.................................Northern Lapwing
Knot............................................Sanderling
Curlew Sandpiper.......................Purple Sandpiper
Dunlin.........................................Common Snipe
Black-tailed Godwit.....................Bar-tailed Godwit
Whimbrel....................................Eurasian Curlew
Common Redshank.....................Turnstone
Black-headed Gull.......................Common Gull
Lesser Black-backed Gull............Herring Gull
Great Black-backed Gull..............Black-legged Kittiwake
Sandwich Tern............................Guillemot
Razorbill......................................Black Guillemot
Little Auk....................................Short-eared Owl
Common Swift............................Skylark
Sand Martin................................Barn Swallow
House Martin..............................Tree Pipit
Meadow Pipit..............................Rock Pipit
Pied Wagtail+white wagtail...........Wren
Dunnock......................................European Robin
Stonechat...................................Northern Wheatear
Blackbird.....................................Song Thrush
Mistle Thrush..............................Grasshopper Warbler
Sedge Warbler...........................Common Whitethroat
Common Chiffchaff......................Willow Warbler
Goldcrest.....................................Blue Tit
Great Tit......................................Magpie
Chough.......................................Jackdaw
Rook...........................................Carrion Crow
Hooded Crow.............................Common Raven
Starling.......................................House Sparrow
Chaffinch....................................Greenfinch
Goldfinch.....................................Linnet
Twite...........................................Reed Bunting

Hey, lists don't bore me peteee23 (perhaps that says something about me!) - I'm happy to read more.

I'm new(ish) to this listing lark, and so I'd never really thought about setting myself a target.

I've posted 3 recent reports of what has become my "patch" (My Outback), and I think my list is between 40 and 50 - although I'll have to check.

100 seems like a nice figure to have as a target, so I'll go for that. The habitats on my patch a reasonably varied so I might stand a chance - although I'm unlikely to get anything exotic.

I'll keep you all posted.

BTW Charles, I think I've gathered from a couple of your posts that you are a USA ex-pat. I remember the first time I used "patch" that it got quite a response from members from the other side of the Herring Pond who had not come across the term.

My patch is within walking distance from my home, as it happens, although I'm sure there's no such"requirement". More important that you bird there fairly regularly, as you suggest, and dare I say it is somewhere you get a little sentimentally attached to - that is to say it becomes your patch.

Stu, your aim of seeing a 100 species in a year on your old patch is admirable but there is one flaw I think you have overlooked. You would have to spend at least six months of your life in PRESTON. Six months. In Preston.

I haven't added a new species to my Reykjavik patch list since September last year when I saw a Spotted Flycatcher. My list is approaching 80 species (total, not this year) and has some notable absentees - no Great Northern Diver for instance, but does have goodies like King Eider, Ring-necked Duck, Gyr Falcon, Arctic Redpoll.

E

Hi Edward-luckily my folks live a few km outside Preston in the countryside/suburbs.........and I was actually born in Carlisle .....

Hey wait a minute! Preston isn`t THAT bad. I took my Japanese wife to Manchester last year and her jaw dropped as we went thru Salford. Now THAT`S grim! At least Preston has a few parks and not so many firearms!!!!!

Birdman-try for the 100. You`ll be surprised!

Charles Harper said:

I'm not clear as to what a 'patch' is-- I presume, some nearby area that one birds regularly? Are there 'patch rules' posted anywhere?

Click to expand...

Hi Charles,

Yes, that's about right. I don't think there's any formal 'rules' for local patches. Otherwise, what is obvious - it should be local to where you live (or work) so you can get to it fairly easily and frequently, and preferably without having to use a car. A patch can be as large or as small as you like, anything from your back garden/yard up to as large as you can comfortably cover.

My own local patch is a public park (Jesmond Dene) close to my home in Newcastle; because of its size (25ha) and fairly limited habitat range (woodland, sports fields, a stream and a small concrete-edged pond; no coastline nor decent wetland) no way could I get 100 species in a year on it, my average annual tally is around 70 species.

Michael

Hi Michael- I went to university in Newcastle in the late 80`s and often went to Jesmond Dene. I lived in Fenham (a definite notch below Jesmond!)......
Wow-you`d get 70 there?!? I think the only birds I can remember from Jesmond Dene were Grey Wagtail and Blackcap.......and Kittiwakes by the Quayside too.....
Did you get the Laughing Gull at the Hospital in `87?
I occasionally went to Seaton Sluice (near St Marys Lighthouse? I can`t remember!) where I got some ok stuff.
Oh happy days in Newcastle. Is the Cooperage still there?

Hi Michael,

Jesmond Dene's not a bad place for a local patch.

Just paid a visit once myself, back in the days before I started birding, when I lived in Winlaton.

What a little treasure in the city!

Hi Stu,

Gosh what a small world! Yep, got the Laughing Gull - even had it over my garden one day, so it's on my garden list as well as the Dene list.

The Kittiwakes are still there, though being shifted around from building to building as unsympathetic owners net the ledges off. Currently, most are now on the Tyne Bridge, as Newcastle Council are too disorganised to move them on (they want to, but we're fighting against that!).

I'll post my complete Dene list (over 100 species) later (needs copying across from another computer!)

Seaton Sluice is a good seawatching spot, it's two miles north of St Mary's. I too have spent many an hour there!

Sorry, don't know about the Cooperage, I'm not a pubs person, but it probably still exists. After all, who ever heard of a pub closing down in Newcastle??

Michael

Hi Birdman,

You too! An even smaller world! Think the Dene might have started you on the trend that led to birding??

Michael

It was a few years later when I actually started birding with any seriousness, but I was definitely taken aback by the Dene and the birds there.

I can't believe the Kittiwakes are getting so much grief. Even before I moved to the NE, Newcastle was famous for it's Kittiwake colony - although at that time I wouldn't have known a Kittiwake if I'd fallen over it!

Not that local, and as I said, not a birder as such at the time, but my life list as it stand has a few entries from Allendale over Hexham way (if I recall correctly?). Even been there?

Allendale - nach! (there's hardly anywhere in Northumberland I haven't been!). Great place, best spot for Wood Warbler, etc, in the county.

Yeah, its a real shame that the Council and others don't appreciate the Kittiwakes. Too many mindless idiots complaining about noise and mess, as if there wasn't plenty more of that from the human component of the local 'ecosystem'. Still, might be able to change attitudes yet; Bill Oddie including them on his recent travel show helped a lot, and anyone here who wants to write in to Newcastle City Council is going to help, too!

Michael