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ZEISS DTI thermal imaging cameras. For more discoveries at night, and during the day.

ABA Big Year 2016 (2 Viewers)

I was going to say that I thought he lost his way/became a bit embroiled in issues in the last blog post (or two) - stresses or sleep deprivation perhaps taking a toll? - but not to say that he's cracking under the pressure or unlikely to make it through.

Generally all very entertaining though - and have to admit that I seem to be checking back daily to see if a new blog post is up.
 
Pedro Ramalho said:
It seems that Olaf has some competition

On eBird a birder named Mike Austin have a total of 522...
Click to expand...

Sometimes people will upload their ABA lifelist onto ebird as one "trip" (which you shouldn't really do for obvious reasons!), which of course can suddenly boost your year list up to a ridiculous and not real at all level.

Also, RE: vagrants he has dipped, I forgot about the Fieldfare up in Labrador. I assume that is gone and I don't think he made his way up their at all yet.
 
Mysticete said:
Sometimes people will upload their ABA lifelist onto ebird as one "trip" (which you shouldn't really do for obvious reasons!), which of course can suddenly boost your year list up to a ridiculous and not real at all level.

Also, RE: vagrants he has dipped, I forgot about the Fieldfare up in Labrador. I assume that is gone and I don't think he made his way up their at all yet.
Click to expand...

Also checking ebird...Mike Austin has submitted only 22 checklists for 2016. I don't think it's even remotely possibly to score 522 species at this time of year visiting only 22 birding sites over 2 months.
 
Mysticete said:
Sometimes people will upload their ABA lifelist onto ebird as one "trip" (which you shouldn't really do for obvious reasons!), which of course can suddenly boost your year list up to a ridiculous and not real at all level.
Click to expand...

It is kind of OK to do that if you choose the date 1/1/1900 for the life list and quickly hide it from being viewed by others.

Niels
 
I looked around ebird and found that the Mike Austin list was "a dummy list for listing purposes" according to the author. It was from BellaVita (gated community) in Harris County, TX (the county with Houston, TX). The list has 505 species (+ 7 other taxa) listed as incidental at 5:25 pm for 2/26/16 at a single address. The list itself was hidden from view. It says, "The observer has hidden the species on this checklist from public output." He earlier on 2/26/16 has a list for 25 species at that address. Confusing, but it appears it was not intented to be a real list!
 
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hhhmm...so where to next? Apparently a Rustic Bunting was seen today in Washington, and a Blue-footed Booby on Anacapa Island in Southern California
 
new blog post up: now at 467, although no new coded birds.

Finally nabbed Island Scrub Jay. Although personally I would not have done that trip so close on the heels of Socal pelagic; Going after this bird at different season would have increased the odds I think of adding a new pelagic bird to the list.

Apparently there is a loophole in how the big year rules are set up. Since the list is updated midway through the year, you can keep birds that ended up lumped and also get any new splits. So apparently he gets to keep Hoary redpoll, since he saw it early in the year, should the AOU lump it, but also add Woodhouse's Scrub Jay, if AOU splits it. Normally this stuff doesn't matter, since lumps are rare in this day in age, so I am not sure I have seen this loophole exploited.
 
If I were him, I would be looking to heading back to Florida as fast as possible. Great White Pelican on Sanibel Island, possible first ABA record if it can clear the "providence" issue.
 
Mysticete said:
If I were him, I would be looking to heading back to Florida as fast as possible. Great White Pelican on Sanibel Island, possible first ABA record if it can clear the "providence" issue.
Click to expand...
Morgan, unless its occurrence had been foreseen, I suspect you meant "provenance". ;)
 
So far:-

Code 1 - 341
Code 2 - 89
Code 3 - 18
Code 4- 11
Code 5 - 2
Code 6 - 1
Total - 462

Remaining species required for 750:-

Code 1 - 149
Code 2 - 92
Code 3 & above - 47

All the best
 
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