• Welcome to BirdForum, the internet's largest birding community with thousands of members from all over the world. The forums are dedicated to wild birds, birding, binoculars and equipment and all that goes with it.

    Please register for an account to take part in the discussions in the forum, post your pictures in the gallery and more.
ZEISS DTI thermal imaging cameras. For more discoveries at night, and during the day.

100 up on 2003 local list (1 Viewer)

Hi Stu & Birdman,

Here's my full Jesmond Dene list; 114 species over the years:
1 — common
2 — rare but annual
3 — rare, less than annual
4 — very rare (less than 5 records)
5 — Dene mega (one record only)
e — previously present (now extinct)

Little Grebe — 4
Cormorant — 3
Grey Heron — 2
Mute Swan — 3
Whooper Swan — 5
Pink-footed Goose — 4
Greylag Goose — 4
Canada Goose — 4
Mandarin Duck — 3
Mallard — 1
Tufted Duck — 2
Goldeneye — 4
Goosander — 3
Sparrowhawk — 1
Kestrel — 3
Merlin — 4
Hobby — 5
Peregrine Falcon — 5
Grey Partridge — e
Pheasant — 5
Moorhen — 1
Coot — 5
Oystercatcher — 5
Golden Plover — 4
Lapwing — 3
Common Snipe — 4
Woodcock — 2
Whimbrel — 5
Curlew — 5
Redshank — 5
Laughing Gull — 5
Black-headed Gull — 1
Common Gull — 1
Lesser Black-back — 1
Yellow-legged Gull — 5
Herring Gull — 1
Iceland Gull — 5
Glaucous Gull — 5
Great Black-back — 1
Common Tern — 4
Rock Dove — 1
Stock Dove — 1
Wood Pigeon — 1
Collared Dove — 2
Cuckoo — 5
Tawny Owl — 1
Swift — 1
Alpine Swift — 5
Kingfisher — 1
Wryneck — 5
Great Spot Woodp — 1
Sky Lark — 2
Sand Martin — 3
Barn Swallow — 2
House Martin — 1
Tree Pipit — 4
Meadow Pipit — 2
Yellow Wagtail — 4
Grey Wagtail — 1
Pied Wagtail — 1
Waxwing — 3
Dipper — 3
Wren — 1
Dunnock — 1
Robin — 1
Redstart — 4
Northern Wheatear — 4
Ring Ouzel — 4
Blackbird — 1
Fieldfare — 1
Song Thrush — 1
Redwing — 1
Mistle Thrush — 1
Sedge Warbler — 3
Icterine Warbler — 5
Lesser Whitethroat — 3
Whitethroat — 4
Garden Warbler — 3
Blackcap — 1
Wood Warbler — 2
Chiffchaff — 1
Willow Warbler — 1
Goldcrest — 1
Spotted Flycatcher — 2
Pied Flycatcher — 4
Long-tailed Tit — 1
Willow Tit — 5
Coal Tit — 1
Blue Tit — 1
Great Tit — 1
Nuthatch — 1
Treecreeper — 1
Jay — 2
Magpie — 1
Jackdaw — 1
Rook — 1
Carrion Crow — 1
Hooded Crow — 5
Starling — 1
House Sparrow — 1
Tree Sparrow — e
Chaffinch — 1
Brambling — 2
Greenfinch — 1
Goldfinch — 1
Siskin — 2
Linnet — 2
Lesser Redpoll — 3
Crossbill — 4
Bullfinch — 1
Hawfinch — e
Yellowhammer — 5
Reed Bunting — e
 
Hi Michael-well Icterine Warbler and Alpine Swift are pretty impressive for a city park.............I wish I`d seen those birds alighting from Ilford Road Metro all those years ago!
 
Gentlemen, if I may interrupt the Hail Fellows Well Met for just a moment to thank Michael and Birdman for the patch information, determined now to find a patch of mine own (actually with one already in mind, a wood once within walking distance but now 15 minutes by car... and may I resurrect my former list there to begin again?), compliment him on his obviously well-worked Jesmond Dene list, and express surprise at a kittiwake colony existing within a city! What's the address, and I'll write to the city council urging conservation. Oh, and tell Stu I got everything I said I would at Ukishima Marsh in Ibaraki and a couple of pratincoles besides.

Thank you for your patience,
 
Hi friends, I have read with interest your postings about your local patch. I have to admit that living in Monteverde-Costa Rica I have more chances to have a huge local patch list. Including nearby areas reached in 5-10 minutes driving from home I have seen so far 226 species. Only within walking distance the list goes as far as 156. In two years and a half living here I have seen 365 species in this area and I have missed quite a few!!!
To name a few goodies seen while taking my dog for a walk this morning... Three-wattled Bellbird feeding on Cecropia, Resplendent Quetzal, Gray-crowned Yellowthroat, Orange-billed Nightingale-Thrush, White-eared Ground-Sparrow, Golden-olive Woodpecker, Golden-crowned and Rufous-capped Warblers, Olivaceus and Streak-headed Woodcreepers, Ochre-bellied Flycatcher, Lesser Ground-Cuckoo, Keel-billed Toucan, Blue-crowned Motmot, Steely-vented Hummingbird, Purple-throated Mountain-gem, Orange-bellied Trogon, Scale-crested Pygmy-Tyrant and a few more.
Unfortunately I am moving back to my home country (Majorca-Spain) next month and my local patch list will not grow next year that big.
Saludos a todos
 
Hi Motmot-from Costa Rica to Mallorca-excuse me while I vomit with jealousy!!!!!!!!!

I`ve never been to Costa Rica but I guess it must be in the top 5 birding destinations in the world (certainly for the number and variety of species). Mallorca might have less but a lot of UK birders on this forum would gladly swap their own local patch for sunny Mallorca.

One of my friends (who recently started birding) works in Caracas Venezuela which I guess is comparable to Costa Rica....within walking distance there`s a sort of national park (that huge green mountain that looms over the city for those who`ve been) and in addition the local city park (also very close to his place) provided me with about 20 lifers in 5 minutes. A place like this would provide a huge list......

I wonder which local patch birder has the biggest list in the world? Not me for sure.

Charles-I`d be interested in your new local patch-of course you can resurrect your old list. I don`t know if there any "rules" as such re local patches.....though I guess they`re often not so well-known and in the ultimate local patch you`d be the only person birding there (just my opinion like I say there are no rules!). It should maybe be somewhere you can walk to (though maybe I`m being a bit pedantic here).
 
Last edited:
I used to walk there when I lived down the train line a couple of stations farther away from Yokohama; now there's nowhere I can walk to that has anything beyond my yard list, unless I decide to count automobile models or silly Japanese apartment building names instead of birds. Mitsukyo Citizens' Forest is a large hunk of overplanted cedar forest next to a U.S. radar station (I think), much of which has been turned over to the locals for truck gardening. The woods have a couple of Green Woodpeckers and Jays, the gardens a few Green Pheasants. There's also a good bit of brush and fallow field between the two areas that is good in migration and winter for things I don't see at home, finches, cuckoos, common thrushes. A tiny stream runs through. More boring details when I get a list together, do a topo on the patch site--- uh, what do people do about documenting the site? Dimensions, ground cover, what else? Tetrads?

I had a great time in Costa Rica, though I don't suppose my bird list was too compendious-- I was dumbfounded by the variety. I remember camping at Santa Rosa National Park, and the Coatimundis ate through my tent flap to get at my food stash. Then the park ranger showed us the egg-laying of the Leatherback(?) Turtles at midnight and scrambled turtle eggs for us for breakfast the following morning. Turned many a herpetologist over in his grave, no doubt.

Reg'ds, Chas.
 
The biggest local patch lister I have found in surfbirds is:


Roger Higson, living in Southern California with 287


The biggest british list is:

James Brown, living in Lowestoft area, Suffolk with 254


The problem is to know which rules does anyone follow to have his own local patch list. If I consider the Monteverde area as my local patch my list is 365 but I wouldn't consider "local" places 5km away from my home, maybe just 1 km radius from home could be considered "local" in my opinion. What do you think?
In his website, surfbirds doesn't give you a guideline for local patch listing.
 
Been away from this thread for a few days for some reason - and it's been interesting catching up.

Thanks for posting your Jesmond Dene list Michael, and I like the format, although of course, it will take me a little time yet to come up with that kind of detail for my patch.

I didn't have much idea how other people document their site, and as a relative novice, I've never come across the Tetrad idea, except in passing in a couple of posts on BF.

I have put together a little sketch map (in Word!!!) of my patch which I knitted together in Photo-something-or-other and tried to post as an attachment (we're talking seriously anally retentive, I know!) to give BFers who gave a damn a chance to visualise all the areas of my patch in relation to each other, and with a few of the more special bird locations labelled. At the minute I can't square the circle of something legible with something small enough to attach!

As for any more "rules" regarding one's own patch, I would again say that there is no hard and fast requirement that it must be local (mine just happens to be) but perhaps it should be possible to get from one end to the other without having to resort to a motor vehicle! As I have said in a thread elsewhere, I don't "do" all my patch in one go (not yet anyway), but I could circumnavigate it, if I got my skates on! If we were to make that "rule 2", then I suppose "rule 1" would be that it is somewhere that you do your birding frequently. If you happen to do you your frequent birding in the most densely bird species populated area on earth - well Good For You!

Finally, before I stop rambling on, I don't for one moment suppose there is anything to stop a person having more than one patch!
 
Dunno but I think the walking distance thing is important...I`d say within a 3 or 4 mile radius from your home perhaps. But I realise this isn`t practical for city dwellers......maybe cycling distance? Or you could say your whole city if you live in a big city perhaps?

I just feel HAVING to drive there stops it being "local"......

I guess it doesn`t really matter!!!! It isn`t as if anyone is going to check up and say "tut tut Mr so and so I`m afraid this place doesn`t meet local patch criteria".........
 
I don't suppose I'd HAVE to drive there, but I'd be tired and disgusted after a 40-minute hike through urbia. Bicycle would be easy distance but it hurts my bum, so I don't have one. Frankly, having thought on it, it's simply the closest place of any interest.

OK-- Patch Rule One: frequently and possessively birded, and reasonably close to home. Rule Two: reasonably circumnavigable (if required) in an outing without motorized assistance. Sounds like enough rules to me-- I can live with anybody's list under those criteria.

Roger Higson's list I can well believe, but I'm surprised at the sized of the British patch list-- his patch is on the sea, I presume?

Waitin' fer yer map, birdman!
 
Hi Charles-"The closest place of any interest" seems as good a definition of a local patch as any I`ve heard.

It`s about a 30-40 minute walk to the cape (the best place in Hakodate) and, yes, I sometimes catch a tram if I`m feeling lazy......................

It would be a long hard slog to visit all my local patch on foot in a day but I guess it would be possible though like you say it`d involve a lot of trudging thru city streets.

Re James Brown`s list-he lives in East Anglia which is usually held up as the best birding area in the UK and yes he lives near the coast ........
 
Last edited:
Yeah, I'd say bikes, buses, trains and trams are definitely allowed for getting to local patches, it's cars that are more questionable, for environmental sustainability reasons. But it's true, if you want to get to the patch for a spring dawn chorus, public transport is no help and a car can be essential if you're unlucky enough to be stuck far from any decent habitat at all.

How big a patch - well, I guess as large or as small as you like, really. I suppose anything over a square mile or so starts to become more difficult to cope with, but if you have a local reserve that's 3 miles by 2, I wouldn't want to deny it to anyone. I just wish I did!

Michael
 
Last edited:
Ok, then I can consider the Monteverde area my local patch list. 90% of my birding effort is spent in it. All the best birding areas are less than 8km radius from home including loads of different highland habitats, from 850m to 1836m high. The total list for the area is near 500 species, including at least 150 of them very very rarely found. There is no coast or marshes in it so basically they are forest and semiopen areas species. In two years I have managed to find, basically by myself, 365 of them. Twitching here is very rare, though some of them where found by local birders and shown to me (Crested Owl, Least Flycatcher). I have worked here ocasionally as a birders guide, but most of the effort was made just for fun! Some of the most remote parts (very birdy) were very difficult to get to and I didn't go but most of the habitats within the area were visited. The weather in the area is let's say irregular, rainy or windy for most of the year. On the caribbean side of the cordillera rainfall is big enough to keep you away from it for most of the year, around 5000mm/year. The Pacific side, where almost everyone lives, is much drier but still rainy, around 2500mm/year. The problem is... most of the birds are on that rainy area and if you want to try to find them you have to face that weather with only trails to walk, there are no roads or transportation available. A few refuges and field stations make it easier but anyway is a great effort, but watching a Bare-necked Umbrellabird's lek while the males are booming and displaying is definitely worth it!!
 
Birding's a dirty job, but somebody has to do it, Motmot. We all know your patch, Monteverde, is one of the most famous and prolific birding areas of the world, so we expect big things of you. I want a copy of your final list when you get back to Mallorca.

I started my new patch list here yesterday: 42 species.
 
I am leaving Monteverde in two days and don't expect any changes in this list.Sorry about its lenght.Best stuff is marked*
NON_PASSERINES
Highland Tinamou*
Least Grebe
Magnificent Frigatebird
Great Blue Heron
Cattle Egret
Green Heron
Bare-throated Tiger-Heron
Blue-winged Teal
Black Vulture
Turkey Vulture
Osprey
Hook-billed Kite
Swallow-tailed Kite
White-tailed kite
Double-toothed Kite
Mississippi Kite
Sharp-shinned Hawk
Cooper's Hawk
Bicolored Hawk*
Barred Hawk
White Hawk
Great Black-Hawk
Gray Hawk
Broad-winged Hawk
Short-tailed Hawk
Swainson's Hawk
Zone-tailed Hawk
Red-tailed Hawk
Black Hawk-Eagle
Ornate Hawk-Eagle*
Crested Caracara
Yellow-headed Caracara
Laughing Falcon
Barred Forest-Falcon*
Bat Falcon
Peregrine Falcon
Grey-headed Chachalaca
Crested Guan
Black Guan
Great Curassow*
Spot-bellied Bobwhite
Black-breasted Wood-Quail
Sunbittern*
Rock Dove
Band-tailed Pigeon
Red-billed Pigeon
Ruddy Pigeon
White-winged Dove
Common Ground-Dove
Inca Dove
White-tipped Dove
Buff-fronted Quail-Dove*
Chiriqui Quail-Dove*
Crimson-fronted Parakeet
Orange-fronted Parakeet
Orange-chinned Parakeet
Red-fronted Parrotlet*
Brown-hooded Parrot
White-crowned Parrot
White-fronted Parrot
Squirrel Cuckoo
Groove-billed Ani
Lesser Ground-Cuckoo
Pacific Screech-Owl
Bare-shanked Screech-Owl*
Mottled Owl
Crested Owl*
Short-tailed Nighthawk
Lesser Nighthawk
Pauraque
Chuck-will's-widow
Whip-poor-will
Spot-tailed Nightjar(1st in CR?)*
Black Swift
White-chinned Swift
Chestnut-collared Swift
White-collared Swift
Chimney Swift
Vaux's Swift
Green Hermit
Stripe-throated Hermit
Green-fronted Lancebill*
Scaly-breasted Hummingbird
Violet Sabrewing
Brown Violet-ear
Green Violet-ear
Green-breasted Mango
Green Thorntail
Canivet's Emerald
Coppery-headed Emerald
Stripe-tailed Hummingbird
Blue-throated Goldentail
Rufous-tailed Hummingbird
Cinnamon Hummingbird
Steely-vented Hummingbird
White-bellied Mountain-Gem
Purple-throated Mountain-Gem
Green-crowned Brilliant
Magnificent Hummingbird
Purple-crowned Fairy
Plain-capped Starthroat
Magenta-throated Woodstar
Ruby-throated Hummingbird
Scintillant Hummingbird
Black-headed Trogon
Violaceus Trogon
Orange-bellied Trogon
Resplendent Quetzal*
Ringed Kingfisher
Blue-crowned Motmot
Rufous Motmot
Turquoise-browed Motmot
Rufous-tailed Jacamar
Red-headed Barbet
Prong-billed Barbet
Emerald Toucanet
Collared Aracari
Fiery-billed Aracari
Keel-billed Toucan
Chestnut-mandibled Toucan
Hoffman's Woodpecker
Yellow-bellied Sapsucker
Smoky-brown Woodpecker
Golden-olive Woodpecker
Lineated Woodpecker
Pale-billed Woodpecker
PASSERINES
Slaty-Spinetail
Red-faced Spinetail
Spotted Barbtail
Ruddy Treerunner
Plain Xenops
Streaked Xenops*
Scaly-throated Foliage-gleaner
Buffy Tuftedcheek*
Streak-breasted Treehunter
Lineated Foliage-gleaner
Tawny-throated Leaftosser*
Grey-throated Leaftosser*
Ruddy Woodcreeper
Olivaceus Woodcreeper
Wedge-billed Woodcreeper
Strong-billed Woodcreeper*
Northern Barred-Woodcreeper
Black-banded Woodcreeper*
Cocoa Woodcreeper
Spotted Woodcreeper
Streak-headed Woodcreeper
Spot-crowned Woodcreeper
Brown-billed Scythebill*
Barred Antshrike
Russet Antshrike
Plain Antvireo
Streak-crowned Antvireo
Slaty Antwren
Immaculate Antbird
Black-headed Antthrush*
Rufous-breated Antthrush*
Scaled Antpitta*
Silvery-fronted Tapaculo
Lovely Cotinga*
Bare-necked Umbrellabird*
Three-wattled Bellbird*
Long-tailed Manakin
Northern Beardless-Tyrannulet
Yellow Tyrannulet
Yellow-bellied Elaenia
Mountain Elaenia
Ochre-bellied Flycatcher
Olive-striped Flycatcher
Slaty-capped Flycatcher
Rufous-browed Tyrannulet
Zeledon's Tyrannulet*
Paltry Tyrannulet
Scale-crested Pygmy-Tyrant
Common Tody-Flycatcher
Eye-ringed Flatbill
Yellow-olive Flycatcher
Yellow-margined Flycatcher
White-throated Spadebill
Sulphur-rumped Flycatcher
Tufted Flycatcher
Olive-sided Flycatcher
Dark Pewee
Western Wood-Pewee
Eastern Wood-Pewee
Tropical Pewee

I have just realised this is half of it and I am already tired! Tomorrow more!
 
Warning! This thread is more than 21 years ago old.
It's likely that no further discussion is required, in which case we recommend starting a new thread. If however you feel your response is required you can still do so.

Users who are viewing this thread

Back
Top