Christmas Bird Counts -- anyone participate? (1 Viewer)

Carlos the "However, the very wet conditions were very good for rails -- we recorded King, Virginia, Sora, Yellow, and Black" you mentioned really "knocked by socks off", so to speak. Wow! Five rail species in one day, awesomej!

csanchez7 said:

I participated in the Long Pine Key Christmas Bird Count in Everglades National Park on December 14th as the team leader for the Pinelands area. The warm temperatures and record rainfall meant that waterfowl, shorebirds, and waders were widely dispersed -- numbers were way down for those species.

However, the very wet conditions were very good for rails -- we recorded King, Virginia, Sora, Yellow, and Black. A total of 18 warbler species also made it onto the list, including Cape May, Black-throated Blue, Worm-eating, and Yellow-breasted Chat. Other good birds included a couple dozen Barn Swallow, Least Flycatcher, Brown-crested Flycatcher, and White-tailed Kite. There was a modest flight of American Robin and American Goldfinch, so we picked up a few of each of these irruptive species (we do not get them most years).

The absolute highlight of this count was an Eastern Kingbird, picked up by my team near the Daniel Beard Center. This bird should have arrived in South America back in October! One of the few documented winter records of this species in the USA.

We recorded 112 species which is near the long term average (114 species) for this circle. It was a lot of fun and the comaraderie between birders for this citizen science survey is truly special.

My next CBC is the Miami circle on December 19th. My last one is the Kendall circle on Decembr 26th -- my absolute favorite for the record smashing numbers of warblers we find wintering in suburbia every year.

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Fantastic!

I did the Flamingo CBC for a few years in a row, tacked on to Christmas visits to family in Florida, it's always a good time.

Western Grebe being seen on Lake Ontario, wonder if it will stick around for Sunday's CBC in Oswego? For that matter if it's reported again this morning I may have to go on a chase this afternoon...

Jeff hopkins said:

50 species is a typical count for our area and about 80 for the overall Allentown CBC. Species we hope in our block for but don't always get are snipe, killdeer, kestrel, and harrier.

But if we want big totals in our block, we need waterfowl. As of yesterday, there was a tundra swan and some GW teal at the quarry. Hopefully they stick around until Saturday. But other than that, I'm not expecting much. We haven't had the large flocks of snow geese we get here, and with the warm temps in Ontario and NY, most of our usual ducks haven't bothered to come south for the winter yet.

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We ended up with 52 species. Temps were right around freezing with 20 mph winds, so we missed a few things, but the waterfowl showed up just in time. We had mallard, black, bufflehead, hooded merg, GW teal, ruddy and ring-necked along with the tundra swan, Canada, cackling and snow geese and a pied-billed grebe.

A fox sparrow and a Carolina chickadee were the other unusual species, but we missed GH Owl, horned lark, and cowbird.

In other words, a typical CBC :t:

Weather was not great here either for yesterday's CBC, below freezing with a strong steady wind keeping stuff down. Overall an average year it seemed, the only thing out of the ordinary was a Marsh Wren (seen in the same place as last year) and a high count of 20-some Long-tailed Ducks on Onondaga Lake; usually they stay up on Lake Ontario.

Over 6,000 American Crows counted as they returned to their evening roost.

Average count for us this year on our local Christmas Bird Count (73 species) in the St. Joseph, Missouri, area.

Snow Goose
Canada Goose
Gadwall
Mallard
Northern Shoveler
Ring-necked Duck
Lesser Scaup
Bufflehead
Common Goldeneye
Hooded Merganser
Common Merganser
Northern Bobwhite
Wild Turkey
Pied-billed Grebe
Double-crested Cormorant
Great Blue Heron
Osprey
Northern Harrier
Sharp-shinned Hawk
Bald Eagle
Red-tailed Hawk
Rough-legged Hawk
American Coot
Killdeer
Bonaparte's Gull
Ring-billed Gull
Rock Pigeon
Eurasian Collared-Dove
Mourning Dove
Eastern Screech Owl
Great Horned Owl
Belted Kingfisher
Red-bellied Woodpecker
Yellow-bellied Sapsucker
Downy Woodpecker
Hairy Woodpecker
Northern Flicker
(*for some reason the "powers that be have now decided to list these species after the woodpeckers. I would think they would be with the rest of the raptors!)
American Kestrel
Merlin
Prairie Falcon
Blue Jay
American Crow
Horned Lark
Black-capped Chickadee
Tufted Titmouse
White-breasted Nuthatch
Brown Creeper
Carolina Wren
Golden-crowned Kinglet
Ruby-crowned Kinglet
Eastern Bluebird
American Robin
European Starling
Cedar Waxwing
Yellow-rumped Warbler
American Tree Sparrow
Dark-eyed Junco
White-crowned Sparrow
Harris's Sparrow
White-throated Sparrow
Song Sparrow
Swamp Sparrow
Northern Cardinal
Red-winged Blackbird
Western Meadowlark
Eastern Meadowlark
Rusty Blackbird
Common Grackle
Brown-headed Cowbird
House Finch
Pine Siskin
American Goldfinch
House Sparrow

* Had only 64 species last year, highest count 84 species a few years ago.

* Average has been 73 species.

The Gainesville CBC (Florida, USA) was held yesterday and we had a great day. The count was 162 species; with one of these (Chestnut-sided Warbler) needing further confirmation. This is an all-time record for the count. My group found a county record first Lesser Black-backed Gull. Other notables include the count firsts Gray-headed Swamphen and the CS warbler, and also 14 Vaux's Swift wintering, Nashville Warbler, Brown Creeper, Ash-throated Flycatcher, Laughing Gull, Purple Gallinule, Summer Tanager, RT Hummingbird, Least FLycatcher, Least bittern, Spotted Sandpiper, Indigo Bunting, Painted Bunting, Black-throated Green Warbler, White-winged Dove. Biggest misses were White-crowned Sparrow and Common Ground-Dove.

Andy

What an awesome count Andy. Wish I could have participated in that one!

Jeff hopkins said:

Temps were right around freezing with 20 mph winds, so we missed a few things

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Should be down in Texas ...temps hitting 80 F and a mere breeze :t:

I helped out for the Pasadena CBC last Saturday (12/19), tagging along with my fellow birder friend Ed and basically re-hashing what we did last year: Peck Rd. Water Conservation Park in Arcadia, Livingston-Graham Quarry (an industrial reservoir) in Irwindale, Alamansor Park in Alhambra, and Lincoln Park in Los Angeles. Nothing truly unexpected showed up, but highlights for our party included a Gray Flycatcher at Peck, a Thayer's Gull (new for my L.A. County list) at the quarry, and a Red-throated Loon (rare inland) at Lincoln Park. The entire Pasadena-San Gabriel CBC apparently ended with a total of 158 species.

Jos Stratford said:

Should be down in Texas ...temps hitting 80 F and a mere breeze :t:

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Supposed to be 70°F on Christmas Day.

Nah, there's no climate change.

Jeff hopkins said:

Supposed to be 70°F on Christmas Day.

Nah, there's no climate change.

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69 here Xmas Eve.

This is supposed to be one of the snowiest cities in the US and we're still waiting on the first real snowfall of the winter.

This year's Christmas Bird Count has been completed and entered into the Audubon's Christmas Bird Count page. We counted 73 birds on our Midland Empire's count (MOSJ). 29 people helped with our count this year. Some of the more interesting sightings included eleven (11) waterfowl species, Bobwhite and Wild Turkey but no pheasant, Great Blue Heron, nine raptors which included PRAIRIE FALCON, MERLIN, Rough-legged Hawk and OSPREY (to be documented), Ring-billed and Bonaparte's Gulls, we had Screech Owl and Great Horned Owl but no Barred Owl (missing the Barred was sort of a surprise), the only shorebird was a sighting of six Killdeer, six (6) species of woodpecker, Red-headed (cw), Red-bellied, Yellow-bellied Sapsucker, Downy, Hairy and Northern Flicker (missed the PIleated this year!), nine (9) Brown Creeper, both kinglets, tons of bluebirds/robins, Am Tree Sparrows, Dark-eyed Juncos, White-crowned Sparrows, Harris's Sparrows, White-throated Sparrows, Song Sparrows, Swamp Sparrows, Eastern and Western Meadowlarks, eight Rusty Blackbirds and 25 Pine Siskins.
Many thanks to all the people who participated in this year's St. Joseph's count. Merry Christmas to All Larry Lade, CBC compiler

This year's Kendall CBC in Miami-Dade County, Florida was held on December 26th -- it was a great year thanks to the great group of enthusiastic birders that helped with the event. The compilation dinner and social hour after all the counting was done really helped round out the entire experience for everyone.

We ended with 143 species on count day, plus 8 species seen on count week (151 species total). Highlights included Short-tailed Hawk (high count of 19), Franklin's Gull, Mangrove Cuckoo (2), Thick-billed Vireo, Warbling Vireo (2), 20 species of warbler (including Nashville (8 of them!), Wilson's Warbler, and Yellow-breasted Chat), and Summer Tanager (high count of 10).