Harris’s Sparrow, Connecticut, January 2012

Early in January a Harris’s Sparrow was found in southeastern CT in the town of Lebanon.  Due to heavy work commitments throughout most of January I couldn’t get away to try for it till late in the month.  So I crossed my fingers that it would remain for a while, and I continued to save all the posts with the micro-directions and suggestions.  Then I started to read that a local birder was putting seed out for it, so I was optimistic it would stay put for a while.

Finally with a small window to chase after it, I left in the early morning to make the 2-hour trek to the location.  When I arrived another birder was there and he reported he had seen it a few times already that morning.  So I just stood quietly and watched the area where the seed had been put on the ground.  After about a 30-minute wait it arrived and fed on the ground, along with lots of White-throats, Songs, and Tree Sparrows.  What a handsome bird.

I then drove up to the Windsor, CT landfill for my second try at Thayer’s Gull (one had been seen there earlier in the week).  No luck with the Thayer’s but 2 first-year Icelands were a nice consolation.

My statebird map for Harris's Sparrow is provided below.  Although Harris' is a common wintering bird in the central and southern plains, it is a frequent vagrant across the country.  I've now seen it in more states as a vagrant (7) than in its typical wintering range (4).

Golden-Crowned Warbler, Lower Rio Grande Valley, Texas, January 2012

I had planned a January business trip to Houston going way back to mid December.  As the plans were coming together, I checked the TX RBAs and NARBA to see if any chaseable rarities were being around.  Sure enough, a couple Golden-Crowned Warblers were being seen in the Lower Rio Grande Valley – a possible new Lifer for me.  So I added a couple days to my trip, and an extra round-trip to and from McAllen, TX.  Now I had to cross my fingers that birds being seen when I made my reservations would still be around when I got to TX weeks later.  As the trip neared, one of the warblers seemed to be somewhat reliable (at Frontera Audubon), while the second bird was no longer being reported.  So I was hopeful.  And a few others that would be TX statebirds (but not lifers) were also being seen.  The key target was the warbler, so I was willing to spend many hours over the 2 days at Frontera to look for it.

With plans all complete, I started my day of flights to south TX.  On a layover I checked the listserve and saw that a Blue Bunting was recently reported – another possible lifebird.  So while on the last leg I developed new plans to go immediately to the bunting location, then try for the warbler the next day.  I arrived at the bunting spot to find 2 other birders already there – though they had not been successful after several hours of searching.  Habitat was extensive, and access was limited, so you’d have to be really lucky to find the bird.  I spent the last 2 hours of daylight there but with no luck.  But I was able to talk with the birders and get some advice on the warbler – one said it was easy if you hear its call, and the other said it was not easy at all (one birder had given up after a 4-hour try).

The next day before heading out I downloaded calls off Xeno Canto to help me know what to listen for.  I arrived at Frontera Audubon a few minutes before the 8 AM opening time.  At 10 of 8 the gates were opened and I headed right to the spot where the warbler was most often seen.  Within a minute or two I started to hear a series of soft “chet” call notes that sounded a lot like the on-line file.  Sure enough there was the Golden-Crowned Warbler!  I had given myself 2 days to find it and I had it before 8 AM on the first day.  I spent the next couple hours birding the Frontera thicket, and was able to refind the warbler both times I went back to the original area just by listening for the call.  In both cases I pointed it out to birders who were there just for the warbler – helping more than 25 birders get a lifer. 

In other stops over the weekend I got only one more statebird – a stakeout Mountain Bluebird at Santa Ana NWR.  But mostly I spent the weekend just enjoying the local birdlife.  That included 3 hours watching a feeder station at Bentsen SP seeing the stakeout Black-Vented Oriole – likely the exact same bird I saw almost exactly a year earlier just a mile away.  The feeding station was covered with birds like Green Jays and Altamira Orioles – I don’t think I’ll ever say that I’ve seen enough Green Jays.  Interestingly the woodlands had few landbirds - fewer than I remember seeing on any winter trip to the Valley.  Maybe the extensive TX drought has something to do with it.

One stop during the trip was to a plowed field area where Mountain Plovers winter.  For the second year in a row I stopped there without luck for Plovers, but saw several Sprague’s Pipits.  I also had a longspur in with a group of Horned Larks – but only a brief view as the flock flew away.  Any longspur would be a good species in the lower Rio Grande, but unfortunately my view did not allow for identification (though the plowed field habitat might be best for McCown’s).

The Golden-Crowned Warbler was ABA #724, and #706 in the lower 48.  My state bird map for Mountain Bluebird is copied in below.  The location is Frontera Audubon where the Golden-Crowned Warbler has been seen.

2011 Birding Year in Review

My 2011 birding year had some truly memorable experiences, featuring excellent results in New England, 4 new ABA reportable states, and 4 new ABA lifers. 

For many years I’ve had the goal of reaching 2,000 statebirds in New England.  For the last 15 years I’ve been averaging about 30 new statebirds per year, as I slowly inch toward the magic 2,000.  But in 2011, I ended up with 50 new statebirds, the highest I’ve had in a year since 1997.  My great year was a function of more chasing than normal, plus a close brush by Hurricane Irene.  Just a day before landfall, the remnants of the hurricane were predicted to pass directly over my town, so my initial thoughts were on the safety of the house rather than birding.  But the storm’s track ended up moving a bit farther west, passing over western MA.  With everything safe at the house, and the rain already ending on our east side of the hurricane though the storm was still southwest of us, it was time to try to chase after windblown rarities.  I decided to head to the large Quabbin Reservoir in western MA as it would be the largest body of water close to the remnants of the eye of the storm.  An afternoon there along with my birding buddy David Deifik resulted in two mega-rarities – a Sooty Tern and a White-tailed Tropicbird – along with a couple Jaeger sp. and Black Terns.  The next day at dawn I was standing on the VT/NH border hoping for hurricane birds to fly down the Connecticut River.  There were no real rarities, but a small flock of Sanderlings were likely storm-related and new for my VT list.  The real highlight was watching a huge amount of debris washing down the river from the tremendous flooding that had occurred upriver especially in VT.  Storm-blown birds continued to be reported along all the New England coastlines, so later that week I headed to the RI coast along with supreme New England total ticker Denny Abbott with fingers crossed.  Within a few minutes of arriving I spotted an adult Brown Pelican, and later an immature Sooty Tern – both were not only new for me but also for Denny.  A couple days later I added Black Skimmer in ME giving me 6 statebirds in 3 states related to Hurricane Irene.

My first extended distant birding trip of the year was a short 2-day trip to western KS in March to fill numerous winter-bird gaps in my statelist.  It was a really fun trip, including finding 3 species of longspurs, and an out-of-place Yellow-bellied Sapsucker.  I ended up with 28 statebirds which was more than twice what I expected. 

My big birding adventure of the year was my annual May trip to work on my statelists.  This year it was an 8-day loop through north-central and northeastern Oklahoma, southwestern Missouri, and eastern and central Kansas.  With the help of advice from some great local birders, I added 128 new statebirds - 65 in KS, 57 in OK, and 6 in MO.  That put me barely over the ABA reportable threshold in KS, and also put my total ticks over 12,000.  I had 223 species including 27 species of shorebirds and 27 species of warblers.  Probably the premier highlight of the trip was birding at Cheyenne Bottoms, KS, where one 4-square-mile impoundment was covered with at least 10,000-20,000 Long-billed Dowitchers, 5,000 Stilt Sandpipers, and 5,000 smaller peeps.  I also found or refound several rarities on the trip –

·         Neotropical Cormorant in OK

·         California Gull in KS

·         Dusky Flycatcher in KS

Another highlight of my trip - while trading e-mails with one OK birder she suggested that I start a blog for my statebirding hobby.  So with my daughter’s help, I started this blog right after the trip.  It’s been fun to prepare the posts after finding a new statebird, though I didn’t keep up with it this year as I kept racking up the New England statebirds.

A sobering part of my trip to tornado alley turned out to be the time I spent in and around Joplin, MO.  Just a couple weeks after my visit a massive EF-5 tornado devastated the area right around where I had birded.  Luckily my local birding friends all made it through the tornado OK.

During the year I also targeted reaching the reportable thresholds for MI and OH.  With 2 partial-day trips as part of business trips to each state, I exceeded the thresholds in both states, though just barely in OH.

Here’s the year by the numbers -

Lifebirds -

• 4 new ABA and Lower 48 lifebirds –
• Black-Vented Oriole (Bentsen State Park, TX), Rufous-Backed Robin (Laguna Atascosa NWR, TX), and “Mangrove” Warbler (off South Padre Island, TX) on the same day - though the warbler is not a fully recognized species (yet?)
• Yellow-Faced Grassquit (Goose Island State Park, TX) on a second trip to south TX
• Yellow-Legged Gull – Hyannis, MA
• ABA total now at 723, US at 725, and Lower 48 at 705

Statebirding -

• Newly reportable in KS, MI, OH and again in WV (after the threshold passed me by last year)
• ABA reportable in 38 states plus DC  
• 263 statebirds added in 17 states
• 50 new statebirds in New England – 1894 total ticks now in New England
• Total Ticks – now at 12,107, with 11,929 of those in the U.S.
• Added state birds in AL, MO, and IN to put a bit more room between my totals and the thresholds

My statebird totals for each state are in the map below (you might want to click on the map to expand it).

As for 2012, statebirding will continue to be my priority.  I’ll be pursuing my lifelong goal of being reportable in all 50 states plus DC – 12 more to go!  I also need to continue to add statebirds in states where I’m just a bit over the ABA threshold since those thresholds continue to inch up over the years.  I have 12 states where although reportable, my total is less than 10 over the threshold, so not very safe.  Chasing after New England statebirds will continue, though they get harder and require more chasing each year.  My goal is to get to 2,000 – with my great year in 2011 I may be just 4 or 5 years away. 

Of course I’ll still chase after lifebirds where feasible.  My big birding trip this year will be more for lifers than for statebirds – going to Barrow and Nome, AK in June as part of a group (with a short side trip to Anchorage on my own).  Although I’ve birded the AK mainland and the Pribilofs, I’ve never been to Barrow and Nome so there are a few likely lifebirds, along with any number of more remote Asian possibilities.  I’m also tentatively considering an April trip to southern NV, southwest UT, and northwest AZ if I can squeeze it in before AK.  Then there are my regular business trips to various spots around the country, including 3 planned January trips in areas where semi-reliable mega-rarity lifebirds are staked out.