Birding!

[jjohnwm]

I thought of this thread just now while sitting in the den and enjoying the small group of Sharptailed Grouse that are scratching through the snow beneath the bird feeders. These are a common bird here, but typically don't come right into the yard except in winter. Always nice to see.

But my happiness is tempered by the fact that the lumpers and spllitters are doing their thing again, and it has worked against me this time. While I don't follow the latest birding news very much, I have just discovered that the eggheads have decided that the Common Redpoll and the Hoary Redpoll are actually a single species, rather than the two distinct species they have always been considered to be. The Common is a bird that, in most winters, is visible every day at my feeders in large numbers. The Hoary, in contrast, is a rare bird indeed, and I might see only one or two...or 6....or none!...in any given winter. Both species are strictly winter birds for me, breeding far to the north and flying south to sunny Manitoba only during the cold season.

So, thanks to some nameless guy in a labcoat and Crocs toiling in the basement of a museum somewhere...at least that's how I envision these guys...my life list has grown shorter by one. Not that I intend to do anything about it...

At the same time, I thought I had a new local rarity to chase. A recent report alerted me to the presence of a Short-billed Gull not too far away; I felt my gluteus maximus tensing up in preparation to fling me out of my chair to go in search of it, and I was excited as I had never before heard of a Short-billed Gull. I figured it must be from so far away, likely Asian or even Australian, that I had never crossed paths with it, and I was pumped to see it.

But....it turns out that the Mew Gull (also called Common Gull) had been split into two species about 3 years ago. The Mew Gull with which I was familiar from the Canadian west coast was now its own species: Short-billled Gull. The birds which had previously been identified as Mew Gulls in Eurasia were now officially called Common Gull. Mew and Common Gull were a single species with a confusing name discrepancy up to that point. Now...there is no Mew Gull any longer, and I need some White-Out to correct my life list...which, believe it or not, is still handwritten on paper.

What a relief to learn that the brightest minds of our age are keeping track of important details like this...

 

[jjohnwm]

One of my favourite backyard birds...mainly because they're almost sorta kinda big enough for me to get pics with my cell phone.



Sharptails are common in my area, the most common upland game bird by far. I can always find them out in the back 40, but some years they venture only rarely into the yard. Other years, like this one, they are seen scratching on the ground beneath the bird feeders every day all winter, right outside the window.

We also have Ruffed Grouse on our property, but they are more solitary and tend to stay in the woods rather than venturing out onto the mowed lawn. "Chickens" (the local common name for Sharptails) outnumber "Ruffies" probably 10 to 1 in most years.

 

[esoxlucius]

One of my favourite backyard birds...mainly because they're almost sorta kinda big enough for me to get pics with my cell phone.

View attachment 1553491

Sharptails are common in my area, the most common upland game bird by far. I can always find them out in the back 40, but some years they venture only rarely into the yard. Other years, like this one, they are seen scratching on the ground beneath the bird feeders every day all winter, right outside the window.

We also have Ruffed Grouse on our property, but they are more solitary and tend to stay in the woods rather than venturing out onto the mowed lawn. "Chickens" (the local common name for Sharptails) outnumber "Ruffies" probably 10 to 1 in most years.

The first bird I thought of when I saw those were partridges, which are quite common in blighty.

 

[jjohnwm]

The first bird I thought of when I saw those were partridges, which are quite common in blighty.

They're a close relative. In fact, back in Ontario, Ruffed Grouse (much more common back there than Sharpies) were commonly referred to as "Partridges" by local hunters. But Gray Partridges, an introduced species, were always referred to only as "Grays".

Gray Partridges are also pretty common in my area now; they're quite a bit smaller than the three Grouse species that are native here.

 

[FINWIN]

I had no idea they were that chunky, but maybe its just winter fat.

 

[jjohnwm]

It's all feathers. You pluck one and it looks like a skinny rubber chicken.

Yes...they're delicious...

Is it just me, or...does that guy look like he has a naked woman hiding under his shirt, clinging to his chest with her legs wrapped around his gut and her shapely butt hanging down over his belt?

Okay, nerver mind...my wife says it's just me...:

 

[tlindsey]

This little fellow was chirping at the cat lol. Eating the buds off the bush.

 

[jjohnwm]

Sigh...Cardinals. I miss Cardinals.

I just participated in the local Christmas Bird Count; these counts are held yearly in the days or weeks around Christmas all across the continent, organized by local birding clubs and individuals. A circle with a radius of 24 km is selected, chopped up into smaller zones and then each zone is assigned to a team of 2 or 3 birders who then meet up on the given day and scour the area for birds. The object is to count every individual bird in the area. Results are tabulated and records maintained, which can show trends in the populations and/or peregrinations of individual species.

At the end of the day all the participants meet up for a tabulation of the results, which is really more like a dinner party with everybody wearing outdoor gear.

This year the count started out painfully slowly; we hit the road at 8:15 and by 9:30 had only seen two species and less than 20 individuals. But we persisted, driving slowly along snowy backroads and peering across barren fields, at distant treelines, and into farmyards that had bird feeders or spilled livestock feed. We'd occasionally park and briefly venture into promising woodlots, but time is always short on these events and we like to keep moving. By day's end, my birding partner and I had accumulated a blistering total of...10 species. The highlight for me was a flock of 80 Bohemian Waxwings, busily denuding Mountain Ash trees of their brilliand red fruit. We also found a small flock of Gray Partridges, not really rare but sometimes hard to find around these parts. A magnificent close-up adult Bald Eagle rounded up our "good" birds. I haven't yet seen the total numbers of species and individual birds, but I think the total species list for all participants was likely no more than 20. I suspect overall numbers are down this year as well.

It was fun, if you happen to be the correct sort of lunatic. My wife still can't believe I enjoy this. She is always referring back to the days when she and I would do an all-day blitz of the Point Pelee National Park area in sw Ontario, one of the great birding Meccas in the world. We would regularly spend a day in and around the park in peak migration times in May and end up with a one-day species list of 120 or more birds...and we'd be doing it in nice weather instead of freezing our butts off in -20C temperatures...to find 10 species.

 

[RD.]

Add me to the missing Cardinals list. I was just mentioning this morning to my 95 yr old mom how I miss seeing and hearing them. She misses them too. I was also saying that one day I hope to make a trip back to the Point, with my wife who has never been.

 

[esoxlucius]

A circle with a radius of 24 km is selected, chopped up into smaller zones and then each zone is assigned to a team of 2 or 3 birders who then meet up on the given day and scour the area for birds. The object is to count every individual bird in the area. Results are tabulated and records maintained, which can show trends in the populations and/or peregrinations of individual species.

When I read this the first thought that came into my head was how your records could possibly be accurate.

If your circle is chopped up into areas and each segment is scoured by teams of three, how can you be sure to avoid multiple counts of the same birds, given that they will no doubt fly about and possibly overlap segments?

Or is the whole exercise just a good excuse to get out and about and treat the day more like a bit of fun, rather than glean some real time accurate bird count results?