[Bristol-Birds] Re: Least Flycatcher
- From: "Wallace Coffey" <jwcoffey@xxxxxxxxxx>
- To: "bristol birds" <bristol-birds@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Mon, 17 May 2004 16:38:28 -0400
In regards to Rick Phillip's noteable find of a Least Flycatcher at the golf
course in Kingsport, the question was raised about breeding records for
Sullivan County, TN and its high elevations.
There is no nesting record for the county that I am aware. Nicholson's
breeding bird atlas for the state indicates a "probable" breeding record on
Holston Mountain which would most likely be about 4,000+ feet elevation and
the map shows it in the vicinity of Holston High Knob. The map marker is
placed in Sullivan County, for whatever that is worth.
Knight gives the earliest date of arrival in the Ridge and Valley Region as
16 April and it is to be expected by the last week of April.
I agree with Rick that this is most likely a transient bird. It is a male
and probably unmated. It does, however, beg for continued monitoring as
Rick expects to do. Least Flycatchers are known to occur at Kingsport in
the month of May. The first Sullivan County record was 6 May 1952 and
reported by Ann Switzer of Kingsport. Unpublished records from the
Kingsport area show it found there 18 April 1956 (Switzer) and 3 May 1958.
The 1958 record was reported on the spring bird count at Kingsport but it
was not included in the published report in THE MIGRANT (state journal of
ornithology).
The Horse Creek watershed, where Phillips reported this from, is at the
lowest elevation (1,200 feet) I know of for Northeast Tennessee's five
county area.
This is problematic in itself for a species which Knight reports to occur
generally at 2,500 feet to 5,000 feet during the breeding season. But
stranger things have happened.
Consider this:
Lee Herndon, John Bailey and Frank Barclay (three of our best ever
naturalists from the region), found a singing male at 1,800 feet along
Laurel Creek at Hampton in Carter County 7 May 1950. It was building a nest
! It was carefully placing nesting material in a fork of a tree over the
road about 20 feet high in a pine tree. They went back with other birders
and found it there several times until 16 July. Starting in June it was
even with another bird believed to be a mate. The nest was never known to
be active and no young were seen. That was the state's first known nesting
evidence. Imagine that !
Albert Ganier and Bruce Tyler reported it as "fairly common, chiefly in the
woodlands along the creek" in Shady Valley 5-8 Jun 1934. It was the first
time Ganier had recorded the species as a summer resident in Tennessee. It
was Tennessee's first breeding season record. It is believed to have
vanished from the valley floor in Shady as a breeder with the cutting of the
spruce forest which was in the valley floor at Orchard Bog and downstream
when Ganier and Tyler were there.
Ken Dubke found one in Shady Valley 12 and 19 May 1962 at 2800 ft. (John
Shumate and I had one16 May 1967. Knight had one 29 Jun 1988 on Cross Mt.
Rd. (3,600 feet elevation in the south end of Shady Valley). Shumate at one
at his parent's home 22 May 1994 at 2800 ft. I have had a male singing the
past two or three years from the woods at the edge of Orchard Bog in May
(about 2,800 feet) but no indication of a mate and both times it was only
found there once or twice and then left the area. It was, no doubt, a
transient.
Least Flycatchers should be nesting now. I know that I was leading a field
trip at the Mount Rogers Naturalist Rally at Grindstone Campground in Smyth
County, VA on Mother's Day weekend several years ago and we counted maybe
six nests of this species which we actually saw birds constructing. All
were in the campground. That was at 3,700 feet elevation or more. But, hey!
That is what Dick Peake calls the "Least Flycatcher capitol of Virginia."
If a bird was to nest at 1,200 feet on Horse Creek, when would nest activity
begin? It should be well underway.
This is a species that nests in the understory of woods so that may pose a
problem at Horse Creek. Good luck to Rick with his Least Flycatcher. Keep
us posted.
Let's go birding....
Wallace Coffey
Bristol
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