[texbirds] Another G.F. Simmons publication (1915 Auk about Harris County)
- From: J B <renreb1@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: "texbirds@xxxxxxxxxxxxx" <texbirds@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Thu, 16 Aug 2012 10:25:14 -0700 (PDT)
Texbirders:
Found the linked article about breeding birds during 1910-14 in Harris County
quite interesting.
He sighted a few species not currently found in the county
Bachman's Sparrow Apr 25, 1911 approximately where san jacinto battelground is
now
Red Cockaded Woodpecker May 25, 2012 in pine woods on Buffalo Bayou, about
eight miles west of Houston (see map at bottom)
14 Greater (Attwater's) Prairie-Chickens June 7, 1913 Aldine, at side of
railroad tracks
Here's the link
http://www.bayoupreservation.org/html/Birds.Trees.Harris.County.1915.pdf
Here's a map from that time period. I think he may have used something similar
to the following map to calculate his distances from city of houston when
taking his rail journeys as this map has concentric circles measuring
distances from the center of Houston (courthouse) and GF Simmons uses this same
method of measurement for each oif his breeding bird sightings
http://www.harriscountytx.gov/archives/Img.aspx?img=13
Using the article, this map and a modern day map, I have entered a few of
Simmons key sightings from the article into ebird here
http://ebird.org/ebird/tx/sightings?listType=first&locInfo.regionType=subnational2&locInfo.regionCode=US-TX-201&beginYear=1900&endYear=2012&continuous=true&sortBy=obs_dt
Other interesting early Harris County reports (not in Simmons report)
Ivory-Billed Woodpecker June, 2013 by Clifford Shackleford (reported in
Olberholser 1974 and in in Bulletin of Texas Ornithological Society 31(2) 1998
p.37 )
http://www.houstonaudubon.org/html/IBWShackelford.pdf
John Berner
West Houston/Katy
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