[texbirds] Re: Historical BBWD Roosts in Harris County (1977-2013 Cypress Creek CBC's)
- From: Berner Family <jcazberner@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: Joseph Kennedy <josephkennedy36@xxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Mon, 24 Feb 2014 21:22:15 -0800 (PST)
Texbirders & Joseph K:
Thanks Joseph. for your historical perspective. I would like to add some of
thhis older data to ebird
I Will see if i can dig up some of the old figures
Using the Audubon Xmas Count website, I was able to pull up all Cypress Creek
CBC data from the current circle and the two predecessor circles
Codes: TXCY, TZ2A, TX2B
Results show that David's recent flock of 1100+ at one location is as large as
the CBC flocks of old. In the Cypress Creek Christmas Bird Count with many
observers over a large area the high count on the Katy Prairie is 1,200. I am
reluctant to enter all 1,200 at one location in ebird though since the CBC has
a 7.5 mile radius unlike david's pond so maybe this is more than one group of
birds. I searched from 1964 on but data stopped at 1977. Presumably there were
very few or no BBWD in Harris County prior to 1977 anyway--as zero were
observed in 1977. All the counts not shown below in mor recent years have zero
BBWD.
Count # # of BBWD
77 0
84 258
85 17
86 1098
87 1100
88 1
89 30
90 30
92 1200
93 1074
94 150
95 732
102 1
105 20
106 7
107 103
108 1
109 300
110 202
111 8
113
1
Joseph, Not sure how to access the early 1980's North American Birds data you
mentioned for Harris County but if some Texbirder has it, i would be glad to do
the searching. I appreciate your thoughts. I would love for the phrase
"all-time Harris County high" to mean more in ebird than it does now--by
loading more historical data. I would welcome suggestions/data sources for high
numbers of species seen together in the past.
John Berner
W.Houston/Katy
***********************************************************************************************************************************
From: Joseph Kennedy <josephkennedy36@xxxxxxxxx>
To: John Berner <jcazberner@xxxxxxxxx>
Cc: "texbirds@xxxxxxxxxxxxx" <texbirds@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Monday, February 24, 2014 7:08 PM
Subject: Re: [texbirds] Record BBWD Roosts in Harris County this month (Local
interest)
Way back in the days of your also know as 1982 or maybe 1983, the black-bellied
whistling ducks had just reached Houston in numbers. I think I remember a
Christmas count of some 2,000 of the new arrivals at that time.
They roosted on an abandoned tree grown rice pond somewhere around maybe
stockdick and porter or some such a little off the usual route of getting rice
field birds in those days.
I had huge numbers of them there over a couple of winters and 2,000 would be a
low number some days. They could be disturbed by people from a house? to the
south and were almost impossible to count due to all the cover and timber.
But I know that there were at least 2,000 and probably more. A review of the
xmas count numbers or American birds would highlight the number and dates which
could be tossed into ebird for a higher record. Not sure if the xmas count
count was at the pond but often the birds were never seen anywhere else on a
days birding. The old OG maps would show the pond location too.
On Mon, Feb 24, 2014 at 9:31 AM, Berner Family <jcazberner@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>Texbirders:
>On Feb 15, 2014 I counted 825 BBWD at Forest Park Cemetery which broke the
>previous all-time Harris County record in ebird of 800 by Mark Scheuerman
>observed twenty-one plus years previously (Nov 15, 1992). These birds were
>just sitting on the bank of a pondin midday--not roosting for the evning
>
>8 days later David's flock of 1,211 on Feb 23 shattered that record.
>
>interesting....
>
>John Berner
>W. Houston/Katy
>
>[texbirds] Large Roost of Black-Bellied Whistling-Ducks in South Houston
> * From: David Sarkozi <david@xxxxxxxxxxx>
> * To: TexBirds <texbirds@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> * Date: Sun, 23 Feb 2014 08:13:23 -0600
>For the last couple of weeks I've been noticing a large number of
>Black-bellied Whistling-Duck coming in to roost right at sunset and leave
>right at sunrise from my neighborhood retention pond. This morning I got up
>and headed down there in time to count then.
>Even thought fog made it impossible to get a count of all the birds the
>number was much higher than I expected. I counted 1,211 Black-bellied
>Whistling-Duck leaving between 6:40 am and 7 am. By 7 am there was not a
>single BBWD left in the pond. There is a small park and parking area adjacent
>to the pond and I imagine
>you could see them coming as well at sunset. See the Google map:
>https://maps.google.com/?ll).602697,-95.35871&spn=0.005737,0.009645&t=h&z --
>David Sarkozi
>Houston, TX
>(713) 412-4409 twitter ID dsarkozi Edit your Freelists account settings for
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>The Berners
>John, Cathy, Abby and Zach
>
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--
Joseph C. Kennedy
on Buffalo Bayou in West Houston
Josephkennedy36@xxxxxxxxx
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