[TN-Bird] Lewis County "blitz"
- From: Bill Pulliam <bb551@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: TN-birds <tn-bird@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Tue, 6 Jan 2009 12:36:58 -0600
Since I haven't yet gotten around to organizing a CBC/winter count
for my area, on a whim yesterday (1/5/09) I went out and covered the
high spots of my prospective count circle solo, as many as I could
get to before dark. At least this gives some baseline data before I
get the real count up and running. I admit part of my incentive was
to get the Robin roost counted since it is very unlikely to be there
again in future years!
I started with a little owling at my own place, turning up one each
of Am. Woodcock, Eastern Screech Owl, and Great Horned Owl. With the
dreary gray rainy weather all day, I had three more daylight Screech
Owls responding to my imitations. Four in one day, after the species
was entirely missed by all parties on the Savannah CBC! The rest of
the day was running from spot to spot, checking all my maps from last
year for where I had marked as "good." The weather toned things down
quite a bit; I only had one vulture all day.
My species total was 63. The biggest surprise was 4 species of
ducks. This is an extremely duck-less area, I didn't expect to get
even one. But I came across two Gadwall in a small pond in a cow
pasture, and was then shocked to discover that Napier Lake, perhaps
because it is severely drawn down, hosted 37 ducks of three
additional species! A total of 39 individuals and 4 species is
probably about 30 individual and three species higher than my
previous best duck day in this county. As I posted earlier, I also
had my second Loggerhead Shrike and first "Pink-sided" (Dark-eyed)
Junco for the county. For the roost species I just used the roost
count for the total, assuming any birds I saw earlier were probably
included in the masses at the roost. The "away from roost" numbers
are informative for comparison to totals from last year when there
was no roost. My totals for the day were:
Canada Goose 45
Gadwall 2
American Wigeon 2
Northern Pintail 34
Green-winged Teal 1
Great Blue Heron 1
Turkey Vulture 1
Red-shouldered Hawk 4
Red-tailed Hawk 2
American Kestrel 4
Killdeer 5
American Woodcock 1
Rock Pigeon 14
Eurasian Collared-Dove 1
Mourning Dove 33
Eastern Screech-Owl 4
Great Horned Owl 1
Belted Kingfisher 1
Red-headed Woodpecker 1
Red-bellied Woodpecker 17
Yellow-bellied Sapsucker 3
Downy Woodpecker 8
Hairy Woodpecker 5
Northern Flicker 8
Pileated Woodpecker 5
Eastern Phoebe 10
Loggerhead Shrike 1
Blue Jay 35
American Crow 77
Carolina Chickadee 16
Tufted Titmouse 30
White-breasted Nuthatch 13
Brown Creeper 3
Carolina Wren 35
Winter Wren 7
Golden-crowned Kinglet 11
Ruby-crowned Kinglet 1
Eastern Bluebird 76
Hermit Thrush 12
American Robin 1000000 (301 away from roost)
Northern Mockingbird 13
Brown Thrasher 1
European Starling 5000 (591 away from roost)
Cedar Waxwing 257
Yellow-rumped Warbler 31
Eastern Towhee 21
Field Sparrow 224
Fox Sparrow 3
Song Sparrow 72
Swamp Sparrow 44
White-throated Sparrow 210
Dark-eyed Junco 393
Northern Cardinal 59
Red-winged Blackbird 1000 (84 away from roost)
Eastern Meadowlark 24
Rusty Blackbird 400 (all at roost)
Common Grackle 5000 (100 away from roost)
Brown-headed Cowbird 100 (all at roost)
Purple Finch 9
House Finch 17
Pine Siskin 12
American Goldfinch 156
House Sparrow 22
For comparison, last year I covered the same area over 8 half-days (4
times as many hours afield), and came up with 67 species. Some
interesting contrasts between last year and this:
Species with higher totals this year than last, in spite of 1/4 the
effort (other than the ducks already mentioned and the huge totals
from the roost)): Eastern Screech Owl, Great Horned Owl, Red-headed
Woodpecker, Red-bellied Woodpecker, Yellow-bellied Sapsucker, Eastern
Phoebe, Blue Jay, American Robin (away from roost), Cedar Waxwing,
Yellow-rumped Warbler, Red-winged Blackbird (away from roost), Common
Grackle (away from roost), American Goldfinch.
Species with much lower totals this year, even allowing for reduced
effort: Black Vulture (weather), Turkey Vulture (weather), Carolina
Chickadee, Golden-crowned Kinglet, Ruby-crowned Kinglet, Chipping
Sparrow, White-crowned Sparrow.
These patterns seem to be consistent with what has been generally
noted this year, that acorn and berry feeders are doing better this
year after a terrible year in 2008 (aftermath of the 2007 freeze). I
had noticed a scarcity of chickadees and kinglets locally this
winter; it seems to be at least a county-wide phenomenon.
Bill Pulliam
Hohenwald TN
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