Tennessee Birders by the Numbers: 2015 (Vol. 11)
Welcome to Tennessee Birders by the Numbers (TBN) report for 2015. 2015 was a
great year for birders in Tennessee and this report, like last years, will also
include data from the new year, 2016--up to the present.
Let me begin with an apology. Last year I included TN county level data from
the ABA and I had hoped to incorporate both ebird and Surf Birds data in this
report. Alas, I bit off more than I could chew. While I had expected my work
responsibilities to decrease, the opposite has happened. In addition, I have
taken on some of the care of my ailing father who is in late stage melanoma.
And while I might have been able to include county level data from the ABA
again, it is clear that some ebirders with large county results are not
reporting on the ABA. For that reason I decided not to include any TN county
results. Going forward, it is easier for me to focus on the original idea of
TBN, which is to mainly report on the activities of TN birders that are
national and international in scope--beyond the patch as it were. Some of you
may remember that TBN began when I was at home having missed out on a birding
trip because of a social engagement, and that I realized three hypotheses I had
assumed were correct could be tested empirically: 1. not many TN birders are
interested in Total Ticks, 2. the distribution of the ABA Area list and the
Total Ticks list is similar: states/provinces with lots of birders on one have
similarly many birders on the other, and 3. the number of birders in Tennessee
is lower than other states/provinces on the ABA Area list. (To be precise,
another reason for starting TBN is that in 2006 I had a stroke that left me
with some aphasia--difficulty in reading, speaking and writing--and I was
advised to write as much as possible to reduce it--thus in part TBN, my
university web pages, etc.) Now, it turned out that in general all of these
assumptions were incorrect, and so TBN began as a way of demonstrating the
strength of Tennessee birding in a national and international context. So, I
will generally go back to that mission given the amount of time I can
reasonably devote to the project, with the exception that I will include the TN
list and related ones.
At the end of the report in the "miscellaneous" category I will also include
what we have learned in the 11 years of TBN.
I.TN List (top 30)
As noted before the ABA continues to include Jeff Wilson's important results.
Note that currently with 409 birds for TN, the 75% level is 307--19 ABA birders
have reached that level.
1. 388 Jeff Wilson2. 366 Michael Todd3. 360 Clyde Blum4. 359 Mark Greene6-t.
355 Dollyann Myers6-t. 355 Terry Witt7. 354 David C. Chaffin8. 352 Kevin
Calhoon9. 349 Tommy Rogers10. 342 Ron Hoff11. 341 Rick Knight12. 335 Gail &
Steve Clendenen13. 327 Chris Sloan15-t.326 Francis Fekel15-t. 326 Rick
Waldrop16. 312 Scott Somershoe17. 311 Ken Oeser18. 307 David Trently19. 303
Thomas McNeil20. 301 Kevin Breault21. 300 Stephen Zipperer22. 283 Rick Cross24.
282 Gail King24. 282 Darrel Wilder25. 280 Mike O'Malley26. 278 John O'Barr27.
276 Rick Shipkowski28. 274 Joshua Stevenson29. 269 Q. Gray30. 265 Morton Massey
II. TN Birders on States/Provinces List
Many TN birders are on the lists for other states and provinces and with the
removal of thresholds we perhaps get a better picture of TN birding. The
following list includes TN birders by the number of states/provinces in which
they reported lists. Also included are the state/province abbreviations for
those TN birders who are first among TN birders on these other lists. So for
example, David Chaffin has reported lists in 61 states/provinces and in the
indicated 13 states/provinces is the leading TN birder. Note that I did not
include areas, e.g., Hawaii, that are not in the ABA area.
1. David Chaffin (61 states/provinces), AK, CA, DC, KY, ME, MI, OK, SD, WV, AB,
NB, PQ, YT2. Kevin Breault (60), CT, ID, IL, IN, MA, MT, NH, NV, NY, OR, RI,
UT, VT, WA, WI, WY, BC, MB, NS, PE, SK3. Rick Waldrop (57), GA, MD, MN, ND,
VA4. Dollyann Myers (54)5. Ron Hoff (50)6. Ken Oeser (49)8-t. Gail Clendenen
(46), AZ8-t. Steve Clendenen (46)9. David Trently (39), PA, NF10. Mike O'Malley
(37)11. Gail King (33)12. Tommie Rogers (31), CO, DE, FL, IA, KS, MO, NE13.
Michael Todd (30)15-t. Kevin Calhoon (24), NM, OH, SC15-t. Scott Somershoe
(24)16. Francis Fekel (23), NJ17. John O'Barr (9)20-t. Clyde Blum (8)20-t.
Thomas McNeil (8)20-t. Stephen Zipperer (8)22-t. Rick Shipkowski (6)22-t. Jeff
Wilson (6), AL, AR, MS, TN23-t. Mark Greene (5)23-t. Rick Knight (5), LA, NC, TX
Note that no TN birder is on the lists for Northwest Territories, Nunavut and
St. Pierre et Miquelon.
III. ABA Area
The following are our TN birders on the ABA Area list, including totals and
ranks in the top 100.
1. Benton Bashan 881 (4)2. David Chaffin 823 (19)3. Dollyann Myers 782 (73)4.
Kevin Calhoon 773 (85)5. Tommie Rogers 771 (90)6. Rick Waldrop 7477. Clyde Blum
7408. Gail & Steve Clendenen 7259. Rick Knight 71810. Michael Todd 70411. Kevin
Breault 69312. Ron Hoff 68913. Ken Oeser 68814. Darrel Wilder 68115. Terry Witt
68016. David Trently 63217. Francis Fekel 61518. Gail King 60719. Jon Mann
60320. Rick Shipkowski 59521. Mike O'Malley 59322. Thomas McNeil 53223. Q. Gray
52724. Gary Brunvoll 51425. Scott Somershoe 51026. Stephen Zipperer 332
IV. Canada
Not many TN birders go to Canada, but that is a mistake. Some of my best
birding experiences were in this undiscovered country. David Chaffin leads TN
birders with 332 birds (a rank of 78), followed by Kevin Breault, 330 (80), and
Rick Waldrop, 263 (122). Note that the overall leader on the Canada list is
Roger Foxall with 546 birds.
V. Lower Forty-Eight
This list includes all states with the exception of Alaska and Hawaii, and is
highly correlated with the ABA Area list. Our leaders for 2015 are: Kevin
Calhoon and David Chaffin, both at 750, followed by Tommie Rogers at 748, Rick
Waldrop at 732, Gail & Steve Clendenen at 725, and Clyde Blum at 716.
VI. United States
Our leaders here are: David Chaffin at 833, Dollyann Myers, 827, Kevin Calhon,
811, Cylde Blum, 777 and Tommie Rogers 771.
VII. AOU North
The AOU stands for the American Ornithological Union, established in 1883, and
the AOU North list is covered by the AOU checklist of North American birds, and
includes North and Central America and island groups like Hawaii. No change
from 2014: on the North list, Rick Waldrop has a great position with 1732 birds
and a rank of 7, followed by David Chaffin at 1282, Clyde Blum, 1040, and Gary
Brunvoll, 1021.
VIII. AOU South
In the South, again as last year, Rick Waldrop leads with 2314 birds and a fine
rank of 9, followed by Gary Brunvoll with 752, Gail King with 750, and David
Chaffin at 525.
IX. Mexico
The ABA Mexico list has Dollyann Myers at the top with 732 birds and a rank of
24, followed by Clyde Blum with 685 and a rank of 32. Gail King also has 660,
followed by Gary Brunvoll, 591, Ron Hoff, 579, and Rick Waldrop, 567.
X. Central America
Rick Waldrop leads here with 909, followed by Dollyann Myers, 693, Ron Hoff,
630, Terry Witt, 615, and David Trently, 605.
XI. West Indies & Caribbean
Here, Rick Waldrop has 306 birds, Kevin Calhoon with 200, Dollyann Myers at
195, and Ron Hoff with 157.
XII. Europe & Western Paleartic
Our top three on this list are Rick Waldrop, 361, Dollyann Myers, 208, and
David Chaffin with 186.
XIII. Asia
The top three here are: Ron Hoff at 1865, and a fine rank of 11, followed by
Dollyann Myers at 1827 (rank of 13), and Terry Witt with 1494.
XIV. World
Dollyann Myers and Ron Hoff continued to add world birds in 2015: Dollyann with
8098 and a rank of 8, and 8035 (rank of 10) for Ron. Others are Terry Witt with
6469, and Rick Waldrop with 5019. We can only be amazed! And note that the new
leader on the world list is Hugh Buck with 9053! Yes, I hope to come up with an
all time World list in the next few years.
XV. North America
No change this year, with Rick Waldrop our leader with 1732 and the fantastic
rank of 3, followed by Dollyann Myers at 1531, Ron Hoff at 1390, Terry Witt at
1329, and David Chaffin with 1299.
XVI. South America
Dollyann Myers and Ron Hoff increased their birds on this list to 2522 and
2519, respectively, and rankings of 11 and 12. Others are Rick Waldrop at 2314,
and Terry Witt with 2078.
XVII. Africa
Dollyann Myers and Ron Hoff also lead here with 1658, followed by Terry Witt
with 1286.
XVIII. Australasia
On this list Dollyann and Ron have strong ranks of 4 and 5, and 987 and 978
birds, respectively.
XIX. Eurasia
Here, Ron Hoff takes the top spot as last year with 2071, followed by Dollyann
Myers at 2058. Terry Witt has 1585, Rick Waldrop is at 1103, and David Chaffin
has 932.
XX. Atlantic Ocean
On this list, Mike O'Malley remains at the top with 66 (rank of 22), followed
by Dollyann Myers at 36 and Ron Hoff at 21.
XXI. Pacific Ocean
Here, Dollyann has 416 and Ron 401 with ranks of 17 and 19. Francis Fekel is at
160 and Rick Waldrop has 118.
XXII. Indian Ocean
Ron has a very strong ranking here at 3 with 250 birds, followed by Dollyann
with 241, rank of 6.
XXIII. South Polar Region
Mike O'Malley is our leader with 25 birds and a rank of 73, followed by Kevin
Calhoon with 24, Dollyann Myers with 20, and Ron Hoff with 18.
XXIV. ABA Millennium
This list includes all the birders who have been the most active regarding the
ABA Area since the century began (specifically, this is the ABA Area list for
the 21st century). First on the list is Clyde Blum at 714 birds with a rank of
18, followed by Gail and Steve Clendenen with 677, Michael Todd with 672, David
Chaffin at 663, Kevin Breault with 615, and Mike O'Malley at 402.
XXV. Photographed ABA Area
Mike Todd leads here with 668 (rank of 19), followed by Kevin Calhoon at 656, a
big change, Tommie Rogers with 635, Ken Oeser with 615, Clyde Blum with 602,
Ron Hoff with 439 and Mike O'Malley at 426.
XXVI. Photographed World
Ron Hoff has a great ranking of 2 of this popular list with 4121 birds,
followed among others by Chris Sloan (new to the list!) with 1609, Kevin
Calhoon with 1472, and Mike Todd at 1431.
XXVII.World Families
Dollyann and Ron are leaders here with 232 families and a rank of 9, followed
by Rick Waldrop with 166. The highest rank has 234 families (two birders), and
Clements lists 234 as the highest possible.
XXVIII. All Territories & Provinces
This list is quite similar to the Total Ticks list below and combines all the
territories/provinces in Canada. Thanks to my trip to the west this year, Kevin
Breault leads here with 1192 (rank of 19), followed by David Chaffin with 1061
(rank of 21), and Rick Waldrop with 594, rank of 42.
XXIX. Total Ticks
My major focus in birding for many years, David Chaffin leads TN birders with
11,604 (rank of 3), followed by Kevin Breault at 11,473 (rank of 4), Rick
Waldrop with 9049, Dollyann Myers with 6768, Ron Hoff at 5600, Ken Oeser at
5360, David Trently at 5202, Gail Clendenen with 4501, Steve Clendenen at 4500,
and Mike Todd with 3,839. Note that the all time TT list can be found below.
XXX. Canadian Provinces
On my list, Kevin Breault, David Chaffin, Francis Fekel, Ron Hoff, Dollyann
Myers, Mike O'Malley, and Rick Waldrop are listed as birding in Canadian
provinces. Kevin Breault leads in five provinces, British Columbia, Manitoba,
Nova Scotia, Saskatchewan, and Prince Edward Island (my favorite so far), David
Chaffin leads in four, Alberta, New Brunswick, Quebec and Yukon, and David
Trently leads in Newfoundland & Labrador. As noted elsewhere there are no TN
birders in the Northwest Territories, Nunavut and St. Pierre et Miquelon. The
easiest of these would be St. Pierre et Miquelon, a short distance (ferry ride)
from Newfoundland & Labrador. And only two birders are on the P & M list, one
at 15, the other with 128 birds. Canada is a great place to bird, and don't
hesitate to contact me for information if you are interested in going.
XXXI. Annual Lists
On the ABA Area annual list we have Kevin Calhoon, 605 (rank of 7), Ken Oeser,
455, Kevin Breault, 426, David Chaffin, 354, and Stephen Zipperer, 278. Note
that I missed Rick Shipkowski's result of 421 for 2014.
XXXII. Annual List for Tennessee
On our annual list, Kevin Calhoon had 273, which if I am right puts him in rank
24 on the all time TN annual list. (255 is now required to be in the top 50, a
list as you know lead by Jeff Wilson with 307 in 2002, the only TN birder ever
to have identified 300 of more birds in a year.) Joshua Stevenson had 253,
followed by Stephen Zipperer at 243, David Chaffin and John O'Barr both with
237, Francis Fekel at 231, Terry Witt at 210, and Ken Oeser with 187. See the
all time top 15 below.
XXXIII. Miscellaneous: Tennessee Birders by the Numbers, Vol. 1-11: What We
Have Learned
Beyond the categories provided by the ABA, what more have we learned?
A. Having lived is so many places (10 states), and having birder in many states
as a young person (I grew up in the northeast, where it is easy to travel to
the many states of the region (in the distance it takes to go from Memphis to
South Holston Lake in NE Tennessee, you can travel from West Virginia or
Virginia to Maine, 13 states and the province of Ontario--and if you live in
New York City, where I did, up can extend that range to include NC to the
south, OH to the west and three additional Canadian provinces = 15 states, 4
provinces), I had assumed that Tennessee birders were not interested in Total
Ticks. Clearly, that was incorrect as I showed in the very first TBN that TN
birders rank in the top 10 of states on Total Ticks, with only Michigan and
Washington having more Total Ticks birders. In subsequent years, Tennessee
birders continued to rank very high, and in three years we ranked first among
all states in the number of Total Tickers.
The obvious question is why have Tennessee birders been so strong in Total
Ticks compared to other states, but from a scientific point of view this cannot
be settled mainly because the sample sizes are low. Several birders over the
years have suggested various reasons however. For example, Chattanooga area
birders are well suited to going beyond the patch as they are located near the
states of Alabama and Georgia. But note that New York has not been highly
ranked on Total Tickers.
B. How do the number of TN birders rank with birders from other
states/provinces? One way to find out is to look at the ABA Area list, and it
was shown in the TBN that in general we rank in the top 15 or so depending on
the year, with California #1, followed by Texas #2. In addition, Tennessee has
more birders on the ABA Area list than any other southern state. Indeed. I was
surprised at how low some southern states ranked, especially KY and MS. Now,
obviously states like California and Texas have higher population size, so in a
subsequent TBN I tried various ways of controlling for population size. After
several statistical considerations Tennessee ended up with a rank of 10 with
3.7 ABA Area birders per million. The highest states were New Mexico and
Colorado at around 6.6 per million, followed by Massachusetts at 5.7 per
million.
C. Is there a correlation by state/province between the number of Total Tickers
and birders on the ABA Area list? That is, does the number of Total Tickers
simply reflect the number of ABA birders? While I don't think I ever calculated
the correlation, it is clear that there are important exceptions to what would
appear to be this reasonable assumption. Notably, Florida, Arizona and North
Carolina have large numbers of ABA birders but relatively small numbers of
Total Tickers. As TBN indicated at the time, this may suggest that Total
Ticking may be less common in the states that are major birding destinations.
Yet, the exception here is that California and Texas have many Total Tickers.
D. Every year (including this one, see above), TBN lists the Tennessee birders
who have reported birds in states other that TN. And every year, David Chaffin
has been at the top of that list, followed by birders such as the late Robert
Odear, Rick Waldrop, Kevin Breault, Ken Oeser, Dollyann Myers and Ron Hoff, all
of whom have listed in more than 50 states and provinces. But TBN has also
looked at TN birders compared to birders from other states. One way of doing
this is to construct regional lists as I did in Vol. 2. Here, TBN looked at
what the U.S. Census Bureau calls the "East South Central Region," consisting
of Alabama, Kentucky, Mississippi and Tennessee. Of the top ten birders on this
combined list fully six were from Tennessee: Jeff Wilson (#1), David Chaffin
(#2), Rick Waldrop (#3), Mark Greene (#4), Daniel Jacobson (#9), and John
Henderson (#10). The following is an updated version of this list (December,
2015):
1. 1334 Jeff Wilson2. 1195 David Chaffin3. 1123 Rick Waldrop4. 1080 Kevin
Calhoon5. 1067 Mark Greene6. 1039 Larry Peavler7. 1007 Kevin Breault8. 978
Tommie Rogers9. 966 Michael Todd10. 965 Leif Anderson11. 956 Thomas
Heatley12. 908 Mike Resch14. 871-t Clyde Blum14. 871-t Dollyann Myers15. 863
Scott Somershoe
Thus, now eight Tennessee birders are in the top ten on this list, 11 out of 15
if you include Scott! Very strong performance for TN birders!
A list that combined other states/provinces was also discussed in Vol. 3. Here,
TBN reported on the list that combined all of the states adjacent to TN: AL,
AR, GA, KY, MO, MS, NC & VA. On this list our top birder was Rick Waldrop (#3),
followed by David Chaffin (#4), and Tennessee had seven birders in the top 13.
Finally, in Vol. 7, and again in Vol. 9 TBN report on a list that was called
the "Local Group," that included TN and KY, all the states adjacent to TN and
KY, and one other state, SC, almost adjacent = 14 states. In this case,
however, I only included Tennessee birders, and found for Vol. 9 (2013) that
Rick Waldrop was at the top with 3,591 ticks, followed by David Chaffin with
3,490, Kevin Breault with 3,124, Kevin Calhoon with 2,817, and Tommie Rogers at
2,342. I don't have the energy this year to update this list but obviously as
you increase the number of states/provinces the resulting list increasing
reflects the ABA Total Ticks list for all states and provinces. In thinking
about these various lists, the least satisfactory for me is the East South
Central Region list as many TN birders travel to Georgia, South Carolina, North
Carolina and Arkansas. I do like the "Local Group" but so many TN birders don't
bird north of KY. Perhaps a more useful list for TN birders would be a
"Southeastern" list that would include TN and NC, and all states south: SC, GA,
AL, MS and FL. And, for now I'll leave someone else to construct that one!
E. So are Alabama, Kentucky and Mississippi the major states most TN birders
focus on? Well, not exactly. In Vol. 4, TBN explored this question and found
that the top three states were Alabama, Kentucky and Georgia in that order.
Thus, 50% of birders on the Alabama list were from Tennessee, 36% of the
Kentucky list, and 31% of the Georgia list. Moreover, this result was from ALL
possible combinations of the states/provinces. AND, the 50%, 36% and 31% of
Tennessee birders on the lists for AL, KY & GA were the three highest
combinations! Extraordinary! The next highest (ranks 4 & 5) were Massachusetts
birders on the New Hampshire list, and Maryland birders on the District of
Columbia list (tied at 30.8%). With regard to the other rankings, TN birders
were 24.3% of the South Carolina list (rank 13), 20% of both the North Carolina
and West Virginia list (rank 21), and 18.5% of the Arkansas list (rank 23). We
ended up with seven of these combinations or relationships among the top 30,
the highest overall, with five combinations for birders in Massachusetts.
F. In the "old days," when thresholds were used by the ABA (you could not enter
a list unless you had achieved a certain numbers of birds), the goal for many
Total Tickers was 50% of the birds of states/provinces. A question asked in
Vol. 5 of TBN was which states/provinces were the easiest to achieve the 50%
threshold in a 3-5 day trip at the best time of the year? One way to answer
that question was to divide the top Big Day total for a state/province by the
number of birds on the state's or province's list. So, for example, 214 birds
was the top Big Day total for Manitoba, and a total of 394 birds had been
identified in Manitoba (212/394 = 54.3%). The top ten were:
1. 54.3% Manitoba2. 53.1 Wisconsin3. 50.1 Missouri4. 49.8 Alberta5. 49.5 New
Jersey6. 49.1 Delaware7. 49.0 Saskatchewan8. 48.5 Ohio9. 48.2 Iowa10. 48.1
Kentucky
Note that TN ranked 28 on this list, quite average in terms of how easy it is
to reach the 50% threshold. Here is the list of the bottom ten (hardest to
achieve 50%):
53. 37.3% Rhode Island54. 36.8 Arizona55. 36.0 California56. 35.5 Florida57.
33.5 Nevada58. 33.3 New Brunswick59. 31.0 Nova Scotia60. 26.7 Yukon
Territory61. 23.5 Alaska62 19.9 Northwest Territory
Now, we don't use threshold anymore (a good thing allowing all birders to
list), but I think 50% is a "good" number to shot for in the Total Ticking
game. But, good luck in Northwest Territory!
G. Vol. 5 of TBN also explored the growth in state/province bird lists from
1992. In the case of Tennessee, we had 369 birds in 1992 and 408 in 2009, an
increase of 39 new birds for the state. How did we rank compared to other
states/provinces during this period? Not too bad! We ended up with a rank of
19. The top 5 were:
1. Yukon Territory2. Alaska3. Idaho4. Saskatchewan5. Washington
Lowest on the list?
57. Oklahoma58. Manitoba59. Florida60. Missouri61. Pennsylvania
H. Jeff Wilson, Jeff Wilson, Jeff Wilson. You can't talk about birding in
Tennessee without talking about the late Jeff Wilson. He was number one on any
TN list you might want to construct, but my interest was to see how he ranked
with other birders in a national context. Perhaps Jeff was a good birder in TN
but not so much when others outside TN were discussed. Not a chance! I took up
the challenge in Vol. 3 when I compared Jeff with other top ranking birders in
other states and provinces. Specifically, how did Jeff do as a percentage of
the birds of Tennessee compared to others. Among all states and provinces, Jeff
ranked 4th, having identified 95.1% of the birds of Tennessee. Only three
others had higher rankings, Bud Johnson (AZ) with 95.5%, John Parmeter (NM)
with 95.4% and Robert Fox (MA) with 95.3%.
The result in Vol. 3 made me think about other ways to evaluate birders across
the country and Canada. As I was (slowly, too slowly it turned out) working on
this, I heard that Jeff had died and so I finished up my work and devoted all
of Vol. 8 to the report. The question was this: how did Jeff''s ranking on the
TN list over the last 25 years (1988-2012) compare to all birders in all states
and provinces. The list I reported was of the top 100 birders during this 25
years, but of course many more birders were not included. Indeed, about 2,500
birders were evaluated in the study and total data points ended up being
63,000. Each birder was scored on a 1,000 point system. Jeff ranked #2, with
995 points, only Robert Janssen of MN (still active) got higher, 997. Only two
other TN birders ended up in the top 100, Daniel Jacobson, 929 with a rank of
46, and John Henderson, 875 a rank of 95. Dollyann Myers and Kathy Jacobson
came close with 854 and 851, respectively (rank of 122 and 126). Jeff was
certainly one of the very best state level birders of that 25 year period. And
I still sorely regret his not having seen the result.
I. In 2011 (Vol. 6) the issue seemed to be whether the great recession had
impacted birding. U.S. Big Days, the ABA Area list, the U.S. list, all the
state and province lists, the Annual ABA Area list and the Total Ticks list
were included for national data. Various Canadian lists and other international
reporting areas were also involved. Nationally, the results indicated a strong
recession effect. Generally, the number of birders reporting birds in 2010 was
much lower than in 2005. The Canadian results were better but the best
non-recession findings were in the area of international reporting areas.
Clearly, wealthier birders who could go on expensive overseas trips were
relatively immune from the recession. Perhaps another result indicating
recession was that birders with lower life lists were hit the most, while high
life list birders with the money to go the many places needed were comparably
immune. In an update for the following year (2011-Vol. 7), TBN reported that
the number of ABA birders had increased by 7.4%: "It would appear that the ABA
has turned a corner on the recession."
J. One of the statistics TBN covers is the All Time Annual Tennessee List. Vol.
7 produced the 50 highest annual TN totals of all time, and 23 of the 50 places
were held by Jeff Wilson, 46%. Jeff also owned 11 out of the 15 highest places
or 73%. The following is an updated top 15:
1. Jeff Wilson (307 birds-2002)3.-t Jeff Wilson (298-1994)3.-t Jeff Wilson
(298-2005)4. Ruben Stoll (297-2013)5. Rebecca Satterfield (296-1993)7.-t Jeff
Wilson (290-2011)7.-t Jeff Wilson (290-1990)9.-t Michael Todd (289-2002)9.-t
Jeff Wilson (289-1996)10. Scott Somershoe (288-2011)12.-t Jeff Wilson
(286-1989)12.-t Jeff Wilson (286-2003)14.-t Jeff Wilson (284-2000)14.-t Jeff
Wilson (284-2001)15. Jeff Wilson (283-2004)
I have a vague memory of one other total for this list so as always let me know
if I need to make a correction.
K. In Vol. 7, TBN also calculated an All Time Annual World List, 1988-2011. The
leading birder on the list was George Winter of MO, who achieved 7,865 birds in
2006, followed by John Nagstaff of the UK with 6,391 in 2003, and James
Clements (CA) in 1989. Our Dollyann Myers and Hoff were also on the list with
ranks of 45 and 49, respectively, with 1,975 and 1,964 for 2006. At the time
Dollyann was ranked 14 and Ron 16 on the World list noted above.
L. And, of course, it is possible to calculate an All Time Total Ticks list,
and the following is the updated current version:
1. 18,271 Paul Lehman, 20142. 15,760 Deuane Hoffman3. 15,594 Kenneth Ward,
20114. 13,679 Mike Resch, 20165. 13,587 Thomas Heatley, 20166. 12,990 Jon Dunn,
20067. 12,209 Cecil Kersting, 20118. 11,604 David Chaffin, 20159. 11,473 Kevin
Breault, 201610. 11,262 Richard Rosche, 201111. 11,253 Jeffrey Sanders, 201512.
11,016 Leif Anderson, 201513. 10,921 Stephen Dinsmore, 201014. 10,177 Frank
Bumgardner, 201515. 10,138 Robin Carter, 2007
M. Finally, last year (Vol. 10), TBN looked at states/provinces of new rare
birds (5 or fewer individuals found annually), 1950-2011, based on the book
Rare Birds of North America by Steve Howell, Ian Lewington & Will Russel
(Princeton Univ, Press, 2014). First on the list was Alaska for 76 rare birds,
Texas for 30, California for 21, Florida for 19, and Arizona for 14. Other than
Florida, the only southeastern state on the list was North Carolina with 6 rare
birds (rank of 8). Certainly bad news about our Hooded Crane but TN would have
been our first.
That is it for Vol. 11 of TBN. Best of luck for 2015! I apologize in advance
for any errors. Many numbers and calculations are involved. If I've made a
mistake let me know and I'll make the change next year. And if I've made a big
mistake I'll email the group asap.
On a personal note, 2015 was a better year for me as I ended up with 556 annual
Total Ticks compared to 222 for the previous year, visiting 18 states/provinces
and 23 out of state trips (OST) for a total of 11,473. Yet, 556 was well below
what I have done in the past (2005 was the best year with 912 with 21 states
and 27 OST, still quite short of the top annual total tics). My biggest
disappointment was not getting to Arizona and New Mexico this winter. Still,
2015 was a fine life bird year for me mainly because of my trip to Alaska,
ending up with 693 (ABA Area), seven short of the life goal I had set for
myself many years ago. I still need two Code 1 birds (Mountain Quail and Bell's
Sparrow), and 21 Code 2 birds. Of course, the other disappointment is that the
days of easy total ticks are coming to an end. I still have reasonable
possibilities in Canada and in the US southwest, but my current life goal of
12,000 Total Ticks is not going to be easy. I hope to get to central Canada,
CA, and perhaps AZ and NM in 2016, but of course wishing does not get the work
done.
As always you can't list your ABA totals unless you are a member of the
American Birding Association (http://www.americanbirding.org). It is still
quite cheap and you get a great deal with the major magazine, "Birding," the
new magazine called the "Birder's Guide" series that takes on a specific topic
in significant detail every issue (travel, gear, listing/taxonomy, etc.), and a
much better interactive site for listing. Note that the current issue of
Birding (author Diana Doyle) talks about the new Zeiss Victory SF binocular,
which may "reinvent" the way birders use binoculars--the first to be custom
designed for birders.
Always be good to birds and generous to birders of all stripes, totals and
ranks! Good birding and good totaling!
Kevin BreaultBrentwood, TN
http://mtweb.mtsu.edu/kbreault/
