Category: Birding Reports

From: Rex Rowan <rexrowan@gmail.com>
To: Alachua County birding report

Normally warbler migration peaks in late April and trails off to almost nothing after the first week of May. In some years, though, the peak comes later, and this appears to be one of those years. Yesterday morning Mike Manetz, Barbara Shea, and I walked Bolen Bluff and came up with some impressive numbers: 32 American Redstarts, 20 Blackpoll Warblers, 20 Northern Parulas, 8 Black-throated Blue Warblers, 6 Common Yellowthroats, 5 Black-and-white Warblers, an Ovenbird, and a Northern Waterthrush. While we were at Bolen Bluff, Andy Kratter was finding lots of warblers in his SE Gainesville neighborhood, including 18 American Redstarts. Mike went back to Bolen Bluff this morning and found that numbers were a little lower but still high, and that two new species had dropped in: 26 American Redstarts, 10 Northern Parulas, 8 Black-throated Blue Warblers, 6 Blackpoll Warblers, 5 Common Yellowthroats, 1 Black-and-white Warbler, 1 Worm-eating Warbler, and 1 Magnolia Warbler, only the second that Mike has ever seen during spring migration in Alachua County.

Also, don’t forget that Sweetwater Wetlands Park is open on weekends, so you can go this afternoon or all day tomorrow. Our two AK’s (Andy Kratter and Adam Kent) and Jonathan Mays paid a visit this morning and tallied 54 species. Highlights included 14 Least Bitterns (including one juvenile), 2 Purple Gallinules, 2 Limpkins, a Prothonotary Warbler, an American Redstart, an Indigo Bunting, a Blue Grosbeak, 12 Bobolinks, and nine species of shorebirds, including 9 Black-necked Stilts, 4 Semipalmated Plovers, 18 Spotted Sandpipers, 4 Solitary Sandpipers, 10 Semipalmated Sandpipers, and 80 Least Sandpipers. The SWP website is here. If you have no idea where SWP is, the best map for finding it is at the bottom of this page: http://www.sweetwaterwetlands.org/#!contact/cudb

By the way, if you want to learn a little more about SWP, you might be interested in this: The Sweetwater Wetlands Park—Gainesville’s Newest Birding Hotspot. Presented by Debbie Segal.  Monday, May 11th at the Thomas Center (new location). Social at 6:30 p.m. and program at 7 p.m. Learn how the Sweetwater Wetlands was designed to remove large quantities of nutrients and pollutants while simultaneously providing diverse wildlife habitat and passive public recreation. Water quality, vegetation planting, hydrologic features, and long-term management will be discussed. This presentation has been scheduled to occur just prior to the May 17th Alachua Audubon field trip to Sweetwater Wetlands Park.

Kathy Malone has had a leucistic Common Grackle hanging around her place in High Springs. It has three or four pure white primary coverts, and the four tail feathers on the left are white. Otherwise it looks perfectly normal. Kathy posted a nice picture on her Flickr page: https://www.flickr.com/photos/kmalone98/16819442094/in/dateposted-public/

Speaking of photos, on April 21st Trina Anderson got these shots of a Great Blue Heron eating a rather large rodent along the La Chua Trail. I passed them along to Scott Flamand, who in turn passed them along to Fiona Reid, author of the Peterson Field Guide to Mammals of North America, who identified it as a Hispid Cotton Rat: https://www.flickr.com/photos/46902575@N06/sets/72157649847422004

Does anyone on this list use independent listing software, like Bird Brain, AviSys, Birder’s Diary, or BirdBase? If so, please let me know. I’m especially interested in anyone who’s using listing software on a Mac. Thanks.

From: Rex Rowan <rexrowan@gmail.com>
To: Alachua County birding report

See what you miss when you don’t go on Audubon field trips? Rob Norton got this excellent shot of a Swainson’s Warbler at Steinhatchee Springs WMA on the April 26 Hickory Mound Impoundment trip led by John Hintermister: https://www.flickr.com/photos/73960438@N04/17097720139/

Another case in point: participants in last Sunday’s field trip to Newnans Lake saw two American Avocets fly past the pier at Powers Park. That’s a rare bird in Alachua County.

You’re kicking yourself for not going, aren’t you? Don’t despair, there are still some field trips left: https://alachuaaudubon.org/classes-field-trips/

Thrushes, historically rare here during spring migration, have been coming through in surprising numbers during the past two weeks. Beginning on April 20th and continuing through May 5th (but mainly from the 26th through the 2nd) local birders reported 5 Veeries, 4 Gray-cheeked Thrushes, 3 Swainson’s Thrushes, and 6 Wood Thrushes. I previously linked to Becky Enneis’s photo of a Wood Thrush, and Sam Ewing also got a photo of a Gray-cheeked: https://www.flickr.com/photos/121511542@N02/16673743583/  We had an even stronger thrush migration last year. In 2013 it was smaller but still above average, and in 2012 it was closer to normal: a few Wood Thrushes, one Gray-cheeked, one Swainson’s, no Veeries. In spring 2011, only one Wood Thrush and one Veery were observed.

Speaking of migrants, we’re getting to Connecticut Warbler prime time. Of the county’s ten spring reports, all were between May 6th and May 28th, but six of them were between May 9th and May 13th. And remember, Mike Manetz was looking for a Connecticut Warbler when he found this: https://www.flickr.com/photos/74215662@N04/8711298883/  That was a great day: https://www.flickr.com/photos/74215662@N04/8737718788/

Deena Mickelson, Danny Shehee, and Tom Tompkins saw a Brown Pelican over the La Chua Trail on the 30th. Stay away from those three if you don’t want your picture taken: https://www.flickr.com/photos/74215662@N04/17196068340/

I’ve put up another blog post, this one describing a walk on the opening day of Sweetwater Wetlands Park. I was dissatisfied with what I wrote, but the photography, mainly by Danny Shehee (with an assist from Jacksonville’s Kevin Dailey), is excellent, and will give you an idea of what the place looks like if you’ve never been: http://fieldguide.blogs.gainesville.com/239/sweetwater-wetlands-park-open-at-last/

I told the Sun that people were having trouble subscribing to my blog. Trina Anderson had shown me a birding blog that notifies readers by email whenever a new post comes out, so I forwarded that to the editor, and he set up a similar email notification device in the right sidebar of my blog. So if you enter your email address, you’ll get an email whenever I post something new. I don’t think the Sun will sell your email to marketers, but I can’t make any guarantees, so caveat emptor. Or caveat subscriptor in this case.

Going back one paragraph … Attention, eBirders: the new official eBird designation for the sheetflow restoration area is “Sweetwater Wetlands Park.” An eBird hotspot with that name has been established. Please use it – initially with the “Find it on a map” option on the “Where did you bird?” page; afterward it should be under “Choose from your locations.” In that way, all the sightings will be properly gathered into a single database. Old checklists headed “Paynes Prairie Preserve SP–Sheetflow Restoration Wetland” have automatically been changed to the new name.

Also, eBird now has an online store where you can buy eBird hats and tee shirts, though I think it’s still a work in progress: http://shorepromotions.com/ebird_store

Alachua Audubon will hold a Woodpecker Walk for Kids at Northeast Park on May 10th. This is your chance to take a child or grandchild birding, because the Woodpecker Walk is aimed specifically at young people. Meeting time and place here.

Audubon of Florida’s Jacqui Sulek writes, “In honor of International Migratory Bird Day, Waccasassa Bay Preserve State Park will be hosting a birding hike on May 9th. There are only 14 spots available for the hike which is in one week. It’s a unique opportunity since we will be driving a van to the boundary of the preserve and then hiking in to a spot near a spring and trying to spot whatever we can while we’re out there. Contact 352-543-5567 to reserve your spot.  If there is no answer leave your name and number and someone will return your call to verify your reservation as soon as possible.”

From: Rex Rowan <rexrowan@gmail.com>
To: Alachua County birding report

This morning Bob Carroll picked up Miami birder Toe Torres in Hawthorne and took him to Longleaf Flatwoods Reserve, where I joined them. Toe’s Florida life list, though 405 species long, was still lacking Hairy Woodpecker. He’d seen one in Virginia, where they’re much more common, but never in Florida. Hairies have been found along the Red Loop at Longleaf the past two or three years, and Ron Robinson and Jim Allison found one out there on March 11th, so that’s where we searched. We wandered for a good mile over the sandhills back there, but finally located it in about the same place where we saw it last year. Walk out the Red-White Connector (turning left onto the service road), and when the trail forks at the beginning of the Red Loop go straight (which is the right fork). Before long you’ll pass the turnoff to the camping area. Just stay on the main trail for about a hundred yards beyond the turnoff and you’ll be in Hairy Woodpecker territory. Listen for its drumming; it drums more often than it calls. We had to go off the trail to see it, and found it in some pines about a hundred feet from the fence marking the northern border of the property. I was looking at a different stand of pines when I heard Bob and Toe calling for me, and I ran back, but not quickly enough. Oh well, I’ll see it during The June Challenge…

Geoff Parks sent me an interesting email at 8:30, while I was at Longleaf: “I’m too busy to do anything about it right now, but there seem to be several migrants singing around Loblolly [NW 5th Avenue just east of NW 34th Street]. I’m hearing a Gray-cheeked Thrush through my office window, and when I came in there was an unusually high-pitched Black-throated Blue. I don’t want to cause a false panic but there’s a slim chance that it was a Cerulean…”

Speaking of migrants, have you watched “Gulf Crossing” yet this spring? It’s a 2013 film about trans-Gulf migration and it features some really beautiful photography. Watch the first minute and a half – just birds and landscapes – and maybe you’ll watch the rest: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e20qNjdcSUk

Debbie Segal is looking for photos from Sweetwater Wetland Park (which opens on Saturday!). She writes, “I am preparing a power point presentation of the Sheetflow Wetland (aka Sweetwater Wetland Park) and would like to get a few more photos of birds, people, and/or the public use facilities. Do you know a few folks who might have some photos to share with me? If so, can you please forward this email to them or send me their names so I can contact them?” Let me know if you’ve got photos and I’ll put you in touch with Debbie.

Kissimmee Prairie Preserve State Park has just posted a job announcement for their park biologist position (Environmental Specialist I). The preserve is one of the largest remaining tracts of Florida dry prairie. It is a breathtaking and remote landscape. Housing may be provided on site. This position had been held for many years by Paul Miller. He was a strong advocate for the endangered Florida Grasshopper Sparrow, which still exists in small numbers at the preserve. It will take a special person to fill this vacancy given the urgent actions needed for the sparrow at this time. There is a very short application deadline (May 1). Please forward this announcement to anyone you know who may be interested. Here is the direct link to the application site: https://jobs.myflorida.com/viewjob.html?optlink-view=view-796452&ERFormID=newjoblist&ERFormCode=any

Alachua County environmental officials are seeking public input on the 1,179 acre Watermelon Pond Preserve at a public meeting on May 4th at 6 p.m. at the Archer City Hall (16870 SW 134th Avenue). They’re looking for input regarding hiking trails, interpretative kiosks, sandhill restoration, and management of the preserve.

This is probably going to end up humiliating me, but how many of you have tried subscribing to my Gainesville Sun blog and failed, and how many have successfully subscribed? Please let me know, since two or three people have complained to me that they can’t subscribe and I’d like to have a number when I talk to the Sun about it. Of course, if the number of people who have tried to subscribe is no more than two or three, I don’t think the Sun will pay a lot of attention to me…

From: Rex Rowan <rexrowan@gmail.com>
To: Alachua County birding report

The good news is that Steve Goodman and Sam Ewing, participating for the first time in Georgia’s Youth Birding Challenge, won the first place trophy today (!!!!): https://www.flickr.com/photos/74215662@N04/17281902992/  Congratulations, guys! WE knew you were great birders, now everyone else does too!

Other good news: Backyard birding is getting more interesting. Just today, Becky Enneis had a Wood Thrush at her place in Alachua, Dana Griffin had an Ovenbird in his NW Gainesville backyard, and Ron Robinson photographed a Summer Tanager and a Black-throated Blue Warbler in his Back Yard De Luxe west of Gainesville.

Now the bad news: UF wildlife biology professor Dr. Peter Frederick, who has been observing the nesting colonies at Seahorse Key over the past few years, has reported a complete abandonment of nesting activity on Seahorse Key that seems to have occurred within the past two weeks. He gave me permission to publish his report, but he had some cautions: “I am very concerned about speculation and blame in the absence of much evidence and I hope that you will emphasize that there are still many possible explanations for what happened, some of which are natural causes. Please remind the readers that in the 1930s the birds bred predominantly on Snake Key and that colonies can be very dynamic.” With that said, here’s Peter’s report from the 25th:

“We learned a lot today about the loss of nesting at Seahorse, though we do not have a conclusive explanation for events. The synopsis is that Maria and Kenny were right – there has been a complete abandonment of all nesting at Seahorse, and many of those birds have apparently begun nesting at Snake Key. The cause of abandonment is unclear, though we think we can rule out one or two of the potential stressors.

“First, the Seahorse Key trip, in which we walked over large portions of Gardiners Point, revealed no active nesting of any species aside from ospreys on their platforms. Cormorants, Pelicans, ibises, egrets, herons, spoonbills – all are gone. Vic had recorded very typical flight line counts only two weeks ago and I had heard that Larry Woodward may have seen evidence of nesting even more recently. We found nests that were falling apart with no eggs or chicks, and hundreds of eggs on the ground, nearly all of which had been opened by Fish Crows. The characteristic marks of avian egg puncture (shell edge pushed inwards, intact hemispheres of eggs) are easy to tell from raccoon marks (crushed eggs, teeth marks) and we only found one or two eggs that might have been handled by a raccoon. All of this could well have been scavenging rather than direct egg predation. We also saw the remains of up to 15 dead cormorants, five dead pelicans, two dead ibises, three dead black-crowned night herons, and one dead fish crow. We estimate that there must have been many more dead birds – we did not cover the entire island or the entirety of Gardiners Point.

“Its unclear if the numbers of dead birds are abnormal – all breeding aggregations of birds have dead individuals lying about. I thought the number was excessive for normal mortality, though there was disagreement on this point by Marilyn Spalding, who has also been in a lot of colonies. The mortalities all seemed to be roughly the same age though, and many still had beetle larvae on them that may help us to define the rough time of death, CSI style. We collected about seven of the carcasses, and though all were bones and feathers, no flesh, there may be important information to be had from them. The synchronicity of the mortalities is also atypical of most healthy colonies.

“All signs pointed to a mass abandonment of nests that was at least roughly synchronous. The fact that so many species abandoned at once makes interruptions in many different food supplies at once unlikely as an explanation – so does the fact that nearly all species appear to have re-initiated nesting on Snake Key. The lack of evidence of raccoon bite marks on eggs suggests that raccoons were not the primary source of nest abandonment. We found no raccoon tracks on the beaches of Gardiners Point and found only one scat in the interior of Gardiners Point – it did not appear to have shell fragments or feathers in it. We walked the entire gulf-facing beach front on Seahorse and found tracks on the southeast part, suggestive of one or perhaps two individuals. Since Fish Crows cannot usually intimidate birds off their nests, their eating of eggs looks entirely secondary to the abandonment – the crows were scavenging abandoned eggs. The fact that the birds have re-initiated on Snake Key strongly suggests that something occurred at Seahorse that was hugely incompatible with nesting there, and frightened all the birds off.

“There are several possibilities for the cause. Eagles could have begun attacking adult nesting birds – this has caused mass abandonment before in seabird colonies, and the placement and skeleton evidence suggests that the carcasses we found could have been eaten by a raptor. However, they could also have been cleaned off by crabs or rats or beetle larvae and the evidence might have looked very similar. Eagles are common at Seahorse, but they have coexisted with birds there for some years and at other colonies elsewhere in coastal situations for some years. Snake Key has a resident pair – if the birds were flipped out by predatory eagles it seems unlikely they would have chosen Snake to re-nest.

“Human disturbance that included killing through shooting or some other mechanism could also be a possibility. The placement and disposition of the dead birds could have been from birds that were shot. There were many more carcasses on the edge, particular the north end of Gardiners Point, than in the middle. Thus someone with a gun might have been shooting  birds from a boat, creating this pattern. The carcasses we collected should allow us to tell whether they were shot – usually there are marks on bones that indicate the passage of lead shot, though this is easier to tell with shotgun than with single shot. We also found no shell casings despite some pretty intensive looking-down to avoid the cottonmouth moccasins. Similarly,  predation by eagles has characteristic talon marks that often puncture the back of the head. So I believe it would be of great value to get the carcasses analyzed by some lab that can do decent forensics. While it seems farfetched that someone would do such a thing (and even more, that no one would hear or see it), remember that we have probably gone two weeks without noticing that the birds had abandoned – so our detection and monitoring is episodic, and such an event could well have occurred.

“We did find large numbers of all the species except ibises nesting on Snake Key, nearly all on the north side. We saw one pelican apparently on a nest and many others building and courting. I counted 65 cormorant nests and over 150 individuals, many of which were carrying nesting material. We saw Roseate Spoonbills carrying nesting material and descending with it into the mangroves on the north side, and at least two Great Egrets carrying nesting material and displaying high courtship colors on the nares. In short, everything that abandoned at Seahorse was at Snake, starting anew, albeit probably in smaller numbers. Note that this section is being monitored by trail cameras set on poles looking towards the island, and these cameras should have been able to document the buildup of birds there – which may help us pinpoint the timing of the abandonment at Seahorse.

“We may never know what happened on Seahorse – but it is unprecedented in the history of the island as far as I or anyone else on the trip today knew. While the past numbers of nests have fluctuated, there is no record of zero in recent history, especially by all species. This could be temporary, and the birds might return to Seahorse next year, or it could be permanent, especially if they do well at Snake this year. Given the numbers of birds at Snake, it seems appropriate to put up no entry postings as they have been at Seahorse, since in my experience human disturbance from beachgoers and fishermen could be detrimental to nesting – but those are agency decisions to make.

“My experience with other colony abandonments is that we humans tend to jump to conclusions, and usually blame humans for such events, especially in the absence of evidence. Before we do so, I think we should at least get the carcasses analyzed. Until that time, I suggest that we ought to repeat that the abandonments at Seahorse appeared to be synchronous within the last two weeks, and the events leading to that abandonment are unclear. Interruptions in the food supply seems like the least likely explanation at this point, and investigations are ongoing. We should encourage anyone with observations about the nesting at seahorse to contact the Refuge. We should also appeal to the public to keep at least 100 meters away from the shores of Snake Key on all sides to give the birds a chance to re-nest. Given the late start of nesting there, it will probably be necessary to keep disturbance to a minimum well into July.

“I have probably missed important points in this whole description, and so encourage everyone to add information if they can.”

I wonder what will happen to the famous Seahorse Key cottonmouths, which survive on dead fish that fall from the nests. They’ll have a long wait between now and next spring, if the birds even return next spring.

From: Rex Rowan <rexrowan@gmail.com>
To: Alachua County birding report

Mark your calendar! Sweetwater Wetland Park – what we’ve been calling the sheetflow restoration area – will open to the general public on weekends beginning on Saturday, May 2nd. Hours of operation will be 7:00 a.m. to 5:00 a.m. on both Saturdays and Sundays, and the admission price will be $5.00 per car. It’s not going to have enough parking places!

There’s a field trip to Sweetwater Wetland Park (SWP) tomorrow, your last chance to bird the place without paying an admission fee. It’s actually a Santa Fe Audubon field trip, but they’ve extended an invitation to Gainesville birders to join them. Be at the SWP entrance at 8:30 – not the usual double-gated entrance, but the single gate about a hundred yards to the north – and be prompt, because Debbie Segal will have to lock it after everyone gets there. She wanted to scout out the birding conditions before the field trip, so this afternoon she went for a drive around the cells, and she invited Dotty Robbins and me to come along. In the overflow channel that borders the cells on the north side we found shorebirds of a dozen species in a muddy, grassy tract that was partly flooded. There were lots of Greater and Lesser Yellowlegs, lots of Solitary and Least Sandpipers, Killdeer, two Semipalmated Plovers, two Semipalmated Sandpipers, three Long-billed Dowitchers, a Pectoral Sandpiper, a Stilt Sandpiper, and (tying the county’s early record) a White-rumped Sandpiper. There were lots of birds out there, and it’s possible that we missed something. In a different part of the park we counted 63 Bobolinks. Other sightings included Limpkins, Least Bitterns, an American Bittern, a Purple Gallinule, and Northern Rough-winged Swallows.

I suspect that all those birds will still be around when SWP opens on May 2nd, so don’t feel that you have to give up tomorrow’s trip to Hickory Mound Impoundment and Steinhatchee Springs WMA: https://alachuaaudubon.org/event/hickory-mound-wildlife-management-area/?instance_id=405

Earlier in the day I’d led the community education birding class out La Chua. We got most of the expected birds, and nothing unexpected: Blue Grosbeak, Indigo Bunting, Yellow-breasted Chat, Purple Gallinule, and Least Bittern. A couple of us stayed late and added a Summer Tanager and two lingering winter birds, Sora and Northern Harrier, to the day’s list. The Alachua Audubon Society field trip to Bolen Bluff, also held this morning, found American Redstarts, Black-throated Blue Warblers, a Cape May Warbler, Bobolinks, and a Whooping Crane.

People are reporting Rose-breasted Grosbeaks at their feeders. Evelyn Perry had two in her yard near the Kanapaha Prairie on the 23rd, and Bob and Erika Simons had two at their place in SW Gainesville on the 24th. My favorite Rose-breasted Grosbeak report, however, was the one Ron Robinson submitted on the 22nd, because it was accompanied by a photo of a grosbeak feeding right next to a Pine Siskin, not a combination we often see around here: https://www.flickr.com/photos/74215662@N04/17234681116/

If you remember, a pair of American Robins nested in Geoff Parks’s NE Gainesville neighborhood last summer. They seem to be back. Geoff is seeing as many as three hanging around, weeks after the migrant robins have gone north. Even more interesting, Mike Manetz has heard one singing every morning in his NW Gainesville neighborhood, about a mile from Geoff’s place. I suspect it’s one of the offspring from last year’s nesting. But does it have any chance of finding a mate? And, if so, isn’t any female robin that’s still in Gainesville likely to be a sibling?

Finally, excuse the self-indulgence, but the next five paragraphs are from a diary entry, written twenty years ago tomorrow, describing a significant event (well, significant to me and Mike Manetz) that occurred twenty years ago today:

“Since September Mike Manetz and I have been working on a pamphlet, A Birdwatcher’s Guide to Alachua County, Florida. We really started writing around the end of December, and had most of the text done by last month. At this point Jonathan [Vaughan, a high-school friend of mine] was supposed to have taken over and, using his training in layout and graphic design, made a book out of it, but his father developed pancreatic cancer, and Jonathan spent every spare minute at his bedside. When his father died earlier this month, Jonathan really got down to work on the book. I went up to Jacksonville and spent most of a weekend in front of his computer, changing this word, asking him to alter that map; and then last Thursday he brought the computer down and Mike and I looked over everything, suggested a few last-minute changes, and got the final version printed out right there in my dining room. The next morning I delivered it to Xerographics, an inexpensive photocopying shop Mike had made a deal with.

“Yesterday afternoon at 5:30 Mike and his 10-year-old daughter Ashley met me at Xerographics. The pamphlet was still being trimmed and boxed, so we stood around nervously, wondering if they’d left anything out, or stapled anything in upside down. A UF biologist with a young son was there also, conferring with the staff about a Spanish-language folder on a rainforest conference to be held in Peru. When the boxes of our pamphlets were brought out, it took him less than ten seconds to walk over and ask, ‘Can I buy one?’ Mike said sure, and after commenting about the relatively high price (Mike replied, ‘How many thousands of hours of work did we put into this, Rex?’), he wrote us a check. So Peter Polshek was our first purchaser. And he made us autograph the title page. Mike said, as we were walking out the door, ‘I was real cool when he asked to buy the book in there, but I want to tell you, I just barely kept myself from jumping up and down.’

“So how did it feel to have the book in our hands? Partly good and partly disappointing. Here was this thing we’d been visualizing for so long, and we could actually heft it in our hands, and turn the pages, and see our pictures on the back cover and our names on the front. But they’d used cheap paper, so that the back of each sheet showed through, and some of the pages were crooked, and several of the covers had shoddy trimming jobs that gave them frayed edges. So that took the edge off our giddiness – but still I couldn’t keep my hands off the books on my drive home. I kept picking them up and looking at them.

“Last night Nina and the kids and I went over to the Manetzes’ and colored the pamphlet covers. Each cover depicted a Mississippi Kite drawn by Diana, Mike’s wife, and we colored in each of the 249 remaining kites’ eyes with red magic markers.

“This morning I showed the books around the office. Everybody smiled and went, ‘Oh!’ and leafed through it briefly, but no one seemed really interested. Mike, on the other hand, called at about 8:30 to tell me he’d already sold five copies at the school where he teaches.”

Of course that 1995 edition, with its 64 pages, 12 maps, and species accounts for 227 annually- and irregularly-occurring birds, made way for the 2006 edition, with 128 pages, 42 maps, and species accounts for each of the 340 bird species ever recorded in Alachua County. It’s about time for a third edition, but Mike and I are now very old (a surprise to many people who see that 1995 photo on the back of the book) and our vital energies are waning, etc. Who knows, though? We may have one more edition in us. Meanwhile, the 2006 book is still available at Wild Birds Unlimited.

Incidentally, Kevin Dailey is working on a similar project for Duval County: http://birdingjacksonville.com/  It’s quite impressive. Click on “Locations” and “Species” on the menu. It’s a work in progress, and I’m really looking forward to seeing it when he’s done.

From: Rex Rowan <rexrowan@gmail.com>
To: Alachua County birding report

Join Alachua Audubon on Wednesday evening for Dr. Katie Sieving’s presentation, “Cracking the Anti-Predator Code of Tufted Titmice.” Dr. Sieving, a professor in the Department of Wildlife Ecology and Conservation, has been studying the vocalizations of chickadees and titmice for years. They’re highly social birds with exceptional vocal complexity. “Capable of encoding 2/3 of the information that the English language can, the sophisticated information encoded in parid calls is used by numerous species to avoid danger and enhance survival. Dr. Sieving will discuss how we decode meaning in these calls and how we are beginning to map landscapes of animal information.” We’ll meet at the Millhopper Branch Library, 3145 NW 43rd Street. A preliminary social “hour” begins at 6:30 with the talk following at 7:00.

The timing of migration at Cedar Key has been frustrating this week. As described here, the Third Thursday Birding Club pretty much struck out on the 16th with only three or four warbler species. But one day later Pat Burns and Dale Henderson engaged in a little competition during which Pat found 17 warbler species and Dale 15. No matter, we’d try again on the 19th, during the Alachua Audubon field trip. And the 19th started out fairly well, with a Peregrine Falcon circling over Shell Mound and a light-morph Short-tailed Hawk hanging over our heads for thirty seconds at Black Point Swamp. But that used up all our luck, because we didn’t find any migrants except for a single Prairie Warbler and in fact saw few birds of any sort. Several people had already gotten bored and headed home when we called it a day at 1:00 … and of course later that afternoon Pat Burns posted to Birdbrains, “This afternoon we had wind, rain, flooding and birds. I could hear Indigo Buntings, so I visited the State Museum, cemetery and Trestle Trail. Yellow-billed Cuckoo 2, Eastern Wood-Pewee 1, Veery 2, Wood Thrush 8, Gray Catbird in flocks, Yellow-throated Vireo 1, Prairie Warbler 3, Black-and-white Warbler 5, American Redstart 1, Prothonotary Warbler 1, Ovenbird 2, Northern Waterthrush 5, Hooded Warbler 3, Summer Tanager 1, Scarlet Tanager 1, Rose-breasted Grosbeak 15, Blue Grosbeak 5, Indigo Bunting 60+, Orchard Oriole 7, Baltimore Oriole 5.” Bob Carroll decided to drive out there today, and this morning he sent me an email, reporting, “Dude, it’s hopping! Black-throated Green, Blackpoll, Tennessee, Yellow, Indigo Bunting. Flying in as I type. Yay!” And this afternoon I saw a report from Citrus Audubon Society, who visited Cedar Key this morning and had some great birding, including everything mentioned by Pat and Bob as well as two species we don’t often see there in spring, Chestnut-sided and Cerulean Warblers.

Back here in Alachua County, things have mostly been a little tamer, as is normal; inland sites always have a reduced spring migration compared to the coast. But there have been a few exceptions. It’s been a great week for uncommon raptors. On the 18th Dean and Sam Ewing were driving east on University Avenue near Main Street they spotted a Short-tailed Hawk overhead. Sam got a photo, and while they were standing there a Broad-winged Hawk also flew over. Sam didn’t get a picture, but that was okay, because when they got to Powers Park he was able to photograph another Broad-winged Hawk! Steve Hofstetter reports that a third Broad-winged was seen during the Mill Creek field trip – also on the 18th. It usually takes me about five years to see three Broad-winged Hawks, and here were three in a single day! Finally, there was an adult Peregrine Falcon perched on the vulture roost at Palm Point this morning. Mike Manetz had time to snap a photo before it flew away.

A handful of migrant warblers have been showing up locally. On the 17th Becky Enneis of Alachua wrote, “Finally!  Since noon at the drip pool I’ve had Worm-eating Warbler, male Black-throated Blue, and male Blackpoll.” On the 18th Matt O’Sullivan found eight warbler species at Palm Point, including a Cape May, a Black-throated Blue, an American Redstart, and a Northern Waterthrush. On the 20th Mike Manetz had three Cape Mays and a Blackpoll there, as well as a Northern Waterthrush. He returned today, with John Hintermister, Howard Adams, and me, but although we found four Cape Mays, a Prairie, and a Northern Waterthrush, and had 53 species overall (including a flyover Yellow-crowned Night-Heron seen only by John and Mike), the number of migrants seemed to have declined over the three-day period. We’ve still got another week and a half to the warbler migration, however, and it usually finishes strong.

Indigo Buntings are migrating through, and Painted Buntings often accompany them. Phil Laipis had two females in his NW Gainesville yard on the 19th and Rich Lewis had a male eating chopped suet and bark butter in his NW Gainesville yard on the 20th.

John Hintermister and Steve Nesbitt visited Steinhatchee Springs WMA on the 17th and tallied seven (seven!) singing Swainson’s Warblers (seven!). John tells me that he plans to make Steinhatchee Springs one of his stops on the Hickory Mound field trip on the 26th (seven!). Details here: https://alachuaaudubon.org/event/hickory-mound-wildlife-management-area/?instance_id=405

The Western Tanager at Jack and Mary Lynch’s yard is still there, and has been molting in the red head of his breeding plumage. Kathy Malone got a photo on the 17th: https://www.flickr.com/photos/74215662@N04/17039875120/

Speaking of Kathy, she had a very neat idea to help nesting birds: https://www.flickr.com/photos/kmalone98/17170394481/

Hugo Kons got a nice photo of a Barn Swallow at its nest under the I-75 overpass at Williston Road on the 13th: https://www.flickr.com/photos/74215662@N04/17225536972/

Donny Griffin sent this to me. It’s a video of a big hummingbird that makes daily visits to a Brazilian guy who feeds him, flying in through his open window: https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=716617805095045&fref=nf

Hope to see you at the Millhopper Library at 6:30 p.m. on Wednesday, April 22nd. Once we’ve absorbed what Dr. Sieving has to say we’ll be like the NSA to titmice, eavesdropping on their every communication!