Caltech Birding

8/28/07

On this the 898th walk of the series we had quite a pleasant surprise. Jon Feenstra joined us again. It was Jon's 47th walk but the first since 4/13/06. Kent and I were down in the trench at the south end of the maintenance yard when we heard a faint chirp coming from some distance off, which we didn't recognize. We looked at each other with puzzled looks and I said "Well, Feenstra would be all over that." We didn't know what to make of it. We emerged from the trench to join the others and up walked Jon. In the excitement of the moment, we forgot to march Jon back down into the trench to listen for the bird. We should have.

However, Jon was directly responsible for getting us the recently elusive Scrub Jay. He heard one. of course. It was great to have Jon join in again and I hope he can work it into his schedule on a more regular basis.

It was hot (91 F) and we did not set any records. We got 16 species, above average for a week 35. The min/max for week 35 spans a pretty big range from 7 to 21. See the plots at http://birdwalks.caltech.edu/bird_data/species_time.html and http://birdwalks.caltech.edu/bird_data/two_plots.htm The highlight birds were a Pacific-slope Flycatcher, which Kent and I saw down in the aforementioned trench, a Scrub Jay (weird to have a Scrub Jay as a highlight, nicht vahr?), Western Bluebirds, and Wilson Warbler. The bluebirds were perched up on the light fixtures on the poles on the South side of the South Athletic field, same as last week. We also saw two types of Hummingbirds.

The stats:
The date: 8/28/07
The week number: 35
The walk number: 898
The weather: 91F, sunny
The walkers: Alan Cummings, Glenn Hamell, Jim Carlblom, Kent Potter, Simon Radford, Jon Feenstra

The birds (16):

Rock Pigeon
Scrub Jay
Northern Mockingbird
House Sparrow
Mourning Dove
House Finch
Anna's Hummingbird
Acorn Woodpecker
Crow
Pacific-slope Flycatcher
Bushtit
Band-tailed Pigeon
Western Bluebird
Black Phoebe
Wilson's Warbler
Hummingbird, Selasphorus

Respectfully submitted,
Alan Cummings
8/28/07
http://birdwalks.caltech.edu

8/22/07

It was quite a bit cooler than last week, only ~85 F, and we had an interesting walk but no records were set. Our total of 14 species lands us near the middle of the range for a week 34 (min = 10, max = 16). See the plots at http://birdwalks.caltech.edu/bird_data/species_time.html and http://birdwalks.caltech.edu/bird_data/two_plots.htm

We welcomed a new walker to the group, Nicole Sapin, Viveca's daughter. Nicole is walker number 95 and brings the cumulative person walks to 2840. There have been 897 walks in the series, so the average over the last 21 years has been about 3 walkers per walk. We are averaging about 6 per walk in 2007. See the plot at http://birdwalks.caltech.edu/walkers.html

We also welcomed back Beth Moore, who has the third-most walks this year but has been absent for much of the summer. Now that school is about to start she said she expects to be a regular on the walks.

We had a couple of interesting birds: an Olive-sided Flycatcher near the maintenance yard and some Western Bluebirds in the South Athletic field. The bluebirds were one each on the lower west lamp housings of the three light poles on the south side of the field. It seemed as if they were finding shade. I was suspicious that they were Western Bluebirds when we first saw them from great distance just before we entered Tournament Park. We couldn't see any color though from that position. But we were able to enter the field later from the west gate and get a good look.

The stats:
The date: 8/22/07
The week number: 34
The walk number: 897
The weather: 85F, sunny
The walkers: Alan Cummings, Fiona Tindall, Simon Radford, Beth Moore, Ann Patterson, Viveca Sapin, Nicole Sapin

The birds (14):

Rock Pigeon
Northern Mockingbird
House Sparrow
Mourning Dove
Anna's Hummingbird
Acorn Woodpecker
Crow
Red-masked Parakeet
Olive-sided Flycatcher
Black Phoebe
Western Bluebird
Band-tailed Pigeon
Bushtit
Hummingbird, Selasphorus

Respectfully submitted,
Alan Cummings
8/22/07
http://birdwalks.caltech.edu

8/14/07

It was a hot but interesting walk. I thought we had a low total until I checked the records when I got back and found that 13 is the record for a week 33 and we got 13 species. So we tied the all time record for week 33, which was set in 2003 and equaled in 2005. See the plots at http://birdwalks.caltech.edu/bird_data/species_time.html and http://birdwalks.caltech.edu/bird_data/two_plots.htm

Despite the heat, we had a big group of 8 walkers. And we had Melinda onboard for her last walk as a MURF summer student. Her talk is at 2 pm today, so she thought she could squeeze in one last walk before that. Melinda logged 9 walks, a bit behind me -- I have 814. Among the current crop of walkers and 2nd all time is Glenn Hamell with 297 walks. Third all time is Kent Potter with 232 walks. I appreciate everyone's support but especially those two have been outstanding.

One really interesting non-bird sighting were the iridescent clouds over the maintenance yard. I don't recall seeing such an atmospheric phenomenon before. I looked on the web and found they were not "glories" as we thought, but most likely iridescent clouds. Very colorful and beautiful.

We had three bird entries that had to go down as species. We saw a few hummingbirds but couldn't get the ID done. Then we saw a warbler in the maintenance yard. It was most likely a Wilson's but we weren't sure. Finally we had an unidentified hawk that flew out of a tree near Tournament Park, but kept low and disappeared fast.

Now I interrupt this report to go hear Melinda give her MURF talk entitled "Development and Tests of the LED Calibration System for the Daya Bay Reactor Neutrino Experiment."
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Now I'm back. Wow, she gave a first rate, enjoyable, and informative talk. I'm amazed how much she accomplished over her 10 weeks at Caltech, particularly with all the birdwatching that needed to be done! So, it's officially goodbye to Melinda, but I'm secretly hoping she comes back to Caltech as a graduate student We'll see.

The stats:
The date: 8/14/07
The week number: 33
The walk number: 896
The weather: 94F, partly cloudy
The walkers: Alan Cummings, Melinda Morang, Viveca Sapin, Fiona Tindall, Kent Potter, Matt Bradford, Simon Radford, Carolyn Ash

The birds (13):

Rock Pigeon
Northern Mockingbird
House Sparrow
House Finch
Acorn Woodpecker
Crow
Red-masked Parakeet
Bushtit
Warbler, sp.
Hawk, sp.
Hummingbird, sp.
Yellow-chevroned Parakeet
Lesser Goldfinch

Respectfully submitted,
Alan Cummings
8/14/07
http://birdwalks.caltech.edu

8/7/07

This will be a short report as I was on vacation and didn't participate. I looked over the list Glenn gave me and decided I had to reduce the number seen from 12 to 11. The group saw a White-throated Swift and then also claimed a swallow/swift. Since that could have also been a White-throated Swift, the rule has been that you can't take both. Anyway, 11 species is right in line with estimates for week 32. See the plots at http://birdwalks.caltech.edu/bird_data/species_time.html and http://birdwalks.caltech.edu/bird_data/two_plots.htm

According to Glenn the highlight was a flock of 30+ Red-masked Parakeets in the IPAC park. The lowlight is that Melinda may have walked her last walk for sometime. She is giving a SURF presentation on Tuesday 8/14 and will likely miss the walk that day. Then it's back to Chicago, I assume. If so, we will certainly miss Melinda and her enthusiastic attitude.

The stats:
The date: 8/7/07
The week number: 32
The walk number: 895
The weather: 74F, sunny
The walkers: Glenn Hamell, Ann Patterson, Melinda Morang, Viveca Sapin, Kent Potter, Carolyn Ash

The birds (11):

Rock Pigeon
Northern Mockingbird
House Sparrow
Mourning Dove
Anna's Hummingbird
Acorn Woodpecker
Crow
Nuttall's Woodpecker
White-throated Swift
Red-masked Parakeet
Black Phoebe

Respectfully submitted,
Alan Cummings
8/13/07
http://birdwalks.caltech.edu