11/30/09

No records today but we did get above the mean to make it a positive scoring walk of 0.25552. We observed 18 species, one above the median for a week 48.

See the plots at http://birdwalks.caltech.edu/bird_data/species_time.html and http://birdwalks.caltech.edu/bird_data/two_plots.htm

No Rock Pigeon, Scrub Jay, Mourning Dove, or Crow. Those were the problems. It's been a while since we haven't seen a Crow. On the good side, Beth heard a flicker and and we all saw a Black-throated Gray Warbler, a very nice bird. We also saw a California Gull. It has been a long while since we've seen a gull.

Next week looks dicey weatherwise, but we need to get a walk in during week 49, which runs through Wednesday of next week. So, we have three chances starting Monday. We also need a good species number. 2009 is percentage points ahead of 2007 for 2nd place all time. It's going to be interesting to see if we can do it. We need an average walk score of 0.4924 to overtake 2007 for 2nd place. First place is essentially out of reach. We'd need an average score of 2.2972 over the next 4 walks to get that spot. Not likely.

The date: 11/30/09
The week number: 48
The walk number: 1016
The weather: 74 F, sunny

The walkers: Alan Cummings, Beth Moore, Jim Carlblom, Mark Scheel, Viveca Sapin-Areeda, Mark Scheel, Darren Dowell, Ashish Mahabal

The birds (18):

Mockingbird
House Sparrow
House Finch
Anna's Hummingbird
Acorn Woodpecker
Cedar Waxwing
Yellow-rumped Warbler
Northern Flicker
Black-throated Gray Warbler
Ruby-crowned Kinglet
Cooper's Hawk
Bewick's Wren
Hermit Thrush
Black Phoebe
Bushtit
Orange-crowned Warbler
American Goldfinch
California Gull

Respectfully submitted,
Alan Cummings
12/3/09
http://birdwalks.caltech.edu

11/23/09

We set another record today. Ho-hum, getting to be a habit, a good habit. We observed 22 species, one above the previous record for a week 47. Our walk score was 1.64916, which moved our yearly score to 0.65939, which means 2009 is now in 2nd place all-time! In fact, if we average a 1.883 score for the last five walks of the year, we could overtake 2002 and become the best year ever. Not likely, but not impossible.

See the plots at http://birdwalks.caltech.edu/bird_data/species_time.html and http://birdwalks.caltech.edu/bird_data/two_plots.htm

Everyone contributed but I have to give myself a pat on the back, if that's allowed, because last Friday I got the key to Tournament Park, which is closed due to re-seeding, and in there we got three species we wouldn't have seen. And we would have only tied the record had not Viveca seen a House Sparrow on her way back to her office at the conclusion of the walk. According to the Caltech Birdwalk Rules and Regulations (CBRR), paragraph 102, section 301, that is an allowed sighting.

Good finds today included the Downy Woodpecker, the Black-throated Gray Warbler, a Hermit Thrush, and a Bewick's Wren. The North athletic field is being re-seeded and it's closed until January. Going on the field is not on the route but looking it over is, so this is a perfect situation. The workers were busy on the field today so we didn't get any meadowlarks or lark sparrows. But I'm hoping we'll see some good birds feeding on the seeds out there next week.

The date: 11/23/09
The week number: 47
The walk number: 1015
The weather: 73 F, sunny

The walkers: Alan Cummings, Viveca Sapin-Areeda, Mark Scheel, Kent Potter, Simon Radford, Darren Dowell

The birds (22):

Scrub Jay
Mockingbird
House Sparrow
Mourning Dove
House Finch
Anna's Hummingbird
Acorn Woodpecker
Crow
Yellow-rumped Warbler
Downy Woodpecker
Red-whiskered Bulbul
Black-throated Gray Warbler
Raven
Hawk, sp.
Black Phoebe
Ruby-crowned Kinglet
Hermit Thrush
Bewick's Wren
Lesser Goldfinch
Hummingbird, Selasphorus
Cedar Waxwing
American Goldfinch

Respectfully submitted,
Alan Cummings
11/24/09
http://birdwalks.caltech.edu

11/16/09

As I said in the last report, we need some good walks in the last walks of this year to boost the year into second place all time. Well we got in a good one today. In fact, we broke the record for a week 46! We observed 23 species, one above the all time record for this week. Our walk score was 2.13638, i.e., more than 2-sigma above the mean for the week. It was also the highest scoring walk since 9/8/09. So it was a good walk indeed.

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 good total, we failed to get a Rock Pigeon or a Mourning Dove. But we did get some we don't usually get, such as California Towhee, Dark-eyed Junco, and Red-shouldered Hawk. Two of the latter put on quite a display above the South athletic field. I learned that they have a very distinctive flight pattern, with several shallow flaps followed by a soar. Nice to know but they are pretty distinctive looking as well. The Say's Phoebe was back out on the North athletic field but no Western Meadowlarks or Lark Sparrows were to be found.

Caltech grounds people are doing some reseeding on campus and as a result we were locked out of Tournament Park. I have put in a request for a key but haven't heard back. The North athletic field is closed for the same reason until 4 Jan 2010. If Tournament Park is closed for that long, our chances of having really good walks is going to be diminshed some.

The date: 11/16/09
The week number: 46
The walk number: 1014
The weather: 73 F, sunny

The walkers: Alan Cummings, Kent Potter, Mark Scheel, Simon Radford, Darren Dowell, Beth Moore, Viveca Sapin-Areeda, Ashish Mahabal

The birds (23):

Scrub Jay
Mockingbird
House Sparrow
House Finch
Anna's Hummingbird
Acorn Woodpecker
Crow
Lesser Goldfinch
Bushtit
Yellow-rumped Warbler
Dark-eyed Junco
California Towhee
Black Phoebe
American Goldfinch
Say's Phoebe
House Wren
Raven
Red-shouldered Hawk
Robin
Red-whiskered Bulbul
Ruby-crowned Kinglet
Band-tailed Pigeon
Hummingbird, Selasphorus

Respectfully submitted,
Alan Cummings
11/16/09
http://birdwalks.caltech.edu

11/9/09

Another good, positive-scoring walk. We observed 18 species, only one above the median for a week 45, but it was above and not below. That gave us a walk score of 0.29283. The score for the year is 0.60457, still behind 2007 (0.64284) for second place all time.

See the plots at http://birdwalks.caltech.edu/bird_data/species_time.html and http://birdwalks.caltech.edu/bird_data/two_plots.htm

We were joined by a new walker, Mark Scheel, who is a Senior Research Fellow at Caltech in the TAPIR group (Theoretical Astrophysics Including Relativity). He is a birding expert, having been recruited by none other than Jon Feenstra a few years ago to lead walks for the Audubon Society. Mark is the 113th person to participate in the Caltech birdwalks and brings the total number of person-walks to 3436 since the inception of the walks on 15 October 1986, some 23 years ago. My, how time flies! We hope Mark will join the walks on a regular basis. He saved us quite a bit of time on the identification of the Plumbeous Vireo we saw on Wilson.

And that was the highlight bird for the walk. In second place was a Black-throated Gray Warbler in Tournament Park. We were disappointed that the Western Meadowlarks, Say's Phoebe, and Lark Sparrows were not out on the North athletic field, as they have been for a while. And our irregular "regulars" let us down. We didn't see a Rock Pigeon, a Mockingbird, a House Sparrow, or a Mourning Dove. If we could have gotten all of the above (7), we would have broken the record for a week 45 by two species. Better luck to us on the next walk.

By the way, it's going to take a lot of good walks in the upcoming last 7 in the year to catch 2007. We need an average walk score of 0.89 to do it. Sounds hard, but the average score for our last 7 walks has been 1.25, so it's definitely doable.

The date: 11/9/09
The week number: 45
The walk number: 1013
The weather: 79 F, partly cloudy

The walkers: Alan Cummings, Viveca Sapin-Areeda, Beth Moore, Ashish Mahabal, Mark Scheel, Dave Werntz, Darren Dowell, Barbara Ellis, Kent Potter

The birds (18):

Scrub Jay
House Finch
Anna's Hummingbird
Acorn Woodpecker
Crow
Ruby-crowned Kinglet
Yellow-rumped Warbler
Red-tailed Hawk
Orange-crowned Warbler
Black Phoebe
Lesser Goldfinch
American Goldfinch
Black-throated Gray Warbler
Northern Flicker
Cedar Waxwing
Bushtit
Plumbeous Vireo
Hummingbird, Selasphorus

Respectfully submitted,
Alan Cummings
11/13/09
http://birdwalks.caltech.edu

11/2/09

It was a spectacularly beautiful day and the birds did not let us down. We got 20 species, good enough for a walk score of 1.21546, the 9th positive-scoring walk in a row, and only one of those had a score below 1.0. So the birds are out. We got 20 species, 5 above the median and 3 below the maximum ever for a week 44. Not half bad.

See the plots at http://birdwalks.caltech.edu/bird_data/species_time.html and http://birdwalks.caltech.edu/bird_data/two_plots.htm

The Western Meadowlarks were back on the North athletic field and so were the Lark Sparrows, and a Say's Phoebe to boot. Other quality birds were the Dark-eyed Junco and American Goldfinch. We had been seeing mostly Lesser Goldfinch for many weeks but finally we got quite a good number of americans. Another excellent walk!

Not part of the birdwalk but this morning (11/3/09) Darren Dowell alerted Beth and me to a an exotic bird on the North Athletic field. It turned out to be a Long-billed Curlew. It flew off after a few minutes of being watched. Otherwise, I would have alerted everyone via email. It would have been a first for the Caltech birdwalks had it been spotted during regular birdwalk business hours.

The date: 11/2/09
The week number: 44
The walk number: 1012
The weather: 86 F, sunny

The walkers: Alan Cummings, Simon Radford, Darren Dowell, Kent Potter, Barbara Ellis, Ashish Mahabal, Beth Moore, Nathan Dalleska

The birds (20):

Rock Pigeon
Northern Mockingbird
House Sparrow
Mourning Dove
House Finch
Anna's Hummingbird
Acorn Woodpecker
Crow
American Goldfinch
Yellow-rumped Warbler
Ruby-crowned Kinglet
Hummingbird, Selasphorus
Lark Sparrow
Say's Phoebe
Western Meadowlark
Bushtit
Black Phoebe
Dark-eyed Junco
Lesser Goldfinch
Raven

Respectfully submitted,
Alan Cummings
11/3/09
http://birdwalks.caltech.edu