9/28/04
What a good birding day it was! We had nice weather, about 72 F
and sunny. And we set a record for the 39th week of the year.
We recorded 24 species, thanks to a few by ear only from Jon.
The previous record was 20 last year
and the lowest total for week 39 was 7 in 2001.
See the birds_epoch plot at
http://birdwalks.caltech.edu/bird_data/two_plots.htm.
There were three major highlights: a Western Tanager
in the park first spotted by Glenn, a pair of Warbling Vireos
that we might have puzzled over if it were not for
Jon's quick ID on them, and a Sharp-shinned hawk
sitting on an antenna near Chandler cafeteria.
Pretty neat. Jon also heard the first Yellow-rumped
Warbler of the season with many more to come, I'm sure.
What we didn't see was a Scrub Jay.
Pretty surprising. We didn't see many Crows but
we did see a couple in Tournament Park. It was pretty birdy
overall with a lot of birds over in the trees
north of Broad. We saw a huge flock of Band-tailed Pigeons
over the buildings east of Holliston.
The stats:
The date: 9/28/04
The week number: 39
The walk number: 751
The weather: 72 F, sunny
The walkers: Alan Cummings, Glenn Hamell, Kent Potter, Jon Feenstra, Bryan Jacoby
The birds (24):
Rock Dove
Mockingbird
House Sparrow
Mourning Dove
House Finch
Anna's Hummingbird
Acorn Woodpecker
Crow
Bewick's Wren
Lesser Goldfinch
Western Tanager
Bandtailed Pigeon
Bushtit
Black Phoebe
Orange-crowned Warbler
Yellow-rumped Warbler
Warbling Vireo
Red-tailed Hawk
American Goldfinch
Yellow-chevroned Parakeet
Starling
Townsend's Warbler
Sharp-shinned Hawk
Allen's Hummingbird (added by Kent on walk back to his office)
Respectfully submitted,
Alan
9/28/04
http://birdwalks.caltech.edu
9/21/04
It was nice, clear day for a bird walk. We recorded 17 species,
which is tied for the third highest total for
week 38 of the year. The record is way up there,
25 in 2002. See the birds_epoch plot at
http://birdwalks.caltech.edu/bird_data/two_plots.htm.
There were a couple of highlights. Down in the lowland
part of the maintenance yard, I pished and
up popped a male Spotted Towhee, which sat on a branch
just 10 feet from me. Very nice view. On the warbler
front, we saw an Orange-crowned and a Wilson's.
Well, Bryan wasn't with me when I saw the
Orange-crowned, so we went back
to get it for him and though we didn't
find it, we saw Lesser Goldfinches. So
the yellow birds are around.
What wasn't around was a Crow. If you go
to the probability plots at
http://birdwalks.caltech.edu/bird_data/probability_plots.htm.
you will find that in 2002 and 2003, it was 100% probable that
you would see a Crow, no matter what week of the year
you were walking. So, I'm beginning to think
the West Nile virus is impacting the Crow population.
The stats:
The date: 9/21/04
The week number: 38
The walk number: 750
The weather: 83 F, sunny
The walkers: Alan Cummings, Glenn Hamell, Bryan Jacoby
The birds (17):
Rock Dove
Scrub Jay
Mockingbird
House Sparrow
Mourning Dove
House Finch
Anna's Hummingbird
Acorn Woodpecker
Bandtailed Pigeon
Spotted Towhee
Bushtit
Black Phoebe
Yellow-chevroned Parakeet
Orange-crowned Warbler
Lesser Goldfinch
Wilson's Warbler
Starling
Respectfully submitted,
Alan
9/21/04
http://birdwalks.caltech.edu
9/14/04
It was nice to have a bigger squad out there to
search out the birds. Kelly was back from being a student.
She submitted her paper and now has about a month off
from that so she can attend to the important things, like a good
bird walk. And Glenn was back. It turns out he had
a good reason for having a low MOOT (Maximum Optimal
Operating Temperature) point. It was a reaction
to some medication. So, he dropped the meds and now
his MOOT has been raised and he is back in action.
I guess the bird walk is more important than the old ticker.
Actually it wasn't all that hot today anyway, only 77F.
And the birds were plentiful. We saw 19 species
which is the 2nd highest total for week 37. In 2002
we recorded 23 for the same week.
See the birds_epoch plot at
http://birdwalks.caltech.edu/bird_data/two_plots.htm.
There were lots of highlights. We saw a Red-tailed Hawk
in dive mode. We saw both White-throated
and Vaux's Swifts. We saw 3 kinds of woodpeckers,
including a Northern Flicker. Thanks to
Kelly for seeing the red. We also saw
a Townsend's Warbler and finished the day
off with several Allen's Hummingbirds. It was
a good birding day.
The stats:
The date: 9/14/04
The week number: 37
The walk number: 749
The weather: 77 F, sunny
The walkers: Alan Cummings, Glenn Hamell, Kelly Jung, Kent Potter
The birds (19):
Rock Dove
Scrub Jay
Mockingbird
House Sparrow
Mourning Dove
House Finch
Anna's Hummingbird
Acorn Woodpecker
Crow
Red-tailed Hawk
White-throated Swift
Downey Woodpecker
Bushtit
Townsend's Warbler
Bandtailed Pigeon
Vaux's Swift
Northern Flicker
Starling
Allen's Hummingbird
Respectfully submitted,
Alan
9/14/04
http://birdwalks.caltech.edu
9/7/04
It was a hot bird walk, and I don't mean hot
in the bird supply sense. The weather was hot.
It was so hot that www.weather.com
was running a severe weather alert for the local
area, warning everyone to stay inside and avoid
the heat. We didn't. We walked. Well, two of us walked.
And the birds were fairly scarce. We recorded 12 species,
which is a little on the low side for week 36.
The record high was 17 in 1990.
See the birds_epoch plot at
http://birdwalks.caltech.edu/bird_data/two_plots.htm.
I guess the highlight was the Lesser Goldfinches in
the park; or maybe the 3 unidentified swallows
we saw fly over while we walked and sweated up Wilson.
The lowlight was the lack of a Scrub Jay. We also saw
only one Crow. Last week we saw no Crows and
Kent wondered if the West Nile virus had depleted
their numbers and maybe even the Scrub Jay supply.
Possibly. However, Crows are black and they would
really heat up if they were out in the sunlight.
So maybe they are all in shady spots keeping
quiet. Or maybe they're dead.
The stats:
The date: 9/7/04
The week number: 36
The walk number: 748
The weather: 93 F, sunny
The walkers: Alan Cummings, Kent Potter
The birds (12):
Rock Dove
Mockingbird
House Sparrow
Mourning Dove
House Finch
Anna's Hummingbird
Acorn Woodpecker
Crow
Lesser Goldfinch
Swallow, sp.
Starling
Allen's Hummingbird
Respectfully submitted,
Alan
9/7/04
http://birdwalks.caltech.edu