Ted Floyd wrote: "The phenomenon [of large crane flights over Front Range cities] is eminently worthy of further study, formal documentation, and, most of all, enthusiastic sharing here on COBirds."
OK, in the interest of "Discussion", I ask how do these reports provide new knowledge? According to Colorado Birds, 1992, by Andrews and Righter (p. 104), Sandhill Crane is an "irregular" migrant on the Eastern plains, "often locally abundant in fall". An abundance chart indicates their status as "uncommon to fairly common" on the Eastern Plains from mid-Septemer through October. A range map shows normal occurrence along the rivers and along sections of the Front Range area although not the entire eastern plains, probably indicating the region(s) where observers frequently find these birds roosting/feeding, rather than flying over. I would venture that the lack of reports from the Front Range during certain years simply reflects that the flocks passed over a slightly different path, where fewer cities (and thus observers) were located. Because of the non-random, skewed distribution of observers, these casual reports of passive observations would not provide any useful survey data, but rather, suggest misleading population trends for the species. Perhaps someone could offer to receive all the observations (E-bird could serve this function) and then offer some kind of summary remark or analysis (Seasonal Reports in Colorado Birds serves this function), rather than invite myriad postings to a group of 850 people. Earlier this fall (last month actually), numerous reports of migrating Upland Sandpipers over Front Range cities appeared on Cobirds. Those reports indicated that migration status (very rare) provided in Colorado Birds (p. 120) was either wrong or had changed or that 2009 was an anomaly for Upland Sandpiper migration. I welcomed such reports in my Inbox. I'll stay silent on this topic at this point and leave further discussion to others. Nick Komar Fort Collins CO --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ Colorado Field Ornithologists: http://www.cfo-link.org/ Colorado County Birding: http://www.coloradocountybirding.com/ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Colorado Birds" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.as/group/cobirds?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
