The Queens County Christmas Bird Count was held this past Sunday, December 15. We had a record number of 97 participants on what ended up being a great day for birding: no precipitation, moderate temperatures, light winds, and some sunshine!
We counted 43,449 individuals of 132 species, which is two off of our all-time high species count, set just last year. Two count week birds, Yellow Warbler and Painted Bunting, both would have been new additions to the count if they had been seen on count day. Despite the Yellow Warbler disappearing for count day and the Painted Bunting not appearing until two days after the count we had a host of highlights and not many lowlights, many of which are shared below. Thanks to Ian Resnick for making sure we had pizza for the compilation, to APEC for hosting us for the compilation, to Sunny Corrao and Michael DeVito, both from NYC Parks, who led large groups on the count which enabled us to have our most participation ever, to Marcia Abrahams for stepping up and filling in as a Sector Leader, and to Benjamin Davidson who, after the compilation dinner was over and we all learned that we had missed Cackling Goose, took it upon himself to go to Flushing Meadows Corona Park in the dark and find the missing goose by the light of streetlights. (And even managed to get a recognizable image by digibinning it!) Good (Christmas Bird Count) Birding, Corey Finger Queens County CBC Compiler Highlights. Cackling Goose - 6th time ever on the count Wood Duck - 30 is a new high count, besting 25 from two years ago Canada Goose - 6967 is new high count, just over a hundred more than five years ago Eurasian Wigeon - 28th appearance and first in 8 years Black Scoter - 808 is a new count high, topping 751 from 9 years ago Hooded Merganser - 373 crushed our previous high by more than 100 Ruddy Duck - 2,704 is a new high, beating last year by several hundred RIng-necked Pheasant - a miss, none seen in Queens since last June. Seems the breeding population that had been hanging on by a thread is extirpated Clapper Rail - 3, a new high count and only the third time recorded Yellow-crowned Night-Heron - 2, in different sectors, 6th time recorded on the count American Oystercatcher - 10, only 8th time recorded on the count (oodly) Lesser Black-backed Gulls - 9 more than doubled our previous high count of 4 Cooper's Hawk - 28, bested our previous high of 20 from 9 years ago Bald Eagle - 13, new high count, more than doubling our previous high of 6 from 2 years ago and made up for missing them last year Red-tailed Hawk - 51, new high count, besting our previous mark of 50 from 8 years ago Belted Kingfisher - 15, topping last year's high count of 14 Yellow-bellied Sapsucker - 27, topped last year's high count of 25 Hairy Woodpecker - also 27, bizarrely also topping our best count of 25 from last year (and Red-bellied Woodpecker was one off our all-time mark from two years ago!) Merlin - 13, new high count, beating 9 from 5 years ago Clay-colored Sparrow - 3rd count record White-crowned Sparrow - 18th count record Swamp Sparrow - 67, broke high count of 64 set 73 years ago! Baltimore Oriole - 3, tied high count that has stood for 58 years, 14th occurrence Orange-crowned Warbler - 10, new high count by 1 Pine Warbler - 6, doubled our previous high and only 7th occurrence on the count (oddly) Black Vulture - 4th record Turkey Vulture - 6th record -- (copy & paste any URL below, then modify any text "_DOT_" to a period ".") NYSbirds-L List Info: NortheastBirding_DOT_com/NYSbirdsWELCOME_DOT_htm NortheastBirding_DOT_com/NYSbirdsRULES_DOT_htm NortheastBirding_DOT_com/NYSbirdsSubscribeConfigurationLeave_DOT_htm ARCHIVES: 1) mail-archive_DOT_com/nysbirds-l@cornell_DOT_edu/maillist_DOT_html 2) surfbirds_DOT_com/birdingmail/Group/NYSBirds-L 3) birding_DOT_aba_DOT_org/maillist/NY01 Please submit your observations to eBird: ebird_DOT_org/content/ebird/ --
