10,000 Birds

OCTOBER 12, 2014

I ask because, despite my deep affection for warmth, indoor plumbing, and uninterrupted Internet access, I found myself and my family enjoying an overnight out of doors. Camping and birding both fall under the category of “nature” activities, yet the two seem only tangentially related. Birding best bird weekend'

2014 231

2014 Philadelphia Birds Experience 231

10,000 Birds

APRIL 20, 2014

Perhaps the weekend’s pleasure proceeded from the arrival of birds not seen here for months. The Best Bird of my weekend was a real find. This species is quite rare during migration in my area and this bird was, in one sense, way too early but, for my purposes, right on time. What was your best bird of the weekend?

2014 210

2014 Birds Rights Experience 210

10,000 Birds

AUGUST 10, 2014

If you read my weekly posts bookending theweekend birding experience, you know that I pay close attention to phenology. Ilearned that the hard way this weekend when visitingan amazing migrant trap in the dead of summer: too many leaves, too many bugs, and hardly any birds. Birding best bird weekend' How about you?

2014 178

2014 New York Birds Experience 178

10,000 Birds

SEPTEMBER 6, 2022

They may be about bird eggs ( The Most Perfect Thing: The Inside (and Outside) of a Bird’s Egg , 2016), or a 17th-century ornithologist ( Virtuoso by Nature: The Scientific Worlds of Francis Willughby, 2016), or How Bullfinches learn songs from humans ( The Wisdom of Birds: An Illustrated History of Ornithology.

Dissection 259

Dissection Birds Research Europe 259

10,000 Birds

DECEMBER 6, 2016

Birds know habitat. They don’t read treaties or draw maps or build walls and, as far as we can tell (since we can’t talk to birds, yet), they have no concept of political boundaries. Robert Gallardo’s self-published Guide to the Birds of Honduras came out in 2015, and is the first bird field guide dedicated to that country.

El Salvador 235

El Salvador America Costa Rica Honduras 235

10,000 Birds

MARCH 3, 2020

One of these days, Jeopardy will feature a category called “Field Guides” and the first clue will be: “This landlocked South American country finally got its own bird field guide in 2016, but it wasn’t available in the United State until 2019.” Bolivia doesn’t come up much in discussions of birding travel.

Bolivia 209

Bolivia Birds Brazil Switzerland 209

10,000 Birds

DECEMBER 31, 2013

In 2013 I birded in two countries, submitted eBird checklists for seven U.S. states and thirty-seven counties, and added a whopping ninety-two species to my life list. I would like to end 2013 with 303, 512, and 1,150 birds on those lists. But what were my top ten birding moments of 2013?

2013 198

2013 New York City New York Trinidad 198

10,000 Birds

JANUARY 6, 2015

I was birding one of my favorite places yesterday, Wakodahatchee Wetlands in Palm Beach County, Florida, and, as generally happens, people were asking me about the birds they were admiring. Small), it provides a friendly and authoritative way for people interested in the birds around them to learn more quickly and easily.

Colorado 264

Colorado Florida Birds New Jersey 264

10,000 Birds

APRIL 30, 2017

Way back in the days when blog posts still got a lot of comments, I wrote a piece on why field guides that arrange species in a more or less strict taxonomic order regularly frustrate me. Taxonomy is constantly changing and so does the order of species in field guides. Phillipps, Q. & van Balen, N. Brickle & F.

Brunei 190

Brunei 2009 2016 2014 190

10,000 Birds

FEBRUARY 2, 2016

All of these titles deal with birding in specific North American geographic areas: The Atlantic coast, Pennsylvania, and Texas. The photos show the forms of the bird seen on the east coast and are annotated with notes on plumage and other distinguishing field marks. It’s time for some short book reviews. Well, short for me.

Pennsylvania 188

Pennsylvania Texas Whales Whaling 188

10,000 Birds

DECEMBER 2, 2014

The danger of reviewing a field guide to the birds of an exotic country you’ve never been to is that you become obsessed with visiting that country, no matter how far away and how expensive it may be. Did I dare dip my toe into this catalog of tantalizing species? I’m already looking up birding tours of Borneo and pricing airfares.

Brunei 195

Brunei Birds Asia China 195

10,000 Birds

MARCH 5, 2017

In early 2014 the rainfall was good and flooded the main highway south from Broome and made for some excellent birding from your car. The area remained flooded for several months in 2014 and there was significant road damage, but over the months the birding improved as more and more birds arrived in the area.

Geese 100

Geese Breeding 2014 Eggs 100

10,000 Birds

JUNE 2, 2015

Producing a book about birds and nesting is a dangerous business. The truth is that there are few images cuter than baby birds in the nest opening their mouths and begging for food, but there are curmudgeons amongst us, myself included, who don’t like to admit this. And of birds courting and mating. We simply refuse to squee.

Eggs 263

Eggs Family 2006 New York 263

10,000 Birds

JULY 21, 2014

These birds may be the North American ash tree’s last line of defense against the EAB invasion. A study in the journal Biological Invasions used Project FeederWatch information to determine that populations of the above-named birds increased (although the Hairies and Downies initially decreased) in areas of heavy EAB infestation.

Woodpeckers 273

Woodpeckers Illinois Science Chicago 273

10,000 Birds

DECEMBER 28, 2014

Derby is approximately 225 kilometres from Broome and has had almost three times the rainfall that Broome has had so far this month and so we thought it would be interesting to go and investigate the various birding areas that we knew of from other visits during our dry months. Birds visiting the puddle in the track! Long-tailed Finch.

Birds 145

Birds Ducks 2015 2014 145

10,000 Birds

MAY 12, 2014

Birding being a visual and an auditory pursuit, it’s not surprising that publishers have taken advantage of the media of its day to produce bird books accompanied by CDs or DVDs. These allow birders to hear as well as see the birds they are studying. But, that technology is for another article.)

2006 231

2006 2014 Connecticut North America 231

10,000 Birds

MAY 7, 2019

But, sometimes an appreciation of birds and birding requires more than a reference book with images of birds and facts about their identifying field marks. There are large avian handbooks and small ‘how-to bird’ guides, and quite a few excellent books of both types have been published.

Birds 117

Birds North America Breeding America 117

10,000 Birds

JUNE 3, 2014

Hugh, who years ago helped me find my first Pauraque in the Rio Grande Valley , visited Peru as part of the 2014 World Birding Rally, where he stopped thinking of himself as an experienced birder. This is his first contribution to 10,000 Birds. Come to Peru, they said. Golden-tailed Sapphire by Alfredo Fernandez.

Peru 255

Peru Birds South America Owls 255

10,000 Birds

OCTOBER 4, 2016

British birders are very serious about birding and their birds. This is a very good thing; it means they publish a lot of books about birds (probably more at this point than U.S. This is a very good thing; it means they publish a lot of books about birds (probably more at this point than U.S.

Ireland 172

Ireland Birds Groups Falcons 172

10,000 Birds

MAY 6, 2016

Once you eliminate the risque jokes (I know, I know, but it’s a family blog) the Northern Beardless-Tyrannulet might have the most comical name in American birding. How did this itty-bitty bird come to be saddled with a moniker that sounds exactly like a punchline about bird names? There is no great mystery here.

Costa Rica 108

Costa Rica 2014 Family Collecting 108

10,000 Birds

APRIL 2, 2019

I like observing them, reading about them, grappling with species and subspecies identification, and even—on a good day—talking about sparrow taxonomy. Peterson Reference Guide to Sparrows of North America covers 61 species of the New World sparrow family Passerellidae that breed in Canada, the United States, and northern Mexico.

North America 183

North America Sparrows America United States 183

10,000 Birds

NOVEMBER 1, 2014

Doves tend to get a bad rap when it comes to birding. ” Although some doves get as much respect as the late Rodney Dangerfield, we shouldn’t let commonality cloud our view of this big, beautiful family. In neotropical birding circles, the ability of this ground-dove to avoid detection is pretty much legendary.

Costa Rica 188

Costa Rica Bolivia South America Rats 188

10,000 Birds

JANUARY 15, 2014

I had taken the short drive to the park to search for a family of American Dippers sighted near the visitor center by a fellow birder a few days before. I didn’t know what species of woodpecker it was, but I knew it was just in the clearing on the other side of the road. Range map courtesy of South Dakota Birds and Birding.

Woodpeckers 185

Woodpeckers California South Dakota Chad 185

10,000 Birds

JANUARY 26, 2014

The Yellow-rumped Warbler ( Setophaga coronata ) complex is one of the most abundant and widespread representatives of the New World warbler family in North America, present in many parts of the United States even through the winter months, when the birds feed on small fruits and other foods, including sap. So Toews et al.

United States 263

United States 2011 Guatemala North America 263

10,000 Birds

DECEMBER 20, 2014

The magnificent history and diversity of birds on Earth came into sharper focus this month with the publication of 28 new scientific papers in Science and other journals. One of the central papers, Whole-genome analyses resolve early branches in the tree of life of modern birds (Jarvis et al. American Flamingo photo by Dick Culbert).

Family 279

Family Birds Parrots 2014 279

10,000 Birds

AUGUST 19, 2014

There is a fantastic paper just out in Science : “Sustained miniaturization and anatomoical innovation in the dinosaurian anceestors of birds” by Michael Lee, Andrea Cau, Darren Naishe and Gareth Dyke. But birds are dinosaurs. Birds have a number of features that distinguish them from, say, camels. As Lee Et.Al

Camels 221

Camels Whales Whaling Apes 221

10,000 Birds

SEPTEMBER 16, 2022

Pafuri lies in the northernmost part of the Kruger National Park and is described as “some of the most potentially productive birding territory in South Africa” on the SANParks website. Jameson’s Firefinch is a beautiful small bird named for what was probably a very bad person, James Sligo Jameson. ” (HBW).

Elephants 147

Elephants Birds Congo Africa 147

10,000 Birds

NOVEMBER 6, 2018

It actually makes a lot of sense, the geographic features of the isthmus between North America (including Mexico, because Mexico is part of North America) and South America cut across political lines, as do birds. It is the first bird field guide to every country of Central America (plus the islands governed by those countries).

America 214

America El Salvador Costa Rica Honduras 214

10,000 Birds

SEPTEMBER 21, 2015

Way back on 16 May I managed to see my 312 bird species in Queens to add to my Queens list. Somehow I forgot that the last time I predicted what the next ten species I would see in Queens would be was back on 30 December 2013, when my list was sitting at 302. Sooty Shearwater – This will take some more dedicated seawatching.

2013 160

2013 2010 2012 2011 160

10,000 Birds

SEPTEMBER 14, 2023

Sometimes I just want to hug eBird, or more specifically, whoever writes the short species descriptions (even though I am not the typical hugging kind of person, trust me on this). The Plain Sunbird is the plain vanilla version of the otherwise often very colorful family (ok, a very low-budget sort of joke). “Dull, me?

Los Angeles 232

Los Angeles Birds Woodpeckers Owls 232

10,000 Birds

JULY 7, 2021

Whether it is birding tourism or simply spreading awareness about biodiversity, it is always with the aim of getting us humanoids to treat nature a little (ideally, a lot) better. A brief personal digression: I moved back into the house I grew up in back in 2014, my parents vacated at the end of 2016. Birds have also benefitted.

Opossums 264

Opossums Barn Owls Hunting Reptiles 264

10,000 Birds

NOVEMBER 3, 2020

There are few bird names that will elicit great big smiles and Penguin is one of them. Other contenders are Kookaburra, Shoebill, and Umbrellabird, but people smile when they hear these names because they know a song or because they can’t believe these are real names of real birds. <pause> Do I have your attention now?

Penguins 279

Penguins Georgia New Zealand Albatross 279

10,000 Birds

JANUARY 1, 2023

Way back in 2014, when I saw my first Chestnut-sided Shrike-Vireo near the little town of Pino Real, and shared the sighting on a birders’ chat group, it took just over a month for the first biologist/ornithologist to visit me. It seems he had looked long and wide for this species. But he regularly visits family in Morelia.

Mexico 255

Mexico Cuba Species 2014 255

10,000 Birds

JUNE 7, 2022

The Eurasian Wryneck is the woodpecker that doesn’t look like a woodpecker, the bird with the portmanteau name that is also a medical condition (and which may remind some people of a Nora Ephron essay). They are slim and small-headed birds and their bills are fine, not strong and dynamic.

Woodpeckers 263

Woodpeckers Hungary Thailand 2014 263

10,000 Birds

AUGUST 4, 2020

I Love Birds!: 52 Ways to Wonder, Wander, and Explore Birds with Kids. Her children’s books–which include the charming Mama Build a Little Nest , other picture books, and chapter books–evince an easy familiarity with birds, their science and birding ethics. How many birds do you see?

Los Angeles 264

Los Angeles 2019 Birds 2014 264

10,000 Birds

FEBRUARY 7, 2017

I’ve never been to the Indonesian Archipelago, but I really like the birds there. Lynx Edicions, the ornithological (and now mammal) publisher that gave us the Handbook of the Birds of the World , has now published Birds of the Indonesian Archipelago: Greater Sundas and Wallacea , by James A. So, this is no ordinary bird guide.

Indonesia 159

Indonesia Brunei Birds Malaysia 159

10,000 Birds

OCTOBER 7, 2014

The second edition of the National Geographic Complete Birds of North America, 2nd Edition has one of the longest book names in bird bookdom: National Geographic Complete Birds of North America, 2nd Edition: Now Covering More Than 1,000 Species With the Most-Detailed Information Found in a Single Volume.

North America 183

North America America Birds Family 183