10,000 Birds

MAY 10, 2013

Heading out of Ecclesdown Road on the second day of my trip, I had nailed all of my targets save four species ( Caribbean Dove , Yellow-billed Parrot , Jamaican Owl , and Stolid Flycatcher ). I told her that I had three target birds left to see, and she gestured at a tree near the guesthouse where three Jamaican Owls were roosting.

Jamaica 152

Jamaica 2013 Parrots Birds 152

10,000 Birds

JULY 17, 2015

I’ve missed the saucy, parrot-like corvids more than I can say since moving back east, so this started my every day on a good note – as did looking out the bedroom window to see Nashville Warblers and Lazuli Buntings moving their newly-fledged chicks around the yard. Now, none of these are great rarities.

Mountain Goats 160

Mountain Goats Coyotes Goats Nashville 160

10,000 Birds

JANUARY 21, 2017

The notion of sly birding reminds me of being a lone birding kid and noting my lifer Prairie Warbler during a grade school walk-a-thon at Goat Island. To this day, I can’t help but wonder what else was using the woods of Goat Island on that wet September, 1984 morning? Mealy Parrot – Amazona farinosa; El Tapir, 13-Jan.

Costa Rica 102

Costa Rica 2017 Woodpeckers Parrots 102

10,000 Birds

SEPTEMBER 6, 2014

Broad-billed Parrot. Sure, we try not to introduce snakes, rats, cats, goats, pigs, and a host of other creatures to isolated islands. Mauritius Owl. Passenger Pigeon. Alaotra Grebe. Saint Helena Cuckoo. Grand Cayman Thrush. Ascencion Crake. What do the eight birds above have in common? They are all extinct. Pagan Reed Warbler.

Mauritius 171

Mauritius Djibouti Guam Birds 171

10,000 Birds

SEPTEMBER 13, 2014

We miss them all: the parrots, the pigeons, the moas and titan-hawks and stilt-owls and myriads of endlessly exotic avifauna we will never ever know again as they were when they graced this Earth. And some of the extinctions were of small animals, like the many dwarf goats and elephants in the Mediterranean.

Marsupials 165

Marsupials Costa Rica Elephants Cuba 165