ABA Blog

#ABArare - Little Egret - Newfoundland

On May 18, Pierre Ryan found a pair of egrets in Fair Haven, Newfoundland, and reported the pair as Snowy Egrets, which are rare but annual in the province. His photos and description of the birds' plumes led to suspicion that one or both of these birds may be ABA Code 4 Little Egret, an identification that was subsequently confirmed for one of them.

Locals have reported that the two egrets have been present since at least May 12, not always together and occasionally moving up a small river and out of sign for longer periods of time. This would be the 9th record of the species for Newfoundland.

photo by Jared Clarke, used with permission

Fair Haven is about an hour and a half west of St. John's, Newfoundland. From the Trans-Canada Highway turn west onto NL-203 S all the way to the bay.

Although Little Egret is an ABA Code-4 bird, the European range of this species is expanding and some ornithologists predict that Little Egret in North America may begin to expand in a manner similar to what has been occurring in Europe.

#ABArare - Slate-throated Redstart - Arizona

On May 18 an ABA Code 4 Slate-throated Redstart was discovered by P.D. Hulce at the Southwestern Research Station at Cave Creek Canyon in Cochise, Arizona. The bird was refound later and seen by several people, hopefully suggesting that this one will stick around for a little bit.

photo by Chris West, used with permission

Cave Creek Canyon is about 3 hours southeast of Tucson, Arizona. From I-10, exit at Road Forks, New Mexico. Take Hwy 80 south approximately 30 miles to route 533.  Turn right (west) on route 533 and go approximately 7 miles to Portal, Arizona.  You’ll know you’re in Portal when you see Portal Peak Lodge on your left.  Continue up the mountain, staying on pavement, another five miles.

As the Southwestern Research Station is an education and research facility, special rules apply to the viewing of this bird. It is very strongly recommended that birders seeking this redstart take these rules seriously. Please refer to a post on AZ-NM listserv by Richard Webster, the important points of which are copied below:

The bird can be seen from the main (public) road up Cave Creek Canyon. The bird also spends time where it can't be seen from the road, but in order to bird on the SWRS property, SWRS is now requesting that folks sign a release form in the office. The office is open from 8 to 5, roughly, subject to lunch. Birders can look for the redstart from the road at any point, and on the SWRS property once you have checked in with the office and signed.

The Redstart was first seen and was re-found a couple of times along North Fork, which is the creek closest to the main road and the one that goes by the hummingbird feeders (this is below the swimming pool that you see from the main road); it was primarily seen below the hummingbird feeders, where the creek passes between the maintenance area and main road. It was also seen several times along the Main/Middle Fork of Cave Creek down canyon from the maintenance area.

Slate-throated Redstart is a common, variable, and widespread neotropical species ranging from northern Mexico south to southern Bolivia. The subspecies from northern Mexico has red on its breast and belly.  In Guatemala the red is replaced by orange-red underparts grading to yellow in Panama south (Warblers, Dunn and Garrett).

Records of this species in the ABA Area are mostly from Southeast Arizona and Texas. There is one additional record from New Mexico. (ABA Checklist, Pranty et al.).

#ABArare - Green Sandpiper, Tundra Bean-Goose - Alaska

The rarity season in Alaska started with a bang on St. Paul Island this week when Doug Gochfeld and Scott Schuette, both with St. Paul Island Tours, found on near consecutive days an ABA Code 4 Green Sandpiper and a Code 3 Tundra Bean-Goose. The sandpiper was found on Thursday (5/16) and hasn't been seen since, and the goose was found this morning (5/18).

photo by Doug Gochfeld

St Paul Island is accessible by air via several Alaskan airports, most notably Anchorage, on Penair Airlines. The ABA is holding an event there this fall.

Green Sandpiper is a very infrequent vagrant to the Bering Sea region. This record is about the 12th for the ABA Area, but only the third away from the western Aleutians.

Tundra Bean-Goose is a casual vagrant to western Alaska, with most records in the spring. Many Alaska records can only be assigned to bean-goose species because the former Bean Goose sightings were not identified to subspecies at the time. The AOU split Bean Goose into two species, Taiga and Tundra Bean-Goose in 2007 in their annual supplement.  

More, undoubtedly, to come from western Alaska as the spring goes on.

#ABArare - Purple Sandpiper - Alberta

On May 9th, photographer Eddy Matuod found and photographed an unusual sandpiper at Inglewood Bird Sanctuary in Calgary, Alberta. He was uncertain as to its identity, suspecting either Rock or Purple Sandpiper, and posted his find to the provincial listerv, where the identification seemed to galvinaize around Purple Sandpiper, a first for the province and western Canada.

photo by David Pugh/A Calgary Birder

The bird was apparently a two-day wonder, not being seen after Saturday morning, May 11.

Purple Sandpiper is a common "rock-piper" of both sides of the Atlantic, wintering to North Carolina with some regularity and semi-regularly south to Florida. It's annual in the eastern Great Lakes west to Lake Michigan, but is very rare farther west. Only a handful of records exist for this species in the western half of the continent, but it has been recorded in Oklahoma (2013), Utah (2010), and Alaska (1990).

#ABArare - Flame-colored Tanager - Texas

A male Flame-colored Tanager (Code 3) was found near Boot Spring at Big Bend National Park. It was first discovered by Mark Flippo on May 6, and there have been other sightings on May 8 and 9.

photo by Byron Stone

Boot Spring is accessed by hiking trails, though you have two routes from which to choose. Both begin in the Chisos Basin, and both will be at least 9 miles roundtrip. The shorter though steeper option is to do an out-and-back hike on the Pinnacles Trail. The other option is to hike up on the Laguna Meadow Trail and return on the Pinnacles Trail. I created a map with the trailhead and location of the spring marked. Trails are also shown, though you'll have to zoom in to see them better. Whichever route you choose, make sure you bring water.

Big Bend National Park is in one of the most remote areas of the Lower 48. This site has a lot of information to help you plan your visit.

#ABArare - Plain-capped Starthroat - Arizona

One of the ABA Area's best sites for rarities, Arizona's Madera Canyon, produced another one on May 6. On that day, Linda and Jerry Elling found a Plain-capped Starthroat downstream (north) of the Whitehouse Picnic Area. It was seen on both May 6 and 7 coming to some flowering bushes on the downstream side of the bridge with handrails and flagstone steps leading to it. I marked what I believe the location to be on this map.

photos by Jerry Elling

Madera Canyon is about 30 miles south of Tucson. To get there, take I-19 south from Tucson and take the Continental Road exit (Exit 63). Go east on Continental Road, cross the Santa Cruz River and then turn right onto Whitehouse Canyon Road at the next four-way intersection. After about six miles, turn right on Madera Canyon Road. This road is paved. If you miss the turn, you'll be on a dirt road (Box Canyon Road). Madera Canyon Road takes you to the Whitehouse Picnic Area. Park here and walk downstream.

Madera Canyon is a US Forest Service fee area ($5/vehicle/day or a federal pass such as Golden Age Passport, Golden Access Passport, Golden Eagle Passport, and the National Parks Pass with a Golden Eagle sticker affixed). Park in designated areas or risk being ticketed and possibly towed.

#ABArare - Black-faced Grassquit - Florida

Bill Baggs State Park in Miami-Dade, Florida, continues to attract some great Caribbean strays, as close to a perfect representation of the Patagonia Picnic Table Effect as we've seen in recent memory. On April 30,  Iwe, Pia, Bert, and Sybrand de Bruin discovered a female ABA Code-4 Black-faced Grassquit right across the road from where the long-staying Thick-billed Vireo has been seen recently. 

photo by de Bruins,

Bill Baggs Cape Florida State Park (open 8 am to sundown; $4 entrance fee for single-occupant vehicle, $8 for vehicles with 2-8 occupants) is located at the southern end of Key Biscayne. To get here from Miami, take the Rickenbacker Causeway (State Road 913) from the southern end of I-95. It becomes Crandon Blvd on Key Biscayne. Continue on to its end at the park. After entering the park, you can either turn right (west) on the road to No Name Harbor and park at the lot at the end of this road or turn left (east) and park at the lot here. The No Name Harbor lot is closer to the Thick-billed Vireo/Black-faced Grassquit location.

Black-faced Grassquit is resident throughout the Caribbean but are very rarely seen in Florida. The most recent sightings were from Long Pine Key in Everglades National Park in 2003 and Jupiter Ridge Natural Area in 2004. 

 

#ABArare - Garganey - Quebec

On April 27, Louise and Pierre Simard discovered an ABA Code-4 Garganey in flooded fields in Mirabel, Laurentides, Quebec. This is the second Garganey this spring in Quebec and the 18th record of the species for the province. 

photo by Louise Simard, used with permision

Mirabel is just north of Montreal proper. The bird was seen on rang Ste-Marguerite then later on montée Guénette. 

Garganey was formerly an ABA Code-3 species, but over the past few years the number of reports in the ABA Area has declined. This decrease is thought to be correlated to the decline in numbers from eastern Asia.  Between the 1970s and 2003, the total estimated population of Garganey in eastern Asia fell from 90,000 birds to 22,000 (ABA Checklist, 7th Edition, Pranty et al).  

Most reports of the species come from spring when its distinctive plumage allows for ease in identification.  Fall reports come mostly from mid-September to early November. Birds have been reported south of the ABA Area in Sinaloa, Baja California Sur, Puerto Rico, Bermuda, and Barbados (ABA Checklist, 7th Edition, Pranty et al.).  

#ABArare - Baikal Teal - Montana

Not much more than an hour ago, Radd Icenoggle discovered a gorgeous male ABA Code-4 Baikal Teal at the Maclay Irrigation Canal, just outside of Maclay Recreation Area near Missoula, Montana. This is not only a continental level rarity but a potential state first for Montana as well.

photo used with permission

More photos at available at Radd's blog.

Maclay Recreation Area is just west of Missoula, Montana. The bird was initially seen along with a pair of Wood Ducks in a canal just outside of the Recreation Area proper. The trio then flushed approxomately 300 meters to a gravel pit where they settled in with several Mallards.

Baikal Teal is known from just over 20 records of about 30 individuals in the ABA-Area, most of which come from the western Aleutians in fall. There are accepted records for this species all along the Pacific coast from British Columbia to southern California with some as late as April. Interior records from Colorado, Ontario, Oklahoma, Louisiana, North Carolina, and Ohio have been questioned because of uncertain provenance (ABA Checklist 7th Edition, Pranty, et al, but one from Maricopa, Arizona, in 2010 apparently passed muster.

The species went through a significant population decline in the 1980s, but has since rebounded dramatically which may be behind the recent increase in North American reports for this species.

#ABArare - Short-tailed Hawk - Georgia

On Saturday, April 27, Nicole Janke looked up in the sky over her house in Liberty County, Georgia, to find and, amazingly enough, photograph a Short-tailed Hawk passing by. The logistics, and sheer luck, of this find in which Janke spotted the bird and definitively photographed it, are completely incredible to me.

In any case, pending acceptance, this is a first state record for Georgia and one of only a very small handful of records of this tropical species away from Florida, Texas, or Arizona.

Photo by Nicole Janke, used with permission

Hinesville is in eastern Georgia, approximately 2 hours north of Jacksonville, Florida, and one not quite one hour south of Savannah. Nicole is open to accepting visitors to her house, directions to which have been posted on the Georgia listerv here.

Remarkably, the hawk was found again this morning (4/28) at the same address, diving at the many Purple Martins using gourd houses on Janke's property. It flew off at around 12:30 PM after being mobbed by jays.

Short-tailed Hawk is widespread in the neotropics south to northern Argentina, but until relatively recently was only known to breed in the ABA-Area in Florida, where it's fairly common from the central part of the state south to the tip of the peninsula.

In the last few years it has also begun breeding in southeastern Arizona, and vagrants have turned with some regularity in Texas with one remarkable record from the Upper Peninsula of Michigan in 2005. Prior records in New Mexico, north Texas, and as close to Georgia as the Jacksonville area suggest that Georgia birders were right to be on the lookout for this one.