The Ontario Big Year record

An Ontario "Big Year" seems to be all the rage at the moment. With my current year list sitting at 298 species for the province, I decided to search through the ebird data for the province (ebird.org) to see what species I am missing, and how 2011 would have been for a big year attempt.

(All of this inspired by multiple people who have current and future interests in big years, including Josh V here:

http://joshvandermeulen.blogspot.com/2011/11/numbers-game-big-year.html )



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So with my current list at 298, I went into ebird and figured out what missing species I "could have seen" if I was going "all out" in a big year attempt. Here's the list:

Harlequin Duck
Barrows Goldeneye
Brewer's Blackbird
Boreal Owl
Gray Partridge
Spruce Grouse  (yes, I haven't seen this species, despite multiple trips to the far north in Ontario).
Mountain Bluebird (the first of several rarities I didn't "twitch)
Western Grebe
Yellow-headed Blackbird
Loggerhead Shrike
Louisiana Waterthrush
Western Meadowlark
Sora  sad but true
American Avocet
Least Bittern
Piping Plover
Swainson's Hawk
Townsend Solitaire
Snowy Egret
Prairie Warbler
Yellow Rail
Henslow's Sparrow
Pacific Loon
Bells Vireo
Sedge Wren
Black-headed Gull
Purple Gallinule
Black-billed Magpie
Western Kingbird
White-winged Dove
Willow Ptarmigan
Great Gray Owl
White-faced Ibis
Painted Bunting
Northern Gannet
Slaty-backed Gull
Gray-crowned Rosy-Finch

-- for a grand total of 37 species (or 335 as a year list)

There are also some other species that haven't been reported to ebird this year, that wouldn't be terribly difficult to get:

Barn Owl
King Rail
Smith's Longspur (338)

And a few rarities that were reported this year, that may or may not have been possible for me to get:

Worm-eating Warbler (very few this year)
Ruff
Lark Sparrow
Chuck-wills-widow
Mississippi Kite
Little Blue Heron

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So how does that all stack up? Well the Ontario record is 338 species, set by Glenn Coady in 1996. And looking at the current list, I could be sitting at or just below 338 if I had gone really crazy this year. Obviously it would take a LOT of work (eg,/ going to Hudson Bay for Smith's Longspur etc), but seems to be quite possible to accomplish.

The only problem is I have no plans to do a big year anytime soon, so for now, we will have to watch Josh's attempt next year and see if he can set the bar higher. ~!