2015 BIG YEAR - April Update

April 2015

This is the fourth monthly summary of my 2015 CONDO BIG YEAR!!!

Red dot is my condo building

Red mark is the blue area defined in the first map

Click for - BIG YEAR RULES

The birds! (new species in bold)-

Cackling Goose - 1
Canada Goose - 670
Mute Swan - 1
Trumpeter Swan - 1

Tundra Swan - 353

Wood Duck - 25
Gadwall - 46

American Wigeon - 64

American Black Duck - 4
Mallard - 276

Northern Shoveler - 55

Northern Pintail - 141

Green-winged Teal - 55

Canvasback - 40
Redhead - 330

Ring-necked Duck - 4
Greater Scaup - 3154
Lesser Scaup - 1545

King Eider - 3
Surf Scoter - 1415
White-winged Scoter - 1895
Black Scoter - 139
Long-tailed Duck - 2415
Bufflehead - 68
Common Goldeneye - 35

Hooded Merganser - 8
Common Merganser - 81
Red-breasted Merganser - 720

Ruddy Duck - 200

Red-throated Loon - 11
Common Loon - 154
Horned Grebe - 397

Red-necked Grebe - 5

Neotropic Cormorant - 1

Double-crested Cormorant - 4630

Great Blue Heron - 49

Great Egret - 8

Turkey Vulture - 962

Osprey - 15

Golden Eagle - 1

Northern Harrier - 5
Sharp-shinned Hawk - 67

Cooper's Hawk - 13
Bald Eagle - 6

Red-shouldered Hawk - 8
Red-tailed Hawk - 127

Rough-legged Hawk - 5

Killdeer - 119

American Woodcock - 2

Bonaparte's Gull - 1339

Little Gull - 2
Ring-billed Gull - 1565
Hering Gull - 520
Iceland Gull - 1

Lesser Black-backed Gull - 3
Glaucous Gull - 7

Great Black-backed Gull - 51
Caspian Tern - 130

Common Tern - 61
Rock Pigeon - 15
Mourning Dove - 158
Chimney Swift - 1

Belted Kingfisher - 21

Yellow-bellied Sapsucker - 1
Downy Woodpecker - 10

Northern Flicker - 77
American Kestrel - 17
Merlin - 5

Peregrine Falcon - 2

Eastern Phoebe - 6

Blue Jay - 19
American Crow - 124
Common Raven - 3

Horned Lark - 31

Northern Rough-winged Swallow - 61

Purple Martin - 3

Tree Swallow - 405

Barn Swallow - 82

Cliff Swallow - 1

Black-capped Chickadee - 24

Red-breasted Nuthatch - 1

White-breasted Nuthatch - 2

Brown Creeper - 9

Carolina Wren - 3

Golden-crowned Kinglet - 17

Ruby-crowned Kinglet - 1

Eastern Bluebird - 68American Robin - 4755

Brown Thrasher - 1
European Starling - 4070
Lapland Longspur - 2

Yellow-rumped Warbler - 8

American Tree Sparrow - 3

Chipping Sparrow - 4

Savannah Sparrow - 2Song Sparrow - 49

Dark-eyed Junco - 71
Northern Cardinal - 21

Red-winged Blackbird - 6521

Eastern Meadowlark - 1

Rusty Blackbird - 63

Common Grackle - 6376

Brown-headed Cowbird - 4027
House Finch - 81

Pine Siskin - 10
American Goldfinch - 217
House Sparrow - 179

Total species - 109

Total ebird checklists - 27

Best birds of the month: Neotropic Cormorant, Golden Eagle, Little Gull, King Eider, "impure" Green-winged X Common Teal

Useless seasonal rarities: Chimney Swift on Apr 11th! 

Highlight "big year" birds: rarities aside - Ring-necked Duck, Lapland Longspur, Brown Thrasher, Ruddy Duck

Checklists of the month:


#1 - http://ebird.org/ebird/view/checklist?subID=S22644687 (unquestionably epic)
#2 - http://ebird.org/ebird/view/checklist?subID=S22657932 (volume)
#3 - http://ebird.org/ebird/view/checklist?subID=S22783044 (and more volume)

Total species added to the big year this month: 36

Big year total to date: 113



Target species going forwards: May birds. All the May birds. Maybe even some rarities if I'm around...

eBird needs alerts - check back, post-May

KM driven: 0
KM flown: 0
KM by boat: 0
KM by train: 0
KM by helicopter: 0

(1 Kilometer = 0.621371192237334 Miles)


Previous summaries: January | February | March |


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Thoughts:

Once again, I hardly saw anything in the previous months (Jan-Mar) that I didn't see in April... Heck, even the Neotropic Cormorant decided to have a double-month layover. There was some epic migrations in this month, even though things felt really late in "getting going". The best birding was probably the first few days of the month before some abnormally cold weather set back in. I was busy enough with work that it didn't bother me too much...

I was really happy with some "first condo records" such as Golden Eagle and Lapland Longspur. The Eagle was probably one of my best looks ever at the species as it slowly circled beside my building. A lot of other birds were great for the season.

I'm sure i'll look back and identify some "misses" as well - such as Fox Sparrow or Eastern Towhee. Mid-late April was tough!

I'm posting this late, and May is half over (along with a few trips to Pelee and a lot of work) - but it's prime time rarity season, so we'll see what other goodies will turn up going forwards!

Apr 15

Apr 16

Apr 20

Apr 20

Apr 21

Apr 21

Apr 26