Re: First bird of the year

[Mark Stackhouse <westwings at sisna dot com>]

Well, Tim, I'd like to say I feel your pain, having spent years trying 
to avoid the "starling first" New Year's tradition. I even made a 
concerted effort one year to see how far down on my year list I could 
make the starling fall, going so far as wearing a baseball cap drawn 
down over my eyes and playing loud music whenever passing starling-rich 
territory and birding intensively in places I knew to be relatively 
starling-free. I made it to 35 before seeing a starling. Last year and 
this year I cheated by passing the New Year in San Blas, Mexico, where 
we don't have starlings. Last year I made it to 105 on my New Year's 
Day journey back to Utah before seeing a starling in Arizona. This 
morning I went birding until noon before packing to leave, and although 
I concentrated on photographing birds rather than simply birding, 
managed a list of 110 species (any year with Military Macaw on the list 
before starling is a good year). Oddly, I also missed Rock Dove, House 
Sparrow, and amazingly, Cattle Egret. Although I haven't seen a 
starling yet, I'm not sure that trading it for Great-tailed Grackle and 
Sinaloa Crow (my first two this morning) is any great improvement!

I should add a few tomorrow morning before crossing the border and 
entering starling country again . . .

Happy New Years (and best of luck for your 2006 lists)!

Mark Stackhouse
Westwings, Inc.
www.westwings.com
mark@westwings.com
801-487-9453 (Salt Lake City, Utah, USA)
011-52-323-285-1243 (San Blas, Nayarit, Mexico)

On Jan 1, 2006, at 10:39 AM, Tim Avery wrote:

> I went out on to my deck with anticipation this morning, what would
> the first bird of the year be... Could it be a flicker, yelping like a
> Red-tail, or maybe a  quail clucking up the block... What about The
> Scrub Jay's heckling the neighbors cats, that would be a good starter.
>  A flock of Geese heading towards the park maybe... Oooh, there were
> jsut so many possibilities, then I heard it the notes whistling from
> the neighbors yard... a House Sparrow... Oh and for the kicker # 2
> were a flock of Starlings that started causiung some racket abotu a
> block away... I should have turned off my hearing and went to the
> park!
>
> Good Birding in 2006
>
> Tim
>
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