4BY2: Quarterly Report

Sure, I’ve been anxious and cranky and noncommunicative most of this calendar year, but one thing that brings me joy is seeing birds. It’s been a pretty good year.

In April I added thirty species to the list. I attribute this luck to being in Portland, Maine, and being there over a weekend for once, which gave us time to go birding. I got to see lots of species I can’t see while landlocked. In April, I added common grackle, horned grebe, pied-bill grebe, bufflehead, American black duck (two, doing it!), merlin, great egret, snowy egret, eastern phoebe, ring-necked duck, green-winged teal, killdeer, glossy ibis, American wigeon, greater yellowlegs, Harlequin duck, surf scoter, black scoter, northern rough-winged swallow, double-crested cormorant, great blue heron, house finch, woodcock, Wilson’s snipe, belted kingfisher, pine siskin, tree swallow, chipping sparrow, broad-winged hawk, and chimney swift.

Surely, I thought, I will not begin to approach that number in May.

But spring was very very good to me, and the birds practically knocked on my front door. (It’s been a good year for birding from bed, ticking off singing species in the early-morning hours before I get up. Also, I took a bunch of walks and bike rides.) I had matched April’s count by midmonth, and by month’s end, I was up forty-one species: rose-breasted grosbeak, yellow-bellied sapsucker, eastern towhee, field sparrow, black-and-white warbler, yellow warbler, gray catbird, white-throated sparrow, brown-headed cowbird, swamp sparrow, spotted sandpiper, barn swallow, tree swallow, northern flicker, wood duck, warbling vireo, white-crowned sparrow, Baltimore oriole, bobolink, common yellowthroat, eastern kingbird, eastern meadowlark, barred owl, ovenbird, ruby-throated hummingbird, indigo bunting, veery, house wren, brown thrasher, chestnut-sided warbler, red-eyed vireo, ruffed grouse, scarlet tanager, wood thrush, American redstart, hermit thrush, eastern wood-pewee, northern harrier, great-crested flycatcher, common nighthawk, and cedar waxwing.

The expected slowdown arrived in June, when I added only five species, despite a trip south to Maryland and Pennsylvania: fish crow, Carolina wren, Carolina chickadee, black vulture, and great-horned owl.

So, year-to-date count for this report: 120. (2012: 102. 2013: 162 [ah, Arizona!]. 2014: 102.)