Wednesday, December 5, 2018

The ABA Rare Bird Alert’s Weekly Highlights

A Tundra Bean Goose has been present near Corvallis, Oregon.

It was a big week for vagrant raptors, not least of which because of the dramatic return of the immature Great Black Hawk in Maine, rediscovered in a Portland city park hunting and feeding on tree squirrels after eluding birders again for a few more weeks. It is exciting that this bird persists in our northeastern-most state, even after cooler weather. Perhaps it will persist a while in Portland. But the real excitement last week was a first in the North America realm, coming from St. Paul Island in the Pribilofs, where a Eurasian hawk – a Long-legged Buzzard – was photographed far from its closest normal range of central Asia!

The growing community of local birders on the Bering Sea islands continues to find amazing rare bird sightings and document them with photographs! Barbara Lestenkof made the exciting Long-legged Buzzard sighting complete with photos, and you can definitely say she’s hooked on finding rare birds, having also documented the first Black Kite in the North America realm previously. Congratulations Barbara!

First North American record Long-legged Buzzard – St. Paul Island, Pribilof Islands, Alaska

First state record Eastern Bluebirds – near Portland, Oregon

Third state record Yellow-billed Loon – Lake Sakakawea, North Dakota
 

REALLY RARE SIGHTINGS

Tundra Bean Goose – near Corvallis, Oregon

Barnacle Goose – Riverhead, New York

Black-headed Gull – coastal South Carolina

Calliope Hummingbird – Annapolis, Maryland

Sage Thrasher – northeast Massachusetts

Townsend’s Soitaire – central New Jersey

Glaucous Gull – central Mississippi

Vaux’s Swifts – Baton Rouge, Louisiana

Continuing rare species reported here in previous week’s issues that were still being observed last week included at least one Roadside Hawk and a Golden-crowned Warbler in southern Texas, and California’s Red-footed Booby south of Monterey and the Little Stint in San Diego. We all await next week’s unpredictable wayward birds that lucky and intent birders find and record!

For more information, see the American Birding Association’s Rare Bird Alert at http://blog.aba.org/2018/11/rare-bird-alert-november-24-2018.html

Special Thanks to Nate Swick, who does such a great job of compiling the ABA’s Rare Bird Alert, which we utilize in preparing this weekly replay!

You can often find more information about individual rare bird sightings from the state rare bird alert listserves that you can access at http://birding.aba.org/