On Mon, 13 Feb 1995, Priscilla Stanford wrote:
>
> Can anyone tell me if there is some sort of official list of neotropical
> migrants for the Pacific northwest?

Hi Priscilla. This a point of contention between many groups, though one
which is never really 'figured out'. There are several lists to choose
from, but you sort of answered your own question further down (I'll get
back to that in a minute). Anyway, if you really need a list of
Cascadian (how's that for GC - geographically correct?) migrants, the
people who worry about it the most are the Northwest Working Group for
Partners in Flight, who have come up with one. I'd e-mail it to you, but
I don't have it stored electronically. If you'd like, I'll snail-mail
one to you. That said, let's get on with part II...

> Also, how far south does a bird have
> to migrate to be considered a neotropical migrant?

This is the REAL question, which leads me (and many others) to think that
the whole idea of trying to create a list of so-called neotropical
migrants is a silly endeavor. What the heck is one? In the east, there
are many birds which fly across the Gulf of Mexico. That is where the
term originated, but I also think that's where it should end. Call them
Trans-Gulf migrants if you must. Of course this ignores the millions of
little guys who leave from Bay of Fundy, Cape Ann, Cape Cod, Cape May,
Cape Hatteras, etc, and never see the Gulf of Mexico except out of the
corner of one eye at the southern terminus of their flight. In the west,
there is no clear-cut ecological barrier such as the Gulf for birds to
evolve migrations around. Some (e.g. Bobolink) fly tremendous distances
during migration, while others will winter in Arizona, Texas, California,
Mexico, or much closer to home. You see the problem? Trying to create a
category of birds based on their migration ends up being a very biased and
very arbitrary decision. Do you count a species if one individual crosses
the Tropic, or goes into Mexico, or beyond? Or must it be all individuals
in a species, population, ... It could go on and on. Trying to
categorize species as 'neotropical' or not will ultimately fail, because
migrations are not that simplistic and represent a continuum of
evolutionary adaptations, not one of 2 categories.

____________________________
Mike Smith
Univ. of Washington, Seattle
whimbrel at u.washington.edu
http://salmo.cqs.washington.edu/~wagap/mike.html