snip from Eric Kraig
> I'm not sure you'd have to go this far. The equivocal nature of the
> status of Northwestern Crow seems to end abruptly at the
> Washington-B.C. border. Looking over Christmas count data, most
> western Washington sites list either American Crow or crow sp., with
> just a couple, Port Townsend and San Juan Is., if I remember right,
> counting Northwestern Crows. North of the border, they're nearly all
> counted as Northwesterns along the coast, with the presence of
> Americans being noteworthy. No such thing as a "crow, sp."

The listing of northwestern crow on BC Christmas counts has nothing to do
with the distribution of crow sub-species in this region. It has
everything to do with the BC and some WA CBC compilers and their
willingness to consider NW crow as a real species. After all it is an
official AOU species and it is one more tick on a count.

>
> If I remember right, hasn't WOS taken an official stance on the
> non-species-status of NW Crow?


The bird records committee of Washington considers all crows in the state
as good ol' American crows. But until the AOU delists NW crow as a full
species it remains on the WA checklist. (for the record I am not a member
of the committee.)



Tom Schooley, Olympia WA , dunlin at mail.tss.net