I've counting them going by the Ocean Shores jetty (back in the good old
days) hundreds per minute for hours (were they making a big circle? don't
think so).

But what about Starlings. Multiply the roosts of hundreds of thousands by
all the urban areas in the US+? Well, maybe not 1000000000.

Gene Hunn, Seattle,


At 06:04 PM 10/24/97 -0700, you wrote:
>Tweeters:
>
>Concerning the most abundant bird:
>
>When in New Zealand, I discussed the question about the most abundant
>bird in the world with John Warham, New Zealand seabird biologist
>extraordinaire. His vote was Sooty Shearwater. I asked him how many he
>thought there were in the world, and, in typical British fashion, he
>answered "1000 million." I said "No way! There can't be!"
>
>He then told me about one island south of New Zealand (in the Snares,
>which have a tiny fraction of the world's Sooty Shearwater population),
>where he told me about 6 million Sooties breeding on an island about 2
>square miles in area. And he claimed there are many such islands, off
>New Zealand, Australia, and South America. So even if Sooties are not
>the most abundant, they're surely near the top.
>
>After spending time at sea through the Pacific and Antarctic, I agree
>that Sooty Shearwaters are much more abundant and widespread than
>Wilson's Storm-Petrels. Wilson's are clearly very abundant locally in
>the Antarctic, but nothing like the abundance of Sooties in several
>oceans around the world. For example, during good shearwater years
>Sooties may outnumber all the breeding species combined along our
>northwest coast (although their abundance here shows indications of
>waning in the last decade).
>
>I think the original reference about Wilson's Storm-Petrel being most
>abundant is from one of Roger Tory Peterson's early coffee table books
>about birds of the world, in which he describes one of his trips to
>Antarctica.
>
>Bob Boekelheide
>Sequim, WA
>
>>Help! Anybody out there have the answer to this one?
>>
>>Gene Hunn.
>>
>>
>>>Date: Tue, 21 Oct 1997 16:49:38 -0700
>>>To: "Wendy Johnson" <WJohnson at evansgroup.com>
>>>From: Hal Opperman <halop at accessone.com>
>>>Subject: Re: Media FYI
>>>Cc: hunnhome at accessone.com
>>>
>>>At 11:41 AM -0600 21/10/1997, Wendy Johnson wrote:
>>>
>>>>Hal,
>>>>
>>>>Could you or another SAS board member confirm this?
>>>>
>>>>BIRD POPULATIONS - NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC. I'm a researcher at National
>>>>Geographic trying to determine what is the most abundant bird in the
>>>>world. We list the Wilson's storm petrel as the most abundant. Does anyone
>>>>have a good reference? >>> Jeanette Howard Email: jhoward at ngs.org Phone:
>>>>202-857-7232
>
>