Hi Tweeters & Inland-NW-Birders -

An updated version of the 2012 county year list project is up at Washington Birder. We've received updates from almost all the counties with details through the end of June. For those not received, I substituted the e-bird year list to help fill things out. County compilers, especially for the underbirded counties, would appreciate receiving reports of any birds seen in their counties.

Not surprisingly, given all the rare birds that have popped up this spring, we are doing better than last year at this stage:
Last year at the mid-way point, we had tallied tallied 326 species in Western WA, 291 in Eastern WA, and 365 statewide. This year, we've reported 331 species in Western WA, 299 in Eastern WA, and 370 in all of Washington.

12 Western WA counties have higher totals that at this time last year, and 14 Eastern WA counties are doing better than last year.

Black-throated Sparrows have been popping up all over, showing up on 13 county lists so far [with 6 of those in Western WA!]

All counties have tallied over 150 species so far, and more than 20 are over 200 for the year -- I think that's mostly a sign of better coverage and reporting these days, but a great sign of what is possible to see out there in every corner of the state. And in a sign of what a difference an individual's big year effort can make, Kittitas County has recorded 100 more species this year so far than it had by the mid-way point last year -- Scott's Kittitas Big Year effort is paying off for us all!

If you'd like to take a look at where things stand, the list and many other interesting files are at the Washington Birder website:

http://www.wabirder.com/


A direct link to the 2012 county yearlist & the list of county compilers, including a growing number of direct links to individual county year lists with more details and more frequent updates:

http://wabirder.com/bartel.html


Thanks to all the compilers and all those pitching in to sketch a picture of another year's birds in WA.


Matt Bartels
Seattle, WA