Subject: [Tweeters] Re: status of Black-capped Chickadee in the San
Date: Mar 27 07:46:24 2012
From: Eugene Hunn - enhunn323 at comcast.net


Tweeters,

I've thought that the scarcity of Black-capped Chickadees on local islands
may be evidence that the Black-capped is a relatively recent arrival in the
PNW from the eastern forest, perhaps an early harbinger of the Barred Owl.
Chestnut-backed Chickadees appear more obviously morphologically adapted to
the PNW habitat. Note also that the Black-capped ranges no further south
than northwesternmost California while the Chestnut-backed ranges further
south.

Gene Hunn
Petaluma, CA

-----Original Message-----
From: tweeters-bounces at mailman1.u.washington.edu
[mailto:tweeters-bounces at mailman1.u.washington.edu] On Behalf Of Charlie
Wright
Sent: Monday, March 26, 2012 10:22 PM
To: tweeters at u.washington.edu
Subject: [Tweeters] Re: status of Black-capped Chickadee in the San Juan
Islands

Hi Charles,
Thanks for starting this discussion about chickadees, the San Juans, and
eBird.

Black-capped Chickadee is certainly rare out there on the islands, but not
completely unheard of. That said, it is likely that visiting birders
sometimes hear chickadees and assume "Black-capped" without a second
thought. We're now going back and e-mailing those birders (that's right,
including Kenn Kaufman!) to see if they can help with details. Incidentally,
we've just finished a brand new filter for San Juan County (it had
previously been on a coastal filter) that should be in place later this
week, and will flag Black-capped Chickadee reports for reviewal from now on.

The spate of Black-cap reports on Orcas Island (including the CBC reports
Barb mentioned) might indicate a small population there, but only time will
tell. It will be interesting to see if they ever do get a toehold out there,
and if so how rapidly they'll increase.

Cheers,
Charlie Wright
Puyallup, Washington

Charles Swift wrote:

Interestingly there is an old Black-capped Chickadee record for San Juan
Island in eBird from one Kenn Kauffman! But in response to my email I have
received no first hand reports of Black-capped Chickadee for the islands
although I did get an intriguing second-hand report of BC Chickadees
regularly coming to a feeder outside of Friday Harbor. If this is the case
it should be possible to document them relatively easily and I have passed
that report along to a resident birder on San Juan Island. There are
additional recent eBird records around Friday Harbor so it is possible there
is small population here but this needs to be confirmed.? Like others I
assumed based on the reference mentioned and limited personal experience
that BCCH are not present in the islands.

It does appear that the San Juan County eBird filter for BC Chickadee is set
so that records can be submitted without confirmation. There are in fact a
good number of BCCH records in eBird for San Juan county - I counted about
30 pins and some of those pins represent multiple records. So probably these
records need to be reviewed by the WA eBird folks (in case they are
reading). I did look at southern Vancouver Island in eBird and there are no
BCCH records there.

thanks, Charles.
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