Eurasian Tree Sparrows are common on the Pacific coast of Asia, so getting onto a ship is not at all unlikely, but it would have had to find food for that long journey (one estimate is 19 days from Xiamen, China, to Seattle).
To me, a question that is just as interesting is how, no matter where it came from, a bird like that finds feeders such as those at Butler's, nestled back in the woodland. Think about it.
Dennis Paulson
Seattle
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On Oct 29, 2019, at 12:01 PM, tweeters-request at mailman11.u.washington.edu wrote:
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Date: Tue, 29 Oct 2019 05:09:43 -0700
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From: Matt Bartels <mattxyz at earthlink.net <mailto:mattxyz at earthlink.net>>
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To: tweeters <tweeters at u.washington.edu <mailto:tweeters at u.washington.edu>>
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Subject: [Tweeters] Fwd: Eurasian Tree Sparrow Origin
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Message-ID: <9CD1DF41-6F39-41B2-96B9-F0407F95F32A at earthlink.net <mailto:9CD1DF41-6F39-41B2-96B9-F0407F95F32A at earthlink.net>>
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Hi hi -
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I?ll chime in on this one :
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The WBRC follows the ABA in its determination of ?countable? birds ? So, yes, by ABA rules, ?ship assisted? alone doesn?t make a bird uncountable.
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Here?s the section from the ABA listing rules [http://listing.aba.org/aba-recording-rules/ <http://listing.aba.org/aba-recording-rules/> <http://listing.aba.org/aba-recording-rules/ <http://listing.aba.org/aba-recording-rules/>> ]
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Rule 3 part a:
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(i) An otherwise wild bird that voluntarily uses or is attracted to a feeder, nest box, audio playback, ship at sea, or other nonnatural device, without being captured, is still considered wild. Physical contact between an observer and a bird does not automatically preclude a bird from being counted, as there are situations where wild birds have learned to eat from outstretched hands or have used people as temporary perches.
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However, the question is whether it is more likely that a bird alighted on a ship and stayed there unassisted for a journey ? for example, the Brown Booby that rode into Edmonds on a sailboat was free to go at any time, so it was countable.But when a House Swift was found dead in BC in 2017, it was ultimately judged more likely that it had been trapped in a container for the cross-Pacific journey than that it had freely crossed on its own.
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With Eurasian Tree Sparrow, I imagine it will be worth a discussion of whether a bird like that [a] is more likely to have wandered west from its core range in MO or [b] if it came from Asia if it was more likely to have freely sat on a ship for the journey or perhaps been stuck inside a container, like House Sparrows in a big WalMart.
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It will be worth a discussion, for sure!
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Matt Bartels
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Secretary, WBRC
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Seattle, WA
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