At its meeting yesterday, COG’s Rarities Panel agreed
to a revised 2008 list of unusual birds, reports of which must be endorsed by
the panel before than can be published as official COG records. This list will
be placed on the “rarities” section of the COG website shortly,
when it has been revised to accommodate Christidis and Boles (2008). It is
essentially the list which was previously aired for comment. And the Regent
Honeyeater is not on it. Why not, you are probably asking. Agreed, the
Regent Honeyeater is unusual in our area. But not exceptionally so. The chief criterion
for a bird to remain on the “unusuals” list is fewer than ten
records of presumably the same individual or groups of the species in the COG
area of concern over the last 25 years. So if all 25 of those who viewed Tobias’s
bird had put in records to the Panel, that would equate to one record, for the
purposes of determining whether the bird remained on the “unusuals
requiring reporting” list. But please do not ignore the need to
record the presence of this stunning visitor! Use a COG datasheet which you can
download from the website or obtain from meetings, or, if you are already
inputting your data electronically, do it that way. And Tobias, why not
think about writing up your discoveries as Odd Obs for Canberra Bird Notes? I’m
sure new editor Anthony Overs would welcome them. I can provide you with a list
of endorsed sightings of both Scarlets and Regents if you are interested.
Barbara Allan, Secretary, COG Rarities Panel
