I would encourage you to persevere with this Philip. I think you could show the shallow-water participants in this activity a thing or two – especially in the area of the less usual parrots
From: Philip Veerman [
Sent: Sunday, 13 January 2013 12:38 PM
To:
Subject: [canberrabirds] Big Year 2012 and counts of ACT birds
Thanks for that, it was Martin who provided the hint to convert the file to a form that I could use. At a quick count my ACT list is at 223, although there are some that I was not sure if I remember right as being ACT obs, rather than COG AOI, so left them off. However I have added one species that is not on the list. That is Fischer's Lovebird, a pair some years ago across the road from my house, being watched greedily by some Pied Currawongs. I don't know why they are not on the list. I did put in a report. These were certainly not Peach-faced Lovebirds, that I have also seen in Canberra.
I wonder why the Spotted Dove, Muscovy Duck and Peafowl are not in the main list but only on the Supplementary List. They are certainly far more abundant than are many of the (vagrant) waders (for example) included on the main list and at least the Spotted Dove and Peafowl are known to be breeding and permanently present as well. Thus are as deserving as Starling, Myna & House Sparrow to be on the main list and more so than these many vagrants.
I also note that some editing needed, with species names (BTNH, gull, tern & cockatoos and no doubt others) are missing a space to separate from the genus names.
As for Geoffrey's question. Well that would be an dubious comparison or at least not relevant to the ACT. The main thing contributing to this is where people have been.
A curious question is what species people have seen both in Australia and the northern hemisphere, especially if you have had limited time in the northern hemisphere. My list is just three: Black Swan, Fork-tailed Swift and Tree Sparrow. But then I have only been outside Australia for 3 weeks.
-----Original Message-----
From: Geoffrey Dabb
Sent: Sunday, 13 January 2013 7:43 AM
To: m("canberrabirds.org.au","canberrabirds");">
Subject: FW: [canberrabirds] Big Year 2012 and counts of ACT birds
There would be some advantages in keeping a personal list. In a previous message I said I couldn’t remember seeing a Red-backed kingfisher ‘in the ACT’. Of course I have. Over a couple of seasons Roger Curnow drew attention to that breeding pair on Ginninderra Creek - seen by many observers at the time. The point is, why just write down birds in the ACT? Why not write down EVERY bird you see? Some people do, of course, and are no doubt better equipped to speak with authority on what species are out there – at least where they’ve been personally. But then, if EVERYONE wrote down EVERY bird they saw and then it was all put together …. but hang on, isn’t that where the world is heading anyway? It’s the mammals I feel sorry for.
From: Philip Veerman [m("pcug.org.au","pveerman");">]
Sent: Saturday, 12 January 2013 11:07 PM
To: 'COG line'
Subject: [canberrabirds] Big Year 2012 and counts of ACT birds
David McDonald wrote that Steve Wilson's Annotated Checklist has been at COG's website for quite a few years - see under 'lists'. But the filename has been changed, thanks for alerting me to that, it is now http://www.canberrabirds.org.au/CheckList.htm . and 'A site at which birders who have observed 150 or more wild bird species in the Australian Capital Territory may have their totals listed.' It also gives inclusion rules.
To which I note that file is a pdf. I wonder, or more to the point request, does this list of bird species exist as an Excel file for example, so that someone can just have a column for yes and put a 1 in it to have the system add up the ones. (Computers are good at that). Otherwise someone needs to manually count, which is hard work. I am sort of curious what would be on my ACT list, as I have never considered that.
