Audubon of Florida Important Bird Area (IBA) Coordinator Marianne Korosy submits her Bird-a-Thon report! You can support Marianne's project by clicking here! Thanks and enjoy:
Team IBA, comprised of five sub-teams, winged across Pinellas County and parts of Pasco County and logged an impressive 142 species by day’s end. Marianne Korosy, the Team’s erstwhile leader, bagged - that’s a figure of speech - 99 species for the day beginning with an Eastern Screech-owl at 5:00 a.m. two blocks from home and finishing at 5:05 p.m. with Sharp-shinned Hawk at Dunedin Hammock. At 9:00 a.m., with 48 species safely tucked onto the day’s list from Wall Springs Park and points in between, Marianne met Dana and Harvey Kerstein and 12 hearty friends at the Honeymoon Island ferry dock for a boat trip to collect monofilament and trash on two different islands in two different Important Bird Areas.
First stop was Marker-26 spoil island in St. Joseph Sound. Host to a large wading bird rookery, the island produced wads of monofilament, sinkers, and hooks for our trash bags plus Roseate Spoonbills and Black-crowned Night Herons for the day’s list. At Three Rooker Bar, part of Anclote Key Preserve State Park, we found more trash than monofilament and collected sought-after shorebirds for the day’s list: Snowy and Piping plovers, a plethora of sandpipers including Red Knot and Whimbrel, Northern Gannet offshore, and a Peregrine Falcon scouring the shoreline. On the mucky, bay side of the island Marianne got the briefest look at a Nelson’s Sparrow and flushed two plump Sora.
Marianne and John Uhlmann searched in vain for Common Ground-doves along roadsides, parking aisles, and the picnic area at Honeymoon but were rewarded with Swamp Sparrow and Merlin. Sid Crawford reported back with Northern Harrier cruising over the dog beach. Back on the mainland, Marianne and John scoped various freshwater ponds, scratching off Hooded Merganser and several ducks including Northern Shoveler. After a quick stop for Marsh Wren, Marianne slowly negotiated entry to Dunedin Hammock through a raucous, well-dressed wedding party to finish the day with Hermit Thrush, Black-hooded Parakeet, and a Sharp-shinned Hawk that landed just beyond arm’s length to check out the loud iPod-recording of a singing Ovenbird – that produced no Ovenbird, alas. The hawk was an acceptable substitute!
Four more intrepid teams of Birdathon-ers contributed another 43 species to the Birdathon’s total day list. The hardworking North Pinellas-Clearwater Audubon team comprised of Nicky Armstrong, Dale Goebel, Mardy and Cy Hornsby, Lynn Sumerson and Mike Judd began their day with a Barred Owl at John Chesnut Park and, a stout 70 species later, moved on to add more great birds at Possum Branch and Kapok Park. Not exhausted enough, Nicky pressed on to Philippi Park on Old Tampa Bay, and finally Eagle Lake Park in Largo before calling the day quits. This team contributed hard-to-find-in-urban-Pinellas species such as Carolina Chickadee and recorded the only Barred Owl and the only Sedge Wren by any bird-a-thon team.
The dynamic duo of Lorraine and Don Margeson birded around their four-story house overlooking Mangrove Bay Golf Course and Weedon Island, then blazed their way to the concrete bird partition wall at scenic Gandy Causeway beach and racked up a bevy of shorebirds and seabirds. Scouting for ducks along the way, they ended their day bushwhacking dry pond edges at the rustic Northeast St. Pete wastewater treatment plant for sparrows and wrens. The Margesons contributed five species no other team saw: King and Virginia Rail, Blue-crowned Parrakeet, Orange-crowned Warbler, and Grasshopper Sparrow – and sent a nice photograph of the Lark Sparrow that has appeared in their neighborhood for the second winter running.
The wide-ranging team of Jane and Steve Mann began their day waiting in line for an hour for the Courtney Campbell dog beach park to open and, finding only the usual suspects (birds, that is), put the pedal to the metal and headed for the ranchlands and forests of rural Pasco County. They ran out of daylight and plan to start their next Birdathon day in Pasco County bright and early(!) Jane and Steve contributed eight species not seen by any other team including the relatively rare Burrowing Owl, Red-headed Woodpecker, and Glossy Ibis – and Painted Buntings at their very own backyard feeder.
Last and surely not ever least, the South Pinellas/St. Pete Audubon crack-birder team of Saskia Janes, Susan Pepper, Sandy Harris, Bonnie Douglass and Judi Hopkins scoured Boyd Hill Nature Park and the Pinellas Point area in preparation for their upcoming Christmas Bird Count. They contributed uniquely to the day’s findings with Lesser Black-backed Gull, Prairie Warbler, American Robin, and House Finch.
For a full list of species spotted in this year's Tampa Bay area bird-a-thon, please click here.
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