Global Big Day 2017

Sanderling - Calidris alba @ Oistins molting

Here is the break down from the Cornell Global Big Day 2017 held on May 13.  It was a very overcast day, the treat of rain was always around but I registered my first bird at 4:55am and the last one at 5pm turning in seventeen checklists and tallying 495 individual birds.  I recorded 53 species, which was seven species over my previous best in 2016.  This was also the highest individual count, up five from 2015 and the highest Global Big Day count for the island, up one from 2015.  I recorded four year birds moving my year tally from seventy – four to seventy – eight. 

Misses and Surprises

I missed a few birds-

• Blackpoll Warbler- I knew this would have been a toss-up but after seeing this late migrant one week before I was hoping to see it again but did not.

• West Indies Whistling Dusk – A single bird at a private pond in St. Philip. This bird was at this location for a few years now it even has ducklings with a Black- whistling duck so I figured that it would have been an easy find but it was not there.

• Red-billed Tropicbird – I did not see a single RBTB at its nesting cliff.

• Southern lapwing – This bird was scarce for most of the year but I saw it on May 4^th and figured that it was back, but I did not see it on bird count day.

• Willet – there was a Willet at Chancery Lane for most of the week prior to the count so I was astonished not to see it.

Surprises:

Bank Swallow - Riparia riparia @ Pile Bay a first for the year

• Bank Swallow – I saw this bird at my second stop of the day, Pile Bay, among a group of Caribbean Martins.
• Pectoral Sandpiper – I was not expecting to see this bird this early in the year, this is normally seen during the winter migration in the latter part of the year.

 

Pectoral Sandpiper - Calidris melanotos

It was a most productive Global Big Day even though this is normally the worst birding period of the year.

Here is a full list of birds seen (Year birds are in red) and a link to more images Black-bellied Whistling-Duck - Dendrocygna autumnalis Pied-billed Grebe - Podilymbus podiceps Magnificent Frigatebird - Fregata magnificens Brown Booby - Sula leucogaster Great Blue Heron - Ardea herodias Great Egret - Ardea alba Little Egret - Egretta garzetta Snowy Egret - Egretta thula Little Blue Heron - Egretta caerulea Cattle Egret - Bubulcus ibis Green Heron - Butorides virescens Black-crowned Night-Heron - Nycticorax nycticorax Common Gallinule - Gallinula galeata Black-bellied Plover - Pluvialis squatarola Pacific Golden-Plover - Pluvialis fulva Semipalmated Plover - Charadrius semipalmatus Ruddy Turnstone - Arenaria interpres Stilt Sandpiper - Calidris himantopus Sanderling - Calidris alba Least Sandpiper - Calidris minutilla Pectoral Sandpiper - Calidris melanotos Semipalmated Sandpiper - Calidris pusilla Short-billed Dowitcher - Limnodromus griseus Spotted Sandpiper - Actitis macularius Greater Yellowlegs - Tringa melanoleuca Lesser Yellowlegs - Tringa flavipesF Laughing Gull - Leucophaeus atricilla Lesser Black-backed Gull - Larus fuscus Royal Tern - Thalasseus maximus Rock Pigeon - Columba livia Scaly-naped Pigeon - Patagioenas squamosa Eurasian Collared-Dove - Streptopelia decaocto Common Ground-Dove - Columbina passerina Zenaida Dove - Zenaida aurita Eared Dove - Zenaida auriculata Black Swift - Cypseloides niger Green-throated Carib - Eulampis holosericeus Antillean Crested Hummingbird - Orthorhyncus cristatus Rose-ringed Parakeet - Psittacula krameri Yellow-crowned Parrot - Amazona ochrocephala Orange-winged Parrot - Amazona amazonica Caribbean Elaenia - Elaenia martinica Gray Kingbird - Tyrannus dominicensis Black-whiskered Vireo - Vireo altiloquus Caribbean Martin - Progne dominicensis Bank Swallow - Riparia riparia Yellow Warbler - Setophaga petechia Grassland Yellow-Finch - Sicalis luteola Bananaquit - Coereba flaveola Black-faced Grassquit - Tiaris bicolor Barbados Bullfinch - Loxigilla barbadensis Carib Grackle - Quiscalus lugubris Shiny Cowbird - Molothrus bbonariensis