Garden / Yard List 2024 (3 Viewers)

[birdmeister]

At one point I did say I would catch up. That was a month ago... Anyway, October ended up being a fine month with steady flights and some great additions.

4 October

Steady flight of 204 migrants, many of the same species as in previous days. Nothing outstanding this time, although a female Black-throated Gray Warbler came in pretty close while foraging. Five Blue-gray Gnatcatchers were good, too.


5 October

A lighter day with 135 migrants, decent variety. Fifteen Vaux's Swifts cruised through, plus a Great Blue Heron. A female Western Tanager might have been the last of the year.

Photos include Vaux's Swift and local Harris's Hawk, Prairie Falcon, and Black-tailed Gnatcatcher. Some of these local species really put on a show.

 

[birdmeister]

6 October

A really nice October flight, with 50 species and 266 migrants. Variety was good, with balanced flights of Horned Larks (17), swallows (13 Violet-green and 21 Barn), and the best Brewer's Blackbird flight of the year (74). My favorite sighting was the 3rd yard record of Acorn Woodpecker (all this fall), a low flyover of this stunning species in full color! A sleek and dark Swainson's Hawk was closer than usual for a treat, too.

 

[birdmeister]

8 October

Numbers were down just a bit (157 migrants), but variety stayed great. Highlights were my second (and final) Common Black Hawk of the autumn nice and close, yet another Acorn Woodpecker, and two new year additions. A possible Hermit Thrush got away and would have been a second yard record.

132. Common Yellowthroat
133. Dark-eyed Junco

One of the two juncos was close enough to ID as the "Gray-headed" subspecies, which seems to be most common when they appear here.


Photos include really close looks at male and female American Kestrel, plus the black hawk and "Gray-headed" junco.

 

[KenM]

I’ve got one of “those” on my grdn.list BM! 🤩

 

[RyanI]

Just the 2 month absence in updates! Early autumn saw a few new fly overs, crossbill, 71 plastic white storks and a redshank while Septembers highlight was a yellow-browed warbler in the garden and another lone maybe not so plastic(?) white stork. Vismig starting to ramp up now so hopefully be able to add a few more this month. A total of 74 sees me beating last year by 8 spp already, although this is probably down to effort as my life has become more sedentary!

64) Crossbill
65) Redshank
66) Cormorant
67) Tree pipit
68) Common sandpiper
69) Greenshank
70) Yellow-browed warbler
71) Siskin
72) GBB gull
73) Sand martin
74) reed bunting

Getting better, just about a month since my last update. Early October was quiet in terms of new birds but its been a decent spell of vismig over the house the past month or so. The past week has seen my add black redstart, chough, hawfinch and brambling

75) Great spotted woodpecker
76) Black redstart
77) Chough
78) Hawfinch
79) Brambling

 

[Bismarck Honeyeater]

Another quiet viz-mig session this morning, and brief too, as I had early morning commitments.

I was just musing to myself about not bothering anymore this Autumn, when, out of a leaden sky, a south-bound #96 Golden Plover called 4x.



Only my second record, after one in September 2021.

Yesterday I had the second record, this year, of Reed Bunting, and today a Feathered Thorn by the front door.



The race plods on for the 💯 year list, though likely new additions are thin on the ground. Raven, Peregrine, Bullfinch & Woodcock would do the trick…

Update: Back out again this afternoon - zilch. Another Moth on a wall, this time Common Plume.

 

[Richard Prior]

You’re getting tantalisingly close BH, warm clothes and flask of coffee necessary to get to that elusive ton I would suggest! I’m still 6 short which is a bridge too far I think, still missing 3 winter species that I would expect most years but I can’t think where another three would come from. The young Bald Ibis that passed near Annecy yesterday would’ve been good……..
Small Copper a first ever for November yesterday but although the weather is superb for gardening etc I would like it to deteriorate in order to get things moving, another Pine Bunting for example

 

[Oregonian]

93. American Redstart, foraging in a plum tree with kinglets and chickadees
This is new for my yard, lifer #128.
Also new would be the Yellow-bellied Sapsucker that was on our property, but 40 yards outside what I call the 'yard'. How particular should I be? We have 20 acres, but it seemed unfair to call it all my 'yard'.
We're in Western Oregon, and both the warbler and sapsucker are vagrants. Other people may come twitch them if they stay around.

 

[Richard Prior]

93. American Redstart, foraging in a plum tree with kinglets and chickadees
This is new for my yard, lifer #128.
Also new would be the Yellow-bellied Sapsucker that was on our property, but 40 yards outside what I call the 'yard'. How particular should I be? We have 20 acres, but it seemed unfair to call it all my 'yard'.
We're in Western Oregon, and both the warbler and sapsucker are vagrants. Other people may come twitch them if they stay around.

Nice bird!
Hopefully other participants in our humble challenge will agree, but for me, if it’s on, over or seen from your property you can count it, as long as it’s the same property of course and not separated by someone else’s terrain. There’s a huge variance in the size of people’s yard/garden/land on this thread, the only ‘competition’ is with oneself really.
That doesn’t prevent us from the odd understandable expressions of jealousy of course

 

[Euan Buchan]

Just saw my first Redwing of the year on my neighbours tree sadly couldn’t get a picture.

 

[Frank van Drogen]

Also new would be the Yellow-bellied Sapsucker that was on our property, but 40 yards outside what I call the 'yard'. How particular should I be? We have 20 acres, but it seemed unfair to call it all my 'yard'.
We're in Western Oregon, and both the warbler and sapsucker are vagrants. Other people may come twitch them if they stay around.

We've got ~15 acres, and since the ponds are on the furthers part, I count it all in.

And, as Richard says, if the bird is sitting in a neighbors three, but you can see it, it counts for sure

In the end, it is all about the fun.

 

[Steve Lister]

November 7th
76. Brambling - heard overhead in the gloom

Still waiting for a Hawfinch though, despite far more than usual being seen locally. Some yew trees nearby are attracting Redwings and Greenfinches so there must be a chance........

 

[Oregonian]

94. Yellow-bellied Sapsucker, seen in the 'yard', from the 'yard', this morning. Close to where it was yesterday.
Willamette Valley, Oregon, USA

 

[Jos Stratford]

Late season birds here - very late Woodcock today (latest ever autumn bird, though one winter record of a single on 14 December some years ago), plus my latest ever White-fronted Geese and Teal on 3 November (the White-fronted Geese a day later than previous records, the Teal three weeks later).

 

[Richard Prior]

Nights finally getting cooler here, down to 5C at dawn yesterday (and today) but still ‘wall to wall blue’ as Ken would say .The first butterfly-less day of the autumn though and I clocked up the four regular woodpecker species in just five minutes at dawn. The main excitement was later on, discovering a flock of around 50 Starling bathing in a stream and having a good old preen atop an old sycamore before going down to feed amongst the cows (which are all still in the fields thanks to the dry weather).
Starlings? Not very exciting I hear you say. Well, as my eBird bar chart for here shows, the species has an odd occurrence pattern for what is a resident just a few kilometres away at lower altitude and this flock represents only the second November sighting for me here in 9 years. I see migratory flocks in the second half of winter and a few pairs nest before all melting away once the young are independent.

 

[Jos Stratford]

Starlings? Not very exciting I hear you say. Well, as my eBird bar chart for here shows, the species has an odd occurrence pattern for what is a resident just a few kilometres away at lower altitude and this flock represents only the second November sighting for me here in 9 years. I see migratory flocks in the second half of winter and a few pairs nest before all melting away once the young are independent.

Any Starling between November and early March is outstanding here - almost purely a summer visitor.

 

[Farnboro John]

Ring-necked Parakeet over this morning while I was hoping for a Hawfinch. I'd heard a parakeet a few hundred yards away during my exercise walk on Monday so it wasn't a major surprise, but we haven't had garden records for a couple of years or so - not since they bred along our street in fact.

John

 

[Richard Prior]

Any Starling between November and early March is outstanding here - almost purely a summer visitor.

I think I read somewhere that the return of the Starling in Spring for Russians evokes similar feelings to that of W Europeans on seeing the first Swallow….

 

[Jos Stratford]

I think I read somewhere that the return of the Starling in Spring for Russians evokes similar feelings to that of W Europeans on seeing the first Swallow….

Pretty much the case here in Lithuania. Lots of everyday folk put up Starling nest boxes (far more than tit boxes). One of the first migrants to return, always a pleasure.

 

[Warixenjalka]

Any Starling between November and early March is outstanding here - almost purely a summer visitor.

Same here.

I made today my this winters first Winter Bird Count (for Finish Natural History Museum) - 13 km route. 256 Fieldfares was a new record from this route. They only arrived here on the south coast this week. The Waxwings will probably follow soon.