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Buncombe County Christmas Bird Count Analysis



It was a cold, but sunny day for the Buncombe County count on Sunday, 12/30
which made it actually a pretty good day for birding.  The only difficulties
were the high wind, especially on the mountain tops (the views were
spectacular up there, though, as they often are in the winter because the air
is clearer) and the limitation of not being able to access the Asheville
reservoir.  The Water Authority rarely allows anyone access to the reservoir
even in the best of times, but has always given us permis
sion to do the count
every year.  With the terrorism thing going on this year, though, they balked.
 So our waterfowl count was lower than usual since the reservoir is the only
major water body in the count circle.  As for the wind problem, it was most
acute at the upper elevations, but wasn’t too bad in the valleys and birding
was best in those areas.
	Considering the limitations, it was quite a good count for this circle.
Species total was 68 and count total was 7,561.  If you take off the big
flo
cks of blackbirds that occur irregularly and skew the bird counts, we
actually had more birds than we have ever had since the count began here in
1972.
There were no blackbirds of any kind this year.  But we recorded the highest
numbers since the count began in 1972 for ten species including Black Vulture,
Ring-billed Gull, Red-bellied Woodpecker, Northern Flicker, Tufted Titmouse,
White-breasted Nuthatch, Brown Thrasher, Eastern Towhee, American Pipit, and
American Goldfinch, and second highest numb
ers of Eastern Bluebird, Northern
Mockingbird, Yellow-rumped Warbler, and White-throated Sparrow.  The
participant numbers (30) were only on the high side of average, so that is
just part of the reason.  I think the extended warm fall helped keep some
birds around, like the Brown Thrasher and Yellow-rumped Warbler, for longer
than normal.  We also had the first Catbird on the count since 1982 and the
first Ring-billed Gulls ever.  Large flocks of gulls have been hanging out at
a few of the large lake
s around the southern mountains in the last week and
these were probably headed toward the Asheville reservoir as they were seen in
that section.
Other trends of note include:
-Black Vultures only began showing up on the count in the mid-90’s, but are
now regularly seen.
-Rock Dove numbers have grown since the 1990’s, likely the result of the
increasing urbanization of the count circle.
-Northern Bobwhite have only been seen once since 1979, also likely the result
of the urbanization of the count c
ircle and the loss of habitat.
-Red-bellied Woodpeckers were sparse until the mid-90s, but numbers have grown
since then to reach a peak this year.  Red-bellied numbers actually exceeded
Downy this year for the first time ever.  Red-bellies have been expanding
their range north, so maybe they are also expanding their range upward in
elevation.  I had some at houses that were above 3000 feet in elevation.
There are more people building homes on steep mountain slopes and putting up
feeders.
-Good news
 on Eastern Bluebirds.  Until the 90’s there were less than 100 seen
in every count except one, but in the last decade there have almost always
been over 100 and this year was the second highest count ever.
-Less happy news, this is the first count since the mid-70’s when over 1000
Starlings were seen.
-This is only the second count year that we have had American Pipits, the
first being last year.  It looks like they have found a field that they like
in the circle as there were 100 of them there.
	O
ne other note, two groups reported seeing a Broad-winged Hawk.  As pictures
were not obtained nor were rare bird sighting forms completed, they are not
accepted at this time.  I will ask the groups to fill out the proper forms.
	Sorry for the long-winded report, but I generally find trends and general
bird behavior more interesting than sightings of birds outside their normal
range.  It must be an extension of all the data analysis I do for my work.  I
will put the complete results on the www.birdsour
ce.org web site as soon as
the count week period is over.
	Many thanks to all the people who participated in this year’s count.
	Marilyn Westphal
	mjwestphal@unca.edu