Re: Mississippi Kite; AL and MS Redpolls? Bird houses

[Joshua Stuart Rose <jsr6@duke.edu>]

Hi Carolinabirders,

Mitch Reese brought his family up from Sanford yesterday to visit my 
house, or more specifically my hummingbird. The critter showed up, right 
on schedule... On a more springy note, our local salamander breeding pond 
was full of Spotted Salamanders and their eggs Sunday night; we also 
watched a few Southern Cricket Frogs calling, and saw one very out-of- 
season Marbled Salamander in the pond, along with many more timely larvae 
of the same species. One dragonfly naiad too!

A post on the Georgia birding listserv mentions Common Redpoll reports 
from both southeastern Tennessee and Holly Springs, Mississippi. Folks in 
the western Carolinas take note, and keep your eyes peeled... Further 
afield, a new species of owl has reportedly been discovered in Sri 
Lanka, and Bruijn's Brush-Turkey, a species native to Irian Jaya, has 
been rediscovered after not having been seen in 62 years; both according 
to BIRDCHAT posts.

I already replied privately to Cecille, but I found specs for not only 
bluebird houses, but also houses for several other species (even Bewick's 
Wren, heh heh heh...) at 
http://birding.about.com/hobbies/birding/library/blhousespecs.htm

On Mon, 26 Feb 2001, Gary Phillips wrote:
>
>     Just for the fun of it: Post & Gauthreaux in "Status and Distribution of
> SC Birds" (1989) state MIKI is "casual on coastal plain in winter" and offer
> 3 records, all in February: 2/2/36, 2/16/71, 2/24/74. McNair & Post in
> "Supplement to Status and Distribution of SC Birds" (1993) state these "are
> questionable" due to "no details available," and then go on to say "the
> earliest credible reports are in early April," but provide no specific
> date(s). Given the prior account, a sighting on 2/24/01 would not be
> unprecedented.
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Harry Legrand <harry.legrand@ncmail.net>
> 
> >A Mississippi Kite in late February?  I really doubt that. I know they
> >breed in the area, but they shouldn't be back until late April at the
> >earliest. I hope there is some verification for the report.
> >
> >Gary Phillips wrote:
> >>
> >> Mississippi Kite - Santee Coastal Reserve

You know, I saw a report from one of the other listservs, Virginia maybe, 
a few weeks ago wherein someone claimed to have seen a Mississippi Kite 
in the Carolinas, I think on the Outer Banks. At the time, I dismissed 
the report as being a midID for the reasons Harry cited above. And I seem 
to recall Norm Budnitz tentatively reporting a MIKI late last winter from 
the Butner Gamelands, on the CBC I think, though he didn't get a good 
enough look to be 100% certain. One of these days, somebody's going to 
have to get a photo of one of this possible winter kites, or otherwise 
confirm that they really show up here from November-March...

Joshua S. Rose
Duke University
Department of Biology (Zoology, R.I.P.)

jsr6@acpub.duke.edu
http://www.duke.edu/~jsr6/