Tuesday 12 March 2024

[cobirds] Yard list questions: How many of CO's 520 species have been seen (or heard) from a yard?

Dear Co-birders,

It has been a delight to read through this thread.  We are east of the Foothills in Unincorporated Boulder County, and fortunate to be surrounded by over 100 acres of conservation easements, other large properties and have a small pond just to our south.  I have tallied 145 species seen or heard on our 2 acre lot or from the surrounding land.  I take joy in them all, but the rarities include a Long-eared Owl, a Kentucky Warbler here for three days, a Sage Sparrow, a White-throated Sparrow, 4 Harris's Sparrows that spent almost 3 months on our property, 76 Sandhill Cranes that roosted overnight in the fields across the road, Common Redpoll and 2 sp. of Rosy Finch.

Sadly, I have had to back off of feeding as we were helping to raise too many mice that would find their way into the house and the seed also attracted skunks, rabbits and hunting coyotes (during the daytime no less).

Pam Piombino
west of Longmont.


On Mon, Mar 11, 2024 at 10:40 AM Thomas Heinrich <teheinrich@gmail.com> wrote:
Hi all,

Every now and then one of us will share the excitement of adding a rarity or new species to a yard list, report yard list totals, or comment on local trends. And some of the lists, and variety of species, are really impressive (e.g. David Suddjian's, Gary Lefko's). 

Yellow Grosbeak, Pyrrhuloxia, Streak-backed Oriole, Long-billed Thrasher, Costa's Hummingbird, Laurence's Goldfinch, and even Anhinga come to mind as rarities that have shown up in or been observed from yards. (Perhaps the recent Brambling, too?)

As a pretty obsessive yard lister (i.e. binocs always on, camera ready when outdoors, much of the time indoors too), I often wonder about others' experience with yard-listing. 

How long have you been keeping your list?
What's your style of yard listing: casual, mainly feeder watching, moderate, dedicated, obsessed?
How many species?
Rarest, or favorite species?
Most memorable experience?
Location/habitat: urban, suburban, rural, etc?

And the big question: if we tallied up all our yard lists, how close to Colorado's 520 species could we get?

It seems likely that certain families would be less well-represented; shorebirds, waterfowl, and gulls, for example. But with neighborhoods lining bodies of water such as Boyd Lake, Lake Loveland, Marston Reservoir, Jackson Lake, and MacIntosh Lake (in Boulder), among many others, many of those species theoretically could have been counted on a yard list. Maybe some lucky person living on the shores of Boyd Lake has Long-tailed Jaeger, Slaty-backed Gull, and Garganey on their yard list!

Wishing all good health, good birding, and an exciting Spring migration!

--Thomas Heinrich


My answers to the questions above:
15 years
Dedicated to obsessive 
152 species
Wood Thrush, Yellow-throated Warbler, N Cardinal, Common Redpoll, Bohemian Waxwing
Watching spring raptor migration from the roof-top, 35 Broad-winged Hawks among 130 raptors of 10 species on one high-flow day (4/18/2020)
Interface between suburban and open space, base of foothills, el. 5600'


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