Date: Mon, 1 Jan 2001 23:52:32 EST Reply-To: Maryland Birds & Birding Sender: Maryland Birds & Birding From: Mark Hoffman Subject: Green-tailed Towhee: Misc. Thoughts MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit The news of a Green-tailed Towhee in Allegany County is, needless to say, very exciting. Congrats to Ray Kiddy! Some miscellaneous thoughts on this bird: 1) There are no accepted Maryland records of this species. The only published prior report was of a bird that was "present throughout January [1969] at the home of Wesley Quail in the Liberty Road area of Baltimore County" (Md. Birdlife 25:63). Unfortunately, as I remember it, no details or photos of this bird were available and hence the report was not amenable to Records Committee consideration. Hence, the current bird would be a first state record and in additions to Ray's written details, it would be desirable to obtain photos and/or video. 2) This record is long overdue for Maryland. A quick look at Sibley (2000) shows the eastern United States literally awashed with "green dots" for this species. A review of some references at hand shows the following number of records for east coast states (listed from south to north): Virginia: 3 records, 26 Jan 1908, 26 Feb-22 Apr 1953, and 7-11 Apr 1953 (Kain 1987); Delaware, 1 record, early Feb-early Apr 1964 (Hess et al. 2000); Pennsylvania: 2 records, both wintering at feeders, 23 Dec 1987-2 May 1988 and 27 Nov 1994-1 Mar 1995 (McWilliams and Brauning 2000); New York: 4 records, at least 2 at feeders, mid-Dec 1962-25 Apr 1963 (feeder), 10-14 May 1969, 19 Oct-3 Nov 1971, 9 Dec 1976-22 Apr 1977 (feeder); Connecticut: 1 unverified sight record, 7 Feb 1983 (Zeranski and Baptist 1990); Massachusetts, at least 9 records, 31 Dec 1946-26 Apr 1947, 9 Oct 1951, 5 Mar-6 May 1953, Jan-Mar 1963, Dec 1970-10 Apr 1971, 25 Nov-20 Dec 1973, Nov 1976-Feb 1977, 17 Oct-4 Nov 1979 and 16 Dec 1979 (Veit and Peterson 1993). The latter authors state this species "is most likely to occur in Massachusetts at bird feeders during fall and early winter". Also note that many of the feeder birds stated well into spring, so there is no reason to believe this bird will be leaving any time soon, although major snow fall events can probably change local bird distribution out west fairly significantly. 3) As can be noted by the above records, many of them have come a feeding stations. This species has been long on my "winter feeding station want list" (along with Western Tanager, Black-headed Grosbeak, etc.). It not being at a feeder makes it all the more unusual. 4) The towhee's preference for feeders is a habit that I would suggest we use to hold the bird in the area (which probably isn't really necessary, as it would not have settled there without a good food supply) and perhaps more importantly, make it a little easier for birders to find. I would recommend that the area near the original sighting (or somewhere nearby that looks good and has good visibility) be "laced" with bird seed (a mixture of millet, corn and sunflowers) on a regular basis. If possible, a temporary feeder would also be put up and maintained. We have used this technique with other "feeder birds" originally found in non-feeder situations (e.g., the 1991-92 Painted Bunting in Stockton) with success. This might make the bird easier to see and document, as oppose to folks trying to dig it out of the thickets each time. 5) I will be looking for this bird on Wednesday. If anyone wants to coordinate with me, feel free to give me a call or email. Home: 410-549-3598; Work 410-260-8449, Mobile 410-409-5777; Email: Mhoff36100@aol.com. 6) People looking for this bird would also do well to familarize themselves with its call, as described by Sibley (2000) "a mewing, nasal meewe". I know this is on the Western version of the Birding By Ear CD, and probably can be found on the web some place. Thanks again to Ray Kiddy for finding the bird and sharing the information with the MDOsprey. Regards, Mark Hoffman Sykesville, MD Mhoff36100@aol.com ======================================================================= To leave the MDOsprey list, send e-mail to listserv@home.ease.lsoft.com with the following message in line 1: signoff mdosprey ======================================================================= =========================================================================