Maryland birders:
I made a mistake earlier in reporting on the
status of the Southern Lapwing. In my original
message, below, I described and applied a
procedure that we use to "break ties" when we
have situations involving accepting a report as
either a species or a member of a "group" (such
as a genus or a complex); for example, when the
members have to decide between accepting a report
as either a Rufous Hummingbird or a Selasphorus,
species. The procedure we use when breaking split
votes on the question of origin is different and
requires at least eight votes for a finding of
"natural/wild" origin. Since only six Southern
Lapwing votes were for "natural/wild" and three
were for "questionable origin," the resulting
decision for the lapwing is "Identification
Accepted/Questionable Origin." Therefore the
Southern Lapwing will NOT be placed on the main
Maryland checklist, but rather it will be added
to Part 4 of the checklist, a separate section in
the back, where similar species such as Falcated
Duck, Monk Parakeet, Silver Gull, etc. are placed.
I apologize for the confusion.
Phil (egg on face) Davis
At 01:03 07/19/2008, Phil Davis wrote:
>Southern Lapwing (Vanellus chilensis) - Accepted
>as a new species for Maryland. This is the first
>accepted record for North America, north of
>Mexico. The bird was discovered and photographed
>by Mark Hoffman on 17 Jun 2006 in a marsh at
>West Ocean City, Maryland. The Southern Lapwing
>is native to most of South America regularly
>ranging northward to Colombia, Venezuela, and
>Trinidad. Recent reports have come from Belize,
>Mexico, and the species has now bred in Arubua.
>The committee found no issues associated with
>the identification of this bird and members who
>commented on the subspecific identification
>agreed that it was of the cayennensis
>subspecies, which is the northernmost subspecies
>and the subspecies that has recently expanded
>into the Caribbean and South/Central America and
>also apparently into Mexico. On the first round
>of voting, the committee was split in its votes
>on the issue of "origin." Some felt that this
>bird could be a natural vagrant due to the
>expansion of its range and its discovery in
>Maryland shortly after a hurricane, whose path
>crossed directly over a refuge in Florida where
>several birds of this species had been reported
>prior to the hurricane. Some members felt,
>however, that the occurrence of the bird raised
>questionable origin issues. (The committee
>researched registered captive birds in
>zoological institutions and none were reported
>to have escaped; however, the existence of
>unregistered birds or birds in private
>collections could not be ruled out.) After a
>split decision dealing with "origin," the
>committee's procedures call for a second round
>of voting. After the second round, the members
>remained split in their origin opinions;
>however, the committee procedures then resolve
>the "origin" issue via a majority of the votes.
>The final result was 6 votes for natural origin
>and 3 votes for questionable origin; therefore
>the species is accepted onto the Maryland list
>as a "natural/wild" vagrant. We expect that the
>AOU and the ABA will review our files and make
>their own determination with regard to their checklists.
>
>Mark Hoffman's images and sighting details can be found here …
>
> http://www.pbase.com/wcbirding/sola
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Phil Davis, Secretary
MD/DC Records Committee
2549 Vale Court
Davidsonville, Maryland 21035 USA
301-261-0184
mailto:[log in to unmask]
MD/DCRC Web site: http://www.MDBirds.org/mddcrc/rcindex.html
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