ZooChat Big Year 2015

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1. Dark-Eyed Junco
2. White-Throated Sparrow
3. American Crow
4. Red-Tailed Hawk

BIRDS:
5. Blue Jay
6. Rock Dove

MAMMALS:
1. Eastern Gray Squirrel

I have seen a few hawks, but I haven't gotten very good views of them, though I suspect one is a juvenile Red-Shouldered Hawk. But I don't know for sure, so for now, it stays off the list.
 
Managed to get two new birds while driving through Chelmsford:

62. Herring gull Larus argentatus
63. Feral pigeon Columba livia

And then added six new birds - half of them lifers (indicated in bold) - on Wallasea Island.

64. Common redshank Tringa totanus
65. Corn bunting Emberiza calandra
66. Reed bunting Emberiza schoeniclus
67. Common shelduck Tadorna tadorna
68. Bewick's swan Cygnus columbianus
69. Rough-legged buzzard Buteo lagopus

Also added a new mammal on Wallasea:

4. Brown hare Lepus europaeus
 
Are there free ranging muntjacs in England? :eek:

Yes - in 1901 eleven Reeve's and thirty-one Indian muntjac were released in the woodlands around Woburn (the Indian deer died out after a relatively short time). Between the 1930s and 1952 there were seven further releases in other counties. The first one recorded in Essex - where I live - was exactly 40 years after that first release. Now they are found pretty much anywhere in the county with reasonably tall vegetation; they are much more common than any of the other three species of deer in the county.
 
Yes - in 1901 eleven Reeve's and thirty-one Indian muntjac were released in the woodlands around Woburn (the Indian deer died out after a relatively short time). Between the 1930s and 1952 there were seven further releases in other counties. The first one recorded in Essex - where I live - was exactly 40 years after that first release. Now they are found pretty much anywhere in the county with reasonably tall vegetation; they are much more common than any of the other three species of deer in the county.

Common misconception; the pure Woburn Indians hung on a lot longer than was initially thought - into the 1940's I believe - and later releases also included Indian blood. It is believed that the feral population in the UK is more or less entirely Reeves now, but with a dash of Indian blood still present in animals found in Bedfordshire.
 
Common misconception; the pure Woburn Indians hung on a lot longer than was initially thought - into the 1940's I believe - and later releases also included Indian blood. It is believed that the feral population in the UK is more or less entirely Reeves now, but with a dash of Indian blood still present in animals found in Bedfordshire.

Interesting. One question - were these animals released into the deer park and then escaped or properly into the wild?
 
As I understand it all "releases" were accidental, involving escapes from the deer park and other private collections.
 
Birds (9)-
Dark-eyed junco
White-throated sparrow
Northern cardinal
Canada goose
Cooper's hawk
Tufted titmouse
Black-capped chickadee
White-breasted nuthatch
Downy woodpecker
Mammals (3)-
Eastern gray squirrel
Whitetail deer
Thylacine
No, not thylacine but I got more birds today-
10. House finch
11. Red-bellied woodpecker
 
Missed two from the Salton Sea.

147. Semipalmated Plover
148. Long-billed Curlew

Went looking for a Tropical Kingbird and Eurasian Wigeon but I dipped on both. Fortunately I did get two lifers and three year birds while looking for these two vagrants.

149. Red-throated Loon
150. Least Bittern
151. Thayer's Gull

152. Northern Rough-winged Swallow
153. Redhead
 
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We know our local birds. We know where to find them We travel to see birds we can't get locally.

And we know the locations with relatively high species diversity.

:p

Hix
 
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