floraphile

Yes.

Thanks, Charlie. 🙂 I had ordered Stephenson's book earlier this week--based on Amazon ratings--and was hoping it would also be a recommendation from others in the WhatBird group. I will order Dunne's book on finding birds.

Hi, All-- In this time of home confinement and the luxury of birdwatching-at-will that it allows, I want to build my birding library. What Go-To and/or Must Have volumes should I aquire? In addition to the Peterson, Sibley (East & West), and National Geographic field guides for North America, I already have: Karlson & Dunne, Gulls Simplified; Dunne et al, Hawks in Flight; Wheeler & Clark, A Photographic Guide to North American Raptors; and O'Brien, The Shorebird Guide Thanks!

Nevermind. I went over my notes and see the lack of terminal band in the tail--also no pale head--so it cannot be a Rough-Legged.

I'm just learning my hawks, but wouldn't the carpal patches and extremely pale primaries go more with Rough-Legged Hawk? What makes it more likely to be a Red-Tailed?

Could you be hearing Blue Jays mimicking Red Shouldered Hawks? They do that a lot here in Alabama.

I hear Spring Peepers.

@Tony Leukering Tony--I was able to get a recording this morning of the grackles. Can you ID which species from the songs/calls? Thank you. 🙂 20200321_164122.wav

AllAboutBirds site state the Boat-Taileds hold their tails in a V. https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Boat-tailed_Grackle/id

Hi, Tony. My question is about Common vs. Boat-Tailed (not Great-Tailed).

44. Latest one was Pileated Woodpecker.

21 Mar 2020. Baldwin co., AL. <1 mile from Mobile Bay Hi, All. 😞 Today, I noted a large flock of 60-70 grackles (and possibly a few Red-Winged Blackbirds--ID'd by ear only) fly and roost for several minutes in the uppermost branches of surrounding trees. When they flew overhead, their tails were long & large, and unfurled into a shallow V at the end. I ID'd them as Boat-Tailed, but ebird popped up with an error message calling them "Infrequent". On AllAboutBirds and ebird, I listened to the calls of each of the 2 species and they did sound more like Common Grackle (but please see Question #1 below). So my questions: 1--Are the calls of the 2 species as different (as they sounded to me) on ebird/llAboutBirds? 2--Do Boat-Taileds also aggregate in huge flocks (and with other "black-birds") like Common? 3) Do the 2 species socialize/roost/flock together? 4) Regardless of the species of the birds I saw, why would ebird state Boat-Taileds as "Infrequent" here? We are coastal and we have them here year-round. 5) Would not the hugely long tail showing an obvious V shape in flight suggest Boat-Tailed? Thanks, everybody. 🙂

Thank you, Tony for your excellent explanation. 🙂 As you surmised, I had been including Sanderlings as Peeps, and I feel it is the species I have most often seen on the Gulf Coast in the Shorebird "Off-season"

Hi, All. I could not find a proper forum for my question, so I hope posting here is acceptable. I am a little confused by the ranges/distributions of many of the peeps. Most of these birds are stated/mapped in the various field guides to winter along the Gulf Coast, fly north to breed & are absent here in the Summer, but I felt we have small sandpipers at our beaches throughout the Summer? Have I just not noticed their absence?

Hi, Alex. Can we use the saltwater location to eliminate Long-billed?