Wisconsin

eBirder Effort

For the first time, Wisconsin eBirders submitted over 200,000 checklists in a year.  Over a quarter of these checklists came from two counties — Dane and Milwaukee.  The same two counties once again came in first and second for species totals with 292 in Dane and 289 in Milwaukee.  The 356 species observed statewide is a new record in the eBird era, surpassing 354 in 2014 and 2020.

The Birds

Each year we use this space to highlight rare birds and changing patterns in the distribution of species.  The rarities highlighted below are typically less than annual.  This year Wisconsin picked up two first state records.

Southern Birds in Wisconsin

The first new edition to the state list was Limpkin.  Limpkins irrupted north in unprecedented numbers in 2021 followed by an even stronger pattern in 2022.  Here is the story, the U.S. Limpkin population was largely confined to Florida until 2016. Limpkins largely consume freshwater snails and mollusks, and dumps of invasive Giant Apple Snails in Florida and Texas wetlands about 30 years ago set the stage for a range expansion and irruptions north and west.  At first Limpkins were slow to respond, but in the past two years a slew of states picked up their first state records.  In 2022 Wisconsin (three records: Racine, Dane, & Sheboygan), Iowa, Missouri, Kansas, Nebraska, New York, Indiana, and Kentucky all had their first state records.

The second new addition was Brown Booby.  Brown Booby has a long-standing pattern of vagrancy with records from Iowa (2015), Ontario (2013 & 2020), Indiana (2019), Ohio (2020), Missouri (2020 & 2022), and Nebraska (2017).  The Wisconsin bird was found near La Crosse and eventually wandered across the Mississippi River, providing Minnesota with its first record too.

Speaking of patterns of vagrancy, the range expansion and breeding of Black-bellied Whistling-Ducks have been covered in this space many times in the past.  With multiple records now expected annually they are not really worth featuring here.  However the eight records this year (high count of 25 in Dane Co.) provide context for the arrival of an even rarer species — Fulvous Whistling-Duck.  The push of Black-bellied Whistling-Ducks typically comes April–June.  This year’s May Dane County Fulvous Whistling-Duck record falls right in the middle of that span.  This was Wisconsin’s 2nd record— preceded by a 1989 record in Columbia County.  Relevant is an unusually northern breeding record for this species from Illinois — just south of St. Louis near the Mississippi River in 2019.

More than waterbirds arrived from the south — A photogenic Scissor-tailed Flycatcher showed well in Racine County in late April.  There were also records from Milwaukee and Price Counties.

October brought Wisconsin’s seventh Mexican Violetear.  This species has an affinity for Wisconsin, which makes sense for migrants with mirror-image misorientaion.  Only Texas has more records than Wisconsin and Arkansas also has seven records.

Western Birds in Wisconsin

Given our location in the middle of the continent and our decidedly eastern avifauna it is not surprising that a plurality of Wisconsin’s vagrants are western in origin.  So what western specialties showed up this year?

Legendarily unchaseable Black-billed Magpies lingered for most of the month of April in Bayfield County  What kept these birds from moving on?  On April 20 Ryan Brady discovered evidence of nest-building furnishing the easternmost breeding record in North America.

In a typical year we are lucky to get one Say’s Phoebe.  This year eBirders found four — Oconto, Dane, Milwaukee, and Dodge Counties.

In the 1800’s Long-billed Curlews were breeding birds on Wisconsin’s prairies.  Now they are exceptionally rare.  Below is this year’s Ashland County bird.  Previous 21st century records were 2018 (Portage) and 2008 (Juneau).

Ash-throated Flycatchers show up exclusively along Lake Michigan — at least so far.  Two of the state’s five records come from Wind Point in Racine (including this year’s).   The first four records were in a window from October–December.  This year’s Racine record was the first spring record (April).

Lark Bunting is becoming nearly annual.  This year there were four records (Bayfield, La Crosse, Milwaukee, and Ozaukee Counties).

Burnett County is attractive to western vagrants and Crex Meadows State Wildlife Area is especially magnetic.  This year the Lazuli Bunting pictured below was found visiting feeders at a private residence. Wisconsin has more than ten records of the western counterpart to Indigo Bunting.

May brought the 7th Wisconsin eBird record of Bullock’s Oriole.

A Cassin’s Kingbird was found in Marathon County.  This is Wisconsin’s third record and the first with media documentation.

Many birders got a look at this Glaucous-winged Gull during September’s Jaegerfest.  This is Wisconsin’s sixth record and the third for Wisconsin Point in Douglas County.

Lastly, a Prairie Falcon was observed in Iowa County during the Christmas Bird Count Season.

Northern/Arctic Birds in Wisconsin

This Ivory Gull spent time in Duluth and Superior at the start of the year.

Black-legged Kittiwakes are perhaps more pelagic than arctic.  This species is nearly annual along the Great Lakes.  2022 brought three records (Racine, Ozaukee & Grant Counties).  Notable was a new record high count this year of four in Grant County along Wisconsin’s “west coast” the Mississippi River.

Western Sandpiper is an arctic breeder that rarely visits our state.  It is also an identification challenge and potentially overlooked.  This year a breeding plumaged bird was found in Dane County (May) followed by a a non-breeding plumage bird (November in Manitowoc County) accompanying a Sharp-tailed Sandpiper!

Below is the Manitowoc County Western Sandpiper in non-breeding plumage with Dunlin.

A few notes on the identification of this bird.  It was identified from pictures after it departed with the help of shorebird expert Jon Dunn.  Western Sandpipers are most easily confused with Semipalmated Sandpiper.  Dunn noted that Semipalmated Sandpipers are very rarely seen in full basic plumage in North America in fall.  Other key field marks include:

• The bird’s fine, but distinct streaking on the breast
• The pale gray upper parts without brown tones
• The absence of a bold supercilium
• A bill that is not long, but thins on the lower mandible

Eurasian Birds in Wisconsin

Given Wisconsin’s placement in the middle of North America you might think Eurasian species would be exceedingly rare.  But that is not entirely true.  Highly migratory species cross over into the Western Hemisphere with some regularity and eventually find their way to Wisconsin.

Sharp-tailed Sandpiper is the more brightly colored Eastern Hemisphere counterpart to Pectoral Sandpiper.  Wisconsin picked up its second and third records in 2022 (Sauk & Manitowoc Counties).  Wisconsin’s first record came in 2018 (Dodge County).  The image below shows a Sharp-tailed Sandpiper (left) with Pectoral Sandpiper (right).

Wisconsin picked up its second Garganey in Jefferson County (April).  So how did this duck get here?  Spear, Lewis, Myres, and Pyle (available here) explain:

The pattern of Garganey sightings in continental North America suggests northward spring migration of birds that arrived in the Western Hemisphere in the fall or winter and became incorporated into North American flyways.  Although frequent occurrences of females with males in spring are well documented in the western Aleutians, the complete absence of records of females in continental North America in spring suggests that males are not arriving from normal wintering grounds, but instead are coming from extralimital wintering grounds were they have not had an opportunity to pair.  [T]rans-Atlantic flight is most frequent in species that, like the Garganey have a strong east-west component in fall migration.

Ruff are now found annually here.  Are they increasing?  Are birders getting better at finding them?  There are 20+ spring records in eBird (one in 2022 Rusk), but only six fall records.  Notably two of the six fall records came this year (Jefferson & Dodge Counties).

Black-headed Gull is common to abundant in Europe and routinely makes its way to the east coast.  Some of these birds travel west through the Great Lakes and occasionally make it to Wisconsin.  All but two of Wisconsin’s records come Lake Michigan.  The others (not surprisingly) come from Lake Superior and Lake Winnebago.

Slaty-backed Gull is increasingly being reported across North America with good numbers present year round in Alaska.  This year a single bird was found in Wisconsin (Dane County) after three were found in 2021.

Odds and Ends

Years ago when eBird and eBird maps were relatively new we used this space to highlight the northward push of Eurasian Tree Sparrows — hypothesizing their future as established residents in Wisconsin.  At the time Wisconsin was only picking up a handful of records each year.  After eight records last year this species took off in 2022 with 20+ records and likely many more hiding amongst flocks of House Sparrows in southern tier counties.

While the eBird maps are still a powerful tool for understanding species distribution, other this raw data is now being packaged into more sophisticated products.  The eBird Status and Trends:

Uses state-of-the-art statistical models and machine learning to build visualizations and tools to help decision makers, scientists, and birders alike to better understand migration, abundance patterns, range boundaries, and much more. The team compiles raw eBird data (the when and where people report birds) and high-resolution satellite imagery from NASA, NOAA, and USGS into cutting-edge statistical models to predict population trends and to predict when, where, and in what numbers species occur every week of the year.

Below is the trend map for Eurasian Tree Sparrow.  Blue indicates a population increase and red indicates a decrease.  Interestingly Eurasian Tree Sparrows appear to be declining on the southeastern edge of their range as they push further north into Iowa, Minnesota, Illinois, and Wisconsin.

Years ago we were able to track the movements of Eurasian Tree Sparrows using public data crowd-sourced from birders across the Midwest.  Until recently this was not true for all introduced/exotic species.  Escapees were typically hidden from public outputs barring significant signs that they were on a path to becoming established.  Also birders would often omit “uncountable” species from their lists because it would throw off their totals.

The new exotic species update in eBird makes significant changes to how these species are handled.  Want to learn more?  Check here and here.

The Numbers

2022 Species by County

 

2022 Checklists by County

 

The Birders

Top County Totals – 2022 Species (Threshold 200):

In 2022, 148(!) birders matched or exceeded the 200 species threshold.  This surpasses the previous high of 128 set in 2020.  As always Dane County dominates the chart occupying 57 of the slots.  The all time high in the eBird era is Neil Gilbert’s 286 species in Dane County (2020).  Well done county eBirders! Congratulations to Jeremy Meyer for topping this year’s list.

 

 

The 2022 Wisconsin Local Patch Challenge

In 2022, 16 birders surpassed the 200 species threshold in their home-centered patches.  This is the highest total in the short history of the Patch challenge.  The previous high was 14 in 2020.

For the uninitiated the Wisconsin Local Patch Challenge is a way to standardize patch birding.  Each patch listed is a 7.5 mile radius circle (or smaller) centered at the birder’s home.  Congratulations to Cynthia Bridge for the year’s highest total!

Below are the 2022 Wisconsin Local Patch Challenge Participants and their year totals (threshold 150 species):

Errors and omissions are unintentional.  Corrections are welcome.  Data was pulled on 12/31/2022 12:45PM.

Aaron Stutz

agstutz@sbcglobal.net