I just got back late last night from a two week trip in Panama...blog-posts of the daily birding highlights will appear soon on my Panama birding blog. In the meantime, the Clement's World Checklist of Birds has just been updated (Version 6.9 can be found here) and I was keen to update my life list to reflect recent changes and my latest (2014) Canada, United States, and Panama ticks.
Since January 2014 I added 6 species to my Canada list, 10 species to my United States list, and 76 species to my Panama list. I lost one species (Green-crowned Woodnymph) off my Ecuador list due to the species being re-lumped to Crowned Woodnymph. Pine Warbler was my only Canadian lifer; the remaining five species were new ticks, but previously seen elsewhere. The best non-lifer Canadian tick was Laysan Albatross of the coast of Uclulet during a pelagic trip with Wild Research on 11 May 2014.
The 10 new additions to my United States list were made during a trip to Arizona from 28 March to 5 April. Of these 10 species, 7 were lifers and included Gray Flycatcher, Rufous-crowned Sparrow, Cordilleran Flycatcher, Gray Vireo, Rufous-winged Sparrow, Williamson's Sapsucker, Mexican Chickadee. Daily trip reports can be found on earlier postings of this blog, beginning here.
Updated list totals are posted to the right. The only outstanding records I need to review are those of the recently split Sage Sparrow into Bell's Sparrow and Sagebrush Sparrow. I am quite certain I have had both species, one in southern Arizona and one in coastal California; to be certain however, I need to go back through my field notes.
Finally, with all of the updates and additions (except for the Sage Sparrow split), my life list now stands at 1,439. With an upcoming trip to the United Kingdom and Morocco at Christmas, I may just be able to crack 1,500 species by the end of the year.
Until next time, happy birding.
