?

?

I was fortunate to have observed one species that may go extinct if man does not intervene, the?Hooded Grebe.? The population has decreased by 80% in the past few years due in part to their breeding lakes drying likely from Global warming. The population stands at 700 individuals, most of which nest on the Strobel Plateau of Patagonia, a relatively small area. The 700 birds remaining only produced 1 chick last year. Though possibly a cycle, the weed that normally reaches the surface of the lakes upon which the grebe nests is not surfacing. Researchers have developed an artificial platform upon which they place the weed and some birds are using these with copulation noted this year. The population has begun to rise at some 2%.?

?

I met these researchers and they are very dedicated. Rainbow trout were introduced into many lakes for sportsmen who pay $1000 a night to fish because with the rich food source they can grow to 35 pounds. However, the fish consume much of the food the grebes require, The team are dragging nets to remove them but this is slow?going?and money is needed to fund better methods. Introduced Mink kill grebes and can take several at a time because historically the grebes have never had land predators and are unwarry. The mink too are slowly being eradicated with one of the researchers having?trained dogs to kill them.

?

I encourage those who can donate to this cause to do so. The link on top leads to a donation request.

?

Keith Taylor

Victoria BC

On Jan 31, 2024, at 23:47, Derek Matthews <Derek@...> wrote:

Just to add Dan that 30 years ago, tens of MILLIONS of white-rumped vultures were flying the skies of Asia – it was the most abundant large bird of prey in the world and, as you say, White-rumped vulture populations have declined by 99.9 per cent since 1992 and are now on the brink of extinction. And that has had an impact on humans too with increases in diseases like Tuberculosis, anthrax and foot-and-mouth diseases. But what is worse is that despite alternative safe drugs being readily available, Diclofenac has been authorized for use in domestic animals in Spain (where 80% of all European vultures are found) and is now becoming widely available on the EU market!

Derek

Derek Matthews - VARC

-----Original Message-----
From: [email protected] <[email protected]> On Behalf Of Daniel Bastaja
Sent: January 31, 2024 1:45 PM
To: Vanbirds <[email protected]>
Subject: [vanbcbirds] Vultures

Not exactly about BC birds, but a great article in this week’s New Yorker magazine about the fight to save South Asia’s vultures. Like many New Yorker feature articles, it is a bit long, but very interesting.

As many of you are aware, many vulture populations in Asia suffered 99% population declines. .. one of the sharper bird population declines in history. Some species went from too numerous to count to critically endangered in a matter of a decade or so. All because of the use of diclofenac. Another tragic example of how nature is being devastated by man’s activities.

Anyway, I hope this link works. :)



Daniel Bastaja
danielbastaja@... <mailto:danielbastaja@...>

On Jan 31, 2024, at 23:47, Derek Matthews <Derek@...> wrote:

Just to add Dan that 30 years ago, tens of MILLIONS of white-rumped vultures were flying the skies of Asia – it was the most abundant large bird of prey in the world and, as you say, White-rumped vulture populations have declined by 99.9 per cent since 1992 and are now on the brink of extinction. And that has had an impact on humans too with increases in diseases like Tuberculosis, anthrax and foot-and-mouth diseases. But what is worse is that despite alternative safe drugs being readily available, Diclofenac has been authorized for use in domestic animals in Spain (where 80% of all European vultures are found) and is now becoming widely available on the EU market!

Derek

Derek Matthews - VARC

-----Original Message-----
From: [email protected] <[email protected]> On Behalf Of Daniel Bastaja
Sent: January 31, 2024 1:45 PM
To: Vanbirds <[email protected]>
Subject: [vanbcbirds] Vultures

Not exactly about BC birds, but a great article in this week’s New Yorker magazine about the fight to save South Asia’s vultures. Like many New Yorker feature articles, it is a bit long, but very interesting.

As many of you are aware, many vulture populations in Asia suffered 99% population declines. .. one of the sharper bird population declines in history. Some species went from too numerous to count to critically endangered in a matter of a decade or so. All because of the use of diclofenac. Another tragic example of how nature is being devastated by man’s activities.

Anyway, I hope this link works. :)



Daniel Bastaja
danielbastaja@... <mailto:danielbastaja@...>

On Jan 29, 2024, at 18:04, Derek Matthews <derek@...> wrote:

Fabulous Pamela – I hope the film can shame Chase Bank (and other building managers) in to turning off lights at night during migration and treating windows to prevent window strikes. It still amazes me that despite films like these that clearly touch people deeply, that we continue to ignore the plight of our birds, and don’t adopt simple practices to prevent the deaths of millions of them each year!
Thanks for sharing!
Derek
Derek Matthews – VARC
From: [email protected] <[email protected]> On Behalf Of Pamela Zevit via groups.io
Sent: January 29, 2024 8:41 AM
To: Vancouver Birds list ([email protected]) <[email protected]>
Subject: [vanbcbirds] Film short on Purple Martins
Gorgeous short from Emergence Magazine on the annual migration roost of purple martins in Austin Texas. Reflecting on the martins we have here on the South Coast and what it would be like to experience such a large aggregation. This film is great in showing how birds can link community and people from different walks of life, issues on bird-friendly design, inner city habitat etc.
“Stumbling across thousands of purple martins circling above a strip mall parking lot in his neighborhood in Austin, Texas, filmmaker Henry Davis was struck by the apparent incongruence of the birds’ intricate patterning with the shopping center’s monuments to modernity, commerce, and excess. Henry returned with his camera over the following week, joining the patchworked community—shoppers, employees, passersby, and avid birdwatchers alike—who gathered to bear witness to the birds’ spellbinding presence. The resulting film, premiering online this week, is a mosaic of funny, sorrowful, and contemplative moments: a fleeting convergence that reveals the deeper entwinement of everyday human life with the creatures who inhabit the Earth alongside us.”

Pamela Zevit RPBio | Biodiversity Conservation Planner
<image001.png> T 604.590.7254 Check out how we are conserving biodiversity in Surrey
As a second generation settler, I am a privileged guest working on the shared traditional lands (tém:éxw) of the s?myám? (Semiahmoo), q??c?iy?a?? (Katzie), K?ik?????m (Kwikwetlem), q??ɑ:n????n? (Kwantlen), Qiqéyt (Qayqayt), Sc??waθ?n (Tsawwassen) and x?m?θk??y??m (Musqueam).
<image004.png>

?

Gorgeous short from Emergence Magazine on the annual migration roost of purple martins in Austin Texas. Reflecting on the martins we have here on the South Coast and what it would be like to experience such a large aggregation. This film is great in showing how birds can link community and people from different walks of life, issues on bird-friendly design, inner city habitat etc.

?

“Stumbling across thousands of purple martins circling above a strip mall parking lot in his neighborhood in Austin, Texas, filmmaker Henry Davis was struck by the apparent incongruence of the birds’ intricate patterning with the shopping center’s monuments to modernity, commerce, and excess. Henry returned with his camera over the following week, joining the patchworked community—shoppers, employees, passersby, and avid birdwatchers alike—who gathered to bear witness to the birds’ spellbinding presence. The resulting film, premiering online this week, is a mosaic of funny, sorrowful, and contemplative moments: a fleeting convergence that reveals the deeper entwinement of everyday human life with the creatures who inhabit the Earth alongside us.”

?

?

Pamela Zevit RPBio | Biodiversity Conservation Planner

?

T 604.590.7254

As a second generation settler, I am a privileged guest working on the shared traditional lands (tém:éxw) of the s?myám? (Semiahmoo), q??c?iy?a?? (Katzie), K?ik?????m (Kwikwetlem), q??ɑ:n????n? (Kwantlen), Qiqéyt (Qayqayt), Sc??waθ?n (Tsawwassen) and x?m?θk??y??m (Musqueam).

?

?

On Jan 22, 2024, at 19:15, Derek Matthews <Derek@...> wrote:

Thanks Dan - yeah, it was pretty epic!

Thought you might like the penguin video I made in the Falklands and South Georgia - my new favourite family of birds! :o)



Take care.

Derek

-----Original Message-----
From: [email protected] <[email protected]> On Behalf Of Daniel Bastaja
Sent: January 21, 2024 11:12 PM
To: Vanbirds <[email protected]>
Subject: Re: [vanbcbirds] Birding Chile, Antarctica, South Georgia & The Falkland Islands

Derek… all I can say is WOW! What a trip! Incredible photos too! It’s like something out of a National Geographic documentary. Love the Sheathbill and the Giant Petrels.. they are such a beast!

Daniel Bastaja
danielbastaja@...

On Jan 19, 2024, at 23:36, Derek Matthews <derek@...> wrote:

Birding Chile, Antarctica, South Georgia & The Falkland Islands We
have just returned from a 6-week birding trip to Chile, Antarctica, South Georgia & The Falkland Islands.
Chile section:
Our travels took us from Vancouver to Santiago, where we met our good friend and bird guide Julian Vidóz and then flew up to Arica and drove to Putre to look for the high-altitude species in the high Andes.
From there we drove back down to Arica to bird the coastal area at Calleta Vitor and the Chaca Valley. We then flew back down to Santiago and drove up to the Fallerones ski area and valley in the Andes for several specific species and from there we drove to Concepción in south-central Chile.
We left Julian at Torres del Paine so he could spend a few days over Christmas with his family, which did not stop us from birding on Christmas Day when we found a spectacular life bird – the near-threatened and shy Spectacled Duck! Not many people can say they had a duck for their Christmas present as opposed to their Christmas lunch! We met up with Julian again at Torres del Paine and made our way to Punta Arenas and across the border into Tierra del Fuego province in Argentina and down to Ushuaia to board the boat for the Falkland Islands, South Georgia and on to the Antarctic peninsula! Some of the highlights of the Chile section of the trip were:

? Searching for the near threatened Diademed sandpiper-plover which Carol almost didn’t make as she had really bad altitude sickness – we’d been up in the high Andes for two days at 15,000+ feet and on the first day we had to bring her down as she thought she was dying. Still, that didn’t deter us from going back up the following morning at 6 am, and after a hike UP another few hundred feet to a bog area Julian had scoped out in November, we got it! As I said to Carol if you must die birding, at least let it be for a bird like this!!
? The next was for Chilean Woodstar, the critically endangered endemic hummingbird with fewer than 50 remaining in two tiny fragments of habitat in the Chaca valley.
? Searching the vast high Andes plains at Putre for Puna Tinamou – perhaps the ultimate needle in a haystack but we got it!
? A pelagic feeding frenzy at Calleta Vitor where we found a deserted beach on the coast with a feeding frenzy of thousands of Gray and Franklin’s gulls, Peruvian boobies, Elegant terns, Peruvian pelicans, Red-legged and Guanay cormorants, Black skimmers and South American sealions all competing for food – to be there on the beach amidst it all was magical!
? And a special day on Chiloe Island when fabulous views of Flightless Steamer Duck finally took our life list to 6,000 species which we had seemed to be inching towards forever!
Antarctica, South Georgia & The Falkland Islands section:
“Glittering white, shining blue, raven black, in the light of the sun the land looks like a fairy tale. Pinnacle after pinnacle, peak after peak – crevassed, wild as any land on our globe, it lies unseen and untrodden”
-- Captain Roald Amundsen, 1911
Amundsen offered his description of Antarctica over a century ago but the superlatives still apply today and no one who goes to Antarctica can be untouched by its raw wilderness and exquisite natural beauty. The legendary wildlife still flourishes and during the austral summer, seals, whales, countless penguins, and other pelagic birds flock to the Southern Ocean to feed on the huge schools of krill, the vital link in the Antarctic food chain.
With stunning scenery surrounded by rocky headlands and snow-capped mountains with thousands of seabirds around us; penguins, albatrosses, giant-petrels, petrels and diving petrels, shearwaters and skuas. In the Falklands we visited a colony of Southern Rockhopper Penguins and Black-browed Albatross. South Georgia was another highlight where we wandered among thousands of King Penguins and visited a colony of Macaroni Penguins. And on reaching the Antarctic Peninsula visiting a colony of more than a million Adelie Penguins on Danger Island, taking our penguin species list to 9 for the trip, and watching feeding frenzies of seabirds among pods of orcas and feeding humpback whales.
The pelagic birding in these southern waters is among the best in the world with 6 species of albatross, several species of prions, storm-petrels, diving-petrels, and shearwaters. It really was the trip of a lifetime!
We finished the entire trip with 301 species of which 121 were new
for us. For anyone interested in photos and videos of the birds we
saw, they can be seen by visiting the VARC Fb page:

We will post the full trip report on our birding website (www.worldbirdtraveler.com) with information on the itinerary, accommodations, guides, and bird lists etc., and, as always, we will be happy to help and provide more information and advice for anyone thinking of planning a trip there.
Happy 2024 birding to you all!
Derek<image003.png>
Derek J. Matthews
Chairman, Director Communication
NABC Certified Trainer
Vancouver Avian Research Centre
Registered Canadian Charity #82118 2656 RR0001 4115, East Braemar
Road, North Vancouver, BC, V7K 3C9
T: (604) 218-1191
E: Derek@...
W: www.birdvancouver.com

On Jan 19, 2024, at 23:36, Derek Matthews <derek@...> wrote:

Birding Chile, Antarctica, South Georgia & The Falkland Islands We
have just returned from a 6-week birding trip to Chile, Antarctica, South Georgia & The Falkland Islands.
Chile section:
Our travels took us from Vancouver to Santiago, where we met our good friend and bird guide Julian Vidóz and then flew up to Arica and drove to Putre to look for the high-altitude species in the high Andes.
From there we drove back down to Arica to bird the coastal area at Calleta Vitor and the Chaca Valley. We then flew back down to Santiago and drove up to the Fallerones ski area and valley in the Andes for several specific species and from there we drove to Concepción in south-central Chile.
We left Julian at Torres del Paine so he could spend a few days over Christmas with his family, which did not stop us from birding on Christmas Day when we found a spectacular life bird – the near-threatened and shy Spectacled Duck! Not many people can say they had a duck for their Christmas present as opposed to their Christmas lunch! We met up with Julian again at Torres del Paine and made our way to Punta Arenas and across the border into Tierra del Fuego province in Argentina and down to Ushuaia to board the boat for the Falkland Islands, South Georgia and on to the Antarctic peninsula! Some of the highlights of the Chile section of the trip were:

? Searching for the near threatened Diademed sandpiper-plover which Carol almost didn’t make as she had really bad altitude sickness – we’d been up in the high Andes for two days at 15,000+ feet and on the first day we had to bring her down as she thought she was dying. Still, that didn’t deter us from going back up the following morning at 6 am, and after a hike UP another few hundred feet to a bog area Julian had scoped out in November, we got it! As I said to Carol if you must die birding, at least let it be for a bird like this!!
? The next was for Chilean Woodstar, the critically endangered endemic hummingbird with fewer than 50 remaining in two tiny fragments of habitat in the Chaca valley.
? Searching the vast high Andes plains at Putre for Puna Tinamou – perhaps the ultimate needle in a haystack but we got it!
? A pelagic feeding frenzy at Calleta Vitor where we found a deserted beach on the coast with a feeding frenzy of thousands of Gray and Franklin’s gulls, Peruvian boobies, Elegant terns, Peruvian pelicans, Red-legged and Guanay cormorants, Black skimmers and South American sealions all competing for food – to be there on the beach amidst it all was magical!
? And a special day on Chiloe Island when fabulous views of Flightless Steamer Duck finally took our life list to 6,000 species which we had seemed to be inching towards forever!
Antarctica, South Georgia & The Falkland Islands section:
“Glittering white, shining blue, raven black, in the light of the sun the land looks like a fairy tale. Pinnacle after pinnacle, peak after peak – crevassed, wild as any land on our globe, it lies unseen and untrodden”
-- Captain Roald Amundsen, 1911
Amundsen offered his description of Antarctica over a century ago but the superlatives still apply today and no one who goes to Antarctica can be untouched by its raw wilderness and exquisite natural beauty. The legendary wildlife still flourishes and during the austral summer, seals, whales, countless penguins, and other pelagic birds flock to the Southern Ocean to feed on the huge schools of krill, the vital link in the Antarctic food chain.
With stunning scenery surrounded by rocky headlands and snow-capped mountains with thousands of seabirds around us; penguins, albatrosses, giant-petrels, petrels and diving petrels, shearwaters and skuas. In the Falklands we visited a colony of Southern Rockhopper Penguins and Black-browed Albatross. South Georgia was another highlight where we wandered among thousands of King Penguins and visited a colony of Macaroni Penguins. And on reaching the Antarctic Peninsula visiting a colony of more than a million Adelie Penguins on Danger Island, taking our penguin species list to 9 for the trip, and watching feeding frenzies of seabirds among pods of orcas and feeding humpback whales.
The pelagic birding in these southern waters is among the best in the world with 6 species of albatross, several species of prions, storm-petrels, diving-petrels, and shearwaters. It really was the trip of a lifetime!
We finished the entire trip with 301 species of which 121 were new
for us. For anyone interested in photos and videos of the birds we
saw, they can be seen by visiting the VARC Fb page:

We will post the full trip report on our birding website (www.worldbirdtraveler.com) with information on the itinerary, accommodations, guides, and bird lists etc., and, as always, we will be happy to help and provide more information and advice for anyone thinking of planning a trip there.
Happy 2024 birding to you all!
Derek<image003.png>
Derek J. Matthews
Chairman, Director Communication
NABC Certified Trainer
Vancouver Avian Research Centre
Registered Canadian Charity #82118 2656 RR0001 4115, East Braemar
Road, North Vancouver, BC, V7K 3C9
T: (604) 218-1191
E: Derek@...
W: www.birdvancouver.com

On Jan 19, 2024, at 23:36, Derek Matthews <derek@...> wrote:

Birding Chile, Antarctica, South Georgia & The Falkland Islands
We have just returned from a 6-week birding trip to Chile, Antarctica, South Georgia & The Falkland Islands.
Chile section:
Our travels took us from Vancouver to Santiago, where we met our good friend and bird guide Julian Vidóz and then flew up to Arica and drove to Putre to look for the high-altitude species in the high Andes.
From there we drove back down to Arica to bird the coastal area at Calleta Vitor and the Chaca Valley. We then flew back down to Santiago and drove up to the Fallerones ski area and valley in the Andes for several specific species and from there we drove to Concepción in south-central Chile.
We left Julian at Torres del Paine so he could spend a few days over Christmas with his family, which did not stop us from birding on Christmas Day when we found a spectacular life bird – the near-threatened and shy Spectacled Duck! Not many people can say they had a duck for their Christmas present as opposed to their Christmas lunch! We met up with Julian again at Torres del Paine and made our way to Punta Arenas and across the border into Tierra del Fuego province in Argentina and down to Ushuaia to board the boat for the Falkland Islands, South Georgia and on to the Antarctic peninsula! Some of the highlights of the Chile section of the trip were:

? Searching for the near threatened Diademed sandpiper-plover which Carol almost didn’t make as she had really bad altitude sickness – we’d been up in the high Andes for two days at 15,000+ feet and on the first day we had to bring her down as she thought she was dying. Still, that didn’t deter us from going back up the following morning at 6 am, and after a hike UP another few hundred feet to a bog area Julian had scoped out in November, we got it! As I said to Carol if you must die birding, at least let it be for a bird like this!!
? The next was for Chilean Woodstar, the critically endangered endemic hummingbird with fewer than 50 remaining in two tiny fragments of habitat in the Chaca valley.
? Searching the vast high Andes plains at Putre for Puna Tinamou – perhaps the ultimate needle in a haystack but we got it!
? A pelagic feeding frenzy at Calleta Vitor where we found a deserted beach on the coast with a feeding frenzy of thousands of Gray and Franklin’s gulls, Peruvian boobies, Elegant terns, Peruvian pelicans, Red-legged and Guanay cormorants, Black skimmers and South American sealions all competing for food – to be there on the beach amidst it all was magical!
? And a special day on Chiloe Island when fabulous views of Flightless Steamer Duck finally took our life list to 6,000 species which we had seemed to be inching towards forever!
Antarctica, South Georgia & The Falkland Islands section:
“Glittering white, shining blue, raven black, in the light of the sun the land looks like a fairy tale. Pinnacle after pinnacle, peak after peak – crevassed, wild as any land on our globe, it lies unseen and untrodden”
-- Captain Roald Amundsen, 1911
Amundsen offered his description of Antarctica over a century ago but the superlatives still apply today and no one who goes to Antarctica can be untouched by its raw wilderness and exquisite natural beauty. The legendary wildlife still flourishes and during the austral summer, seals, whales, countless penguins, and other pelagic birds flock to the Southern Ocean to feed on the huge schools of krill, the vital link in the Antarctic food chain.
With stunning scenery surrounded by rocky headlands and snow-capped mountains with thousands of seabirds around us; penguins, albatrosses, giant-petrels, petrels and diving petrels, shearwaters and skuas. In the Falklands we visited a colony of Southern Rockhopper Penguins and Black-browed Albatross. South Georgia was another highlight where we wandered among thousands of King Penguins and visited a colony of Macaroni Penguins. And on reaching the Antarctic Peninsula visiting a colony of more than a million Adelie Penguins on Danger Island, taking our penguin species list to 9 for the trip, and watching feeding frenzies of seabirds among pods of orcas and feeding humpback whales.
The pelagic birding in these southern waters is among the best in the world with 6 species of albatross, several species of prions, storm-petrels, diving-petrels, and shearwaters. It really was the trip of a lifetime!
We finished the entire trip with 301 species of which 121 were new for us. For anyone interested in photos and videos of the birds we saw, they can be seen by visiting the VARC Fb page:
We will post the full trip report on our birding website (www.worldbirdtraveler.com) with information on the itinerary, accommodations, guides, and bird lists etc., and, as always, we will be happy to help and provide more information and advice for anyone thinking of planning a trip there.
Happy 2024 birding to you all!
Derek<image003.png>
Derek J. Matthews
Chairman, Director Communication
NABC Certified Trainer
Vancouver Avian Research Centre
Registered Canadian Charity #82118 2656 RR0001
4115, East Braemar Road, North Vancouver, BC, V7K 3C9
T: (604) 218-1191
E: Derek@...
W: www.birdvancouver.com

On Jan 15, 2024, at 5:45?PM, Kevin Neill <goshawk67@...> wrote:

?In what was the tightest race in years, up until this past weekend that is, we finally had a clear winner break out ahead for the win.??

Votes were nicely spread out between 12 different candidates this year, which is higher than usual, and an indication of just how many great birds were found this year.?

#1 with 29% of the votes - Pinyon Jay
#2 with 19% of the votes - Pallas's Bunting?
#3 with 12% of the votes - Summer Tanager?

So West Van's very obliging Jay wears the crown this year. Hopefully you got to see it. It's not too late if you haven't.?

2024 is already off to a decent start.?It feels like it may be a Gray Wagtail or a Tropicbird kind of year doesn't it?
It's good to have goals.?

Kevin Neill
Victoria, BC??