The BirdPage

If you have information about birds to share, please click on the following link to send the information to me via email, being sure to retain the subject line--Bird Information--and adding any further labeling to the subject line that seems appropriate:

sstedman@tntech.edu

 

 

Introduction

I acquired my interest in birds on my 10th birthday (November 2, 1958), became a serious lister at age 22.5 (May 5, 1971--cinco de mayo!), and metamorphosed into a serious birder--or avian naturalist--at age 37 (sometime in early 1986).  I look forward to the year when I can claim to be an amateur ornithologist.  Despite my best efforts during the past half century, I have been unable to extricate myself from the consequences of my obsession with birds, so they remain an important focal point in my life.

    You may access an up-to-date, online version of Birds of Putnam County, Tennessee (2nd edition), as well as about 100 preliminary species accounts for a planned, online version of Birds of the Upper Cumberland Region, via the links below:

    Some information and philosophical comments on the avocational pursuits of bird-watching, listing, and birding, as well as the vocational pursuit of ornithology, are provided at the following link:

    Some reasons for watching, counting, and studying birds are provided at the following link:

      I currently send out occasional email messages relating to birds in the Upper Cumberland Region of Kentucky and Tennessee; I refer to these as UCR Bird News messages.  In the past I have sent out weekly messages known as BIRDFOLK messages. If you think you might like to receive the current, occasional version of these UCR-related messages, click below to see what you need to do to be included in the list of those receiving them:

 

Annual Birding Events

The year's next major birding events are the Fall Bird Counts, county-wide surveys that usually take place on Saturdays from mid-September to early October.  Click on the link below to access the central node for this event:

    The year's most recent major birding event involved the 2009 UCR Forays, which took place on long "week-ends" during late May and early June. Pickett and Jackson counties, TN, and Clinton County, KY, were the target counties this year. Click on the following item to access a page where you can learn more about this birding event:

       Christmas Bird Counts (CBCs) are one of my favorite bird-monitoring activities.  I began taking part in CBCs during the 1971-1972 CBC season.  As of the the most recent CBC season (2008-2009), I have participated in 132 CBCs (counting only those submitted to the bi-continental database).  CBCs are currently conducted annually in ten counties of the Upper Cumberland Region each winter; in the past CBCs have also been conducted in at least two other counties of the Region; and Christmas BirdBlitzes (CBBs)--one-time, not annual,  events--have been conducted in one additional Regional county. To access the Central Node for CBCs/CBBs conducted Regionally, as well as for other information relating to CBCs/CBBs, click on the link below:

    Regional results of a modified version of the Great Backyard Bird Count (GBBC)--most recently conducted 13-16 February 2009--since 2003 and information about the related Rusty Blackbird Blitz may be accessed by clicking on the appropriate link below:

    Spring Bird Counts (SBCs) or Spring BirdBlitzes (SBBs) have been conducted in fifteen counties of the Upper Cumberland Region.  To access a page with links to results of SBCs and SBBs conducted Regionally in years past,  click on the link below:

    An Upper Cumberland Region Foray (UCR Foray) is a bird-monitoring effort designed to document the breeding status, the distribution, and, if possible, the abundance of all species breeding within a single county.  The 2007 UCR Foray took place in White County, TN, during Memorial Day week-end (25-28 May); results of the 2007 UCR Foray are especially interesting as they may be compared to results of a TOS Foray conducted in White County a quarter century earlier (28-31 May 1982).  The 2008 UCR Foray took place in DeKalb County, TN, also during Memorial Day week-end (23-26 May). Jackson County, Pickett County, and Clinton County were the target counties for the 2009 UCR Forays; results of the UCR Foray in Pickett County are most interesting as they may be compared to results of a TOS Foray in that county in 1979.  Cumberland County, TN, is one of the target counties for the 2010 UCR Forays; a TOS Foray (results of which are mostly unavailable) was conducted in that county during 1985.  One of the target counties for the 2011 UCR Forays will probably be Overton County, since there was a TOS Foray in that county a quarter century earlier (1986), and one of the target counties for the 2012 UCR Forays will probably be Bledsoe County, since a TOS Foray was conducted in that county a quarter century earlier (1987).    To access more information about UCR Forays, click on the following link:

    The Breeding Bird Survey (BBS) is another of my favorite bird-monitoring activities.  As of 2008, I have conducted 216 BBSs (132 in TN; 77 in KY; 4 in FL; and 3 in WV) for the federal program and many others for various federal agencies. Three of the federal BBSs I run each year are located in Tennessee and four in Kentucky.  Here are links to the national BBS website and to BBS data for the Upper Cumberland Region:

    Fall Bird Counts (FBCs) or Fall BirdBlitzes (FBBs) have thus far been conducted in seven counties of the UCR--Clinton and Cumberland counties, Kentucky, and Macon, Morgan, Pickett, Putnam, and White counties, Tennessee.  To access a page with links to results of such counts conducted Regionally,  click on the link below:

    Directions and a form for conducting a Thanksgiving Window Watch may be found at the link below:

 

Regional Bird-Related Projects

ParkWatch is a bird project initiated during January 2005.  If you do any birding in a park or other public access birding site within the Upper Cumberland Region, please consider taking part in this project.  For details, click on this link:

    Until recently, the proportions of the color morphs of the Eastern Screech-Owl within the Upper Cumberland Region were not precisely known; however, the Eastern Screech-Owl Morph Project was initiated during November 2004 to change this condition, and this project has been successful in providing preliminary data about this matter.  If you encounter road-killed screech-owls and if you are willing to classify their color morph, as well as provide a few other data about them and, most importantly, take photographs, then you can help update and make still more precise information about the color morphs of the Regional screech-owl population.  Information about the results of this ongoing project is archived at the following page of this website:

       If you watch birds carefully in your own yard or neighborhood, you might be interested in the results of YardWatch, an informal bird project focused on birds of yards and neighborhoods within the Upper Cumberland Region during 2003 and 2004; this project may be resuscitated at some point in the future.  Details are available via this link:

 

Upper Cumberland Region Bird-Related Data

The Upper Cumberland Region (UCR) of Kentucky and Tennessee now holds most of my attention, as far as field work with birds is concerned.  To access a list of the counties comprising this diverse yet distinct Region, as well as check-lists of birds recorded in all UCR counties and gazetteers describing public access birding sites in many UCR counties, click below:

    Creating a check-list of birds recorded in the UCR was a goal I fulfilled in December 2001. Click on the following item to see the most recent version of the list, which includes a link to a page describing the abundance and status of all species occurring Regionally (this page in turn includes links to preliminary species accounts for many rare birds in the Region):

    An preliminary assessment of the current status of bird-monitoring in the UCR may be accessed via the link below:

    Upper Cumberland Region Bird Reports summarize ornithological events of major or minor significance around the Region for various seasons.  To access a page with links to reports for all seasons since the beginning of the third millennium (Winter 2000-2001), click below:

    For links to pages that provide arrival and departure dates for migrant birds in the UCR for migration seasons since spring 2001, click below:

    A bibliography relating to Upper Cumberland ornithology is accessible below:

 

Personal Birding Projects

In April 2003, Barbara Stedman and I began visits to eight National Park Service units located in the Appalachian Highlands and the Cumberland Piedmont to inventory the birds at these sites under contract with the NPS.  Field work for these inventories ended in July 2006 (or sooner), but production of final reports of the results of these inventories continued until August 2007.  Final reports of these inventories may be viewed by clicking on the following link:

    I've spent several thousand hours during several hundred trips recording birds in the Big South Fork National River and Recreation Area in south-central Kentucky and north-central Tennessee; my wife, Barbara, has done much the same in the Obed Wild and Scenic River; click on the link below to see some of the results of our bird-monitoring efforts in these parks:

    I've recorded birds (and butterflies) on some sections of Cumberland Trail State Park; preliminary results are summarized at the following link:

    Horned Grebes (HOGR) are one of my favorite birds to study.  I especially like to follow the activities of HOGRs in the wintering flock at the Floating Mill Recreation Area on Center Hill Lake, DeKalb County, Tennessee.  Some data about numbers of  HOGRs in this flock since 1993 can be accessed at the link below:

    The Cerulean Warbler (CERW) is a songbird with a population number that is decreasing.  This warbler might be placed on the list of endangered species if its population decrease continues.  Using a nonstandard survey protocol, I monitor a population of CERWs in Frozen Head State Natural Area, Morgan County, Tennessee, each year . Click on the first item below if you want to see the results of this survey.  In addition I began monitoring a population of Cerulean Warblers in Putnam County, Tennessee, in 2004; to see results of the survey, also conducted using a nonstandard protocol, click on the second item below.  My wife, Barbara Stedman, conducts a BBS in the Daniel Boone N. F. in Pulaski Co., KY; click on the third item for results of this BBS.  I formerly conducted a breeding bird survey in the Daniel Boone National Forest in an area where there is a dense population of CERWs; this route starts in Whitley County, Kentucky, and ends in McCreary County, Kentucky; click on the last item below if you want to see the results of this BBS, including data for CERW. The first and second of these sources of data reveal a depressing trend in CERW numbers.

    In May of most years, Barb and I teach a course about birdsong identification for personnel with various state and/or federal agencies.  The latest course, for personnel working for the Daniel Boone National Forest and the Kentucky Department of Fish and Wildlife Resources (KDFWR), was taught May 12-16, 2008; Cumberland Falls State Park was the site from which field trips for this course began.  You may see a list of species heard and/or seen during the May 2008 course--conducted at Cumberland Falls State Resort Park and the Daniel Boone National Forest--at the 1st link below, and you may see a list of species heard and/or seen during the May 2007 course--conducted for the KDFWR at Barren River Lake State Resort Park (and Mammoth Cave National Park) May 7-10, 2007--at the 2nd link below (the other two links provide descriptions of the songs and calls of species breeding in Kentucky [3rd link] or of warblers breeding in or migrating through [4th link] Kentucky):

       I occasionally teach non-credit courses about bird identification through the TTU School of Interdisciplinary Studies and Extended Education.  Information about such classes is provided at these links:

    A personal bibliography of my ornithological publications is accessible below:

 

Selecting a Bird Field Guide

Proper identification of birds is one of the major goals of birders and birdwatchers.  Usually, at least one field guide to birds needs to be consulted to make or to confirm an identification of a bird.  Here is a link to a page that provides details about the various field guides available to birders living in the eastern part of North America:

 

Documenting Bird Records

Once you have observed and properly identified a bird, documentation of its presence is your next obligation.  Details about how to accomplish this task may be found in many sources, including the following one:

          Stedman, S. J., and J. C. Robinson. 1987. Documentation and submission of bird records in
                  Tennessee. Migrant 58 (3): 65-79.

You may view an online copy of this article via a link at this page of the TOS website:

   Basic information about a sighting of a common bird can be placed on a field card for permanent storage.  More detailed information about a sighting of a rare bird should be recorded on a special form designed for the purpose, an example of which may be found at the following link:

    A good way to ensure that your bird data are available to future birders and ornithologists is to archive them using eBird.  For details about this important birding resource, click on this link:

 

Cane Creek Park Birdwalks

Each Wednesday morning during the academic year at Tennessee Tech--from late August to late November and from late January to late April--I conduct a birdwalk for 2-3 hours, usually at a site where bird data need to be collected.  Most birdwalks in the past have been conducted at Cane Creek Park (CCP) in Cookeville; a few birdwalks have been conducted at other sites including Ensor Sink Natural Area in Cookeville and Dillon Pond in Livingston.  The primary purpose of these birdwalks is to gather data about the bird populations at the sites where the birdwalks take place.  However, a secondary purpose of the birdwalks is to improve the birding skills of those who take part in them.  If you wish to join me for these walks, arrive at the designated site for the birdwalk a little before 7:00 A.M. (CDT/CST).  If the weather allows, we will conduct the birdwalk; if inclement weather threatens, the birdwalk may be shortened or even canceled.   Please make no attempts to change the time of these walks, the direction of the walks, or the duration of the walks, as these factors affect the comparability of the resulting data. And please keep non-bird-related chatter to a minimum. Fall 2007 birdwalks commenced September 19 at the Merle Osborn Nature Preserve (MONP), a fairly new public access birding site in Putnam County where an effort to gather bird data was much needed; fall 2007 birdwalks at MONP continued until November 28.  Spring 2008 birdwalks were conducted at Cane Creek Park beginning January 30 and ending April 23 except for March 5 (spring break) when there was no birdwalk; Spring 2008 birdwalks focused on finding evidence of breeding in preparation for the DeKalb County Foray (conducted during late May 2008).  Note: Due to the press of many obligations, I suspended all Fall 2008 birdwalks at CCP; in the event that my life gets less obligated, birdwalks at CCP may resume in late March 2009, as part of preparations for the 2009 UCR Forays.

 

This web site was maintained and by Stephen J. Stedman.