February thoughts on 200

I used to enjoy amateur astronomy more than I do. Don't get me wrong, when I'm out before dawn and see the Pleiades, or the Milky Way stretched across a dark sky, I'm still in awe. There's just a point at which you've seen most of what you're going to see - barring the purchase of a better telescope. 

With birding, you can find amazing birds, or miss fairly common ones, for reasons that have nothing to do with equipment. Time of year, time of day, weather, geography, and plain old experience/preparation can all play a part in whether or not you find a bird. So the Big Year (and I still hesitate to call these Big Years, but for want of a better term. . . ) involves a good bit of planning around all of these things; It makes it difficult to pin down predictions!

Nonetheless, I had a number I was looking at... like 207 or something, and that turned out to be off, because I'd totally left out raptors from that total, scrawled in a notebook. But still - it feels like 200 species for the year is likely going to be just within reach, or just out of reach. It's going to be 200 +/- 10, I think. 

A peek at my running tally and needs list shows what I've seen so far, and what I'm still missing. It doesn't really show where I am relative to expectations. The short answer is that I'm at 82 species, and had aimed to be at 88 for the year at this point. Based on the initial scribbling. . . 

Birds I hoped to have seen by now: 

1. Redhead - and I still believe this, but I'll cross paths with some Redheads, no worries
2. Long-tailed Duck - Darn. I was so optimistic about Lake Pateros, but never got there with the best of circumstances (see time of day, time of year, weather etc etc etc above)
3. Gray Partridge (the county is littered with sightings, but I've missed them. I'm hopeful... but the best two months to find them have passed)
4. Ring-necked Pheasant (should be fine, but wow)
5. Sharp-tailed Grouse (there are more chances coming, but this may be a miss in a year where they've dwindled)
6. Wilson's Snipe (that was optimistic, but the chances improve over time)
7. Gyrfalcon (more chances coming - tough bird!)
8. Prairie Falcon (I assumed up on the plateau, but I've missed em)
9. Say's Phoebe (again - just early optimism)
10. Mountain Chickadee (but they're not going anywhere)
11. Brown Creeper (I expected to get this one OR Pacific Wren in Jan, then the other one in February. I only picked up the Pacific Wren, but I think enough birding will turn up a creeper)
12. Bohemian Waxwing (awful winter for a code 2 bird. Maybe next winter?)
13. Pine Siskin (where are all the finches?)
14. Any other finch (I'd penciled in 4, assuming I'd find one other: Common Redpoll, Gray-crowned Rosy-Finch, Red Crossbill, but it hasn't been too finchy.
15. Lapland Longspur (better in the fall? we shall see)

Birds I was happily surprised to find

1. Tundra Swan - earlier than expected
2. Wild Turkey - I had just been hoping for that later, and in a different location
3. Peregrine Falcon - nice find in East Wenatchee
4. Merlin - interesting that every falcon except Kestrel did not go as planned. 
5. Cooper's Hawk - just picked up the hawks faster than expected. Accipiters can be hit or miss.
6. Hermit Thrush - fun find
7. American Dipper - I was happy that there was one hanging around predictably at Lincoln Rock

Some other ones. . . well, I was expecting either a Fox Sparrow OR a Golden-crowned, and got the former. So the real question, I guess is - have I likely missed any birds? Are there any birds I've found that I wasn't just expecting at a later time? 

I'd guess I could end up missing about three of the top list (just guessing BOWA, STGR, and GYRF), and only one of the bottom list was really unexpected (AMDI). So even if that's the case, I may still have a decent shot at 200 birds for the year. Focusing on some of those missing birds in March may be wise - March doesn't really have any birds unique to that window, with most species present either in advance of March or after. 

April and May should be crazy, and I'll find out how well, or how poorly I guessed on shorebirds! There are so many just passing through - I have this feeling that my guesses will be wildly optimistic on them. 

Does 200 matter? 

Oh gosh no. This may be a surprising response to that question, especially given the thought going into all of this! But, take Chelan County, just as an example. I thought 200 species would be almost possible there for a year, and I ended up a few species short. I loved that year. I am loving this year! The numbers just drive the exploration, help me to understand the habitat and the birds better, but at the end of the day. . .195? 202? These years would have very similar feels to them for me. 

Incidentally, the year list record for Douglas County is (sit down for this) 259 species. Only two birders have life lists in the county greater than that total! It's a bit mind-blowing. It's the kind of thing that makes me look at the maps, look at the lists of birds and wonder what's possible. It's the kind of thing that makes me wonder... "How the heck did they do that??". 

This year's feat will not be quite that amazing, but hopefully the methods will at least be transparent. I hope it expands people's ideas about what's possible in the county. Lord knows if anyone lived in a county (I don't live in Douglas), had any inclination for chasing birds at the drop of a hat (I so rarely ever do), and had some skill with identifying birds (I'm going to end up flat-footed on some birds for sure), they could make any of my "Big Years" look pretty small. Some people have! I count this as Mission Accomplished.