300th Life Bird!

Due to a busy schedule, I have not been out birding much nor have I been able to update my blog.  Since my last update, I have made one birding trip, and what a trip it was!

On the morning of the 19th, my dad gave me a call saying there was a Glossy Ibis at Stearn's Lake.  With the morning devoid of any plans, and my life list sitting at 299, I knew immediately what my morning was to ential.  So I made plans to meet my dad just before lunch at Stearn's Lake to track down the Ibis.  I made a quick trip to Walden Ponds to see if there were any good birds there and added American White Pelican and Cinnamon Teal to my year list.  The teal was the last of the three common North American teal species that was evading my year list.  Then I headed off to find my 300th lifer.

Upon arriving at Stearn's Lake, I quickly saw my first Swainson's Hawk of the year sitting on a post just off the road.  I met up with my dad who was parked just up the road from the parking lot at the pond just west of Stearn's Lake.  A bunch of American Avocet dotted the ponds surface, and after a quick scan, the Glossy Ibis was found! Lifer 300! While enjoying views of the ibis, I noticed what looked like part of the shoreline moving and realized I had just seen a shorebird.  After quickly consulting a field guide, we identified it as a Wilson's Snipe.  This was only my third sighting of the species and I was able to get excellent views of this year bird. A male Yellow Headed Blackbird added to the wonderful list of birds I was accumulating on the day. At Stearn's Lake, the first Western Grebes of the season were found.

In other birding news, I am hoping to get out again this week and start chasing down rare migrants and vagrants that are starting to pop up around the state.  I also got a new Kaufman Field Guide to Birds of North America as I lost my original one last month while birding at Baseline Reservoir in Boulder.

Here are a few pics from the 19th:

The Glossy Ibis.

An American Avocet. One of dozens around the pond.

The ibis foraging.

The ibis and a Green-winged Teal.

Lists, lists and more lists

We birders like to keep lists, and I am no exception.  I keep multiple lists myself, including but not limited to:
My all important Life List(ABA area)
My World List(species I've seen outside the ABA area)
A Yard List
A State List
as well as month lists, year lists, birding trip lists and vacation lists.

My Life List currently stands at 299 species.

I just found the bird list that my dad kept from our 2010 Hawaii trip and now I was finally able to create my World List! With 27 new species that I saw on the trip, my world list stands at 326.  My 300th World Bird was the Common Waxbill.  We saw a flock of 30+ on Oahu.  Other excellent birds we saw included: White Tern, Hawaiian Coot, Red-tailed Tropicbird(one of my all time favorite birds!), Hawaiian Stilt, a very uncommon if not rare Christmas Shearwater and Melodious Laughingthrush.  We were able to bird both the islands of Oahu and Maui.  Unfortunately, as I was not big into bird photography at the time, I do not have any pictures to post from the trip.  I do however have great memories.