Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!cs.utexas.edu!rutgers!att!cbnewsk!king From: king@cbnewsk.ATT.COM (joyce.l.king) Newsgroups: rec.birds Subject: Re: Advice wanted on Florida Birding Summary: Yes, we like to think we "count" Message-ID: <1593@cbnewsk.ATT.COM> Date: 3 Dec 89 14:36:01 GMT References: Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories Lines: 37 > For example, do the Florida > Keys count, since they are not quite on the continent? I believe that YIKES! I certanly hope we count!!! Yes, Mark, I believe we do. The Florida Keys Wild Bird Rehabilitation Center has a lot of birding visitors, although I don't know how "ethical" it is to count a bird on your life list after you saw it in a hospital cage. Audubon thinks we count. They have two locations here on Key Largo (National Audubon). The Christmas bird count will be December 28. Groups will be dispersed throughout the mainland Keys and Florida Bay. When you visit, give me a call (305-852-7468) and I'll take you to the Center. If I am out of town (January promises to be a busy month), call Laura at the Center (305-852-4486) and get directions. Just tell her I told you to visit. That invitation is open to anyone coming to the Keys. If you bird by boat, please don't traipse around the uninhabited keys in Florida Bay. This is the beginning of nesting season for reddish egrets and roseatte spoonbills. They will leave the nest if you get too close. Since both populations are declining, we'd like to give them every chance to reproduce uninterrupted. Bring binoculars and sight them from a distance. We have a very large hawk population this winter...one of the largest in recent memory, according to the Audubon biologists. American kestrals are all over the place. We had peregrine flights numbering 200 or more during migration. A scarlet ibis has been seen around the upper Keys (Key Largo to Craig Key), and flamingoes (!) are in abundance on Snake Bight, although the book says they don't exist here. My sister's sea wall is regularly visited by a Wurdemann's heron (I bet that isn't on your list!) and my son works at a dive shop on the south end of Upper Matecumbe Key, where he has made "friends" with a sandhill crane. Most trips into the Everglades part of the Bay will cough up a bald eagle sighting or two. White pelicans are at Snake Bight and at Flamingo, in the Everglades. That's a sample. Come enjoy our birdlife. We are fighting to keep it. Joyce Andrews King (from the Florida Keys via modern communications)