10,000 Birds

NOVEMBER 30, 2014

There are two Painted Bunting populations, one that breeds along the Atlantic Coast from North Carolina to Florida and one that breeds in the interior United States and northern Mexico from southeastern New Mexico to western Mississippi. The Atlantic Coast population lingers on the breeding grounds after nesting to molt.

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Mississippi Mexico Alabama North Carolina 278

10,000 Birds

AUGUST 19, 2020

Northern Mockingbirds aren’t all that common in central Mexico, and for some reason, I rarely hear them sing here. Blue-black Grassquits are tiny birds, only four inches long, that are very common in subtropical savannah habitats from Mexico to Argentina. This male shows its full breeding color. Photo from Paso Ancho).

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Argentina Mexico California Breeding 263

10,000 Birds

AUGUST 14, 2013

” When we think of going birding in Mexico we often think about the colorful tropical species; Russet-crowned Motmot , Eared Quetzal , Black-throated Magpie-Jay …However, searching for rare and little understood species can perhaps be even more exciting and rewarding. Very little is known about this enigmatic species.

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South America San Diego Mexico America 239

10,000 Birds

AUGUST 19, 2022

Here in central Mexico, the winter season always seems to begin with the arrival of various members of the sandpiper family. I assume this is because so many of them breed in the Arctic and tundra regions, so their summer is much briefer than that of other birds. Let that be a lesson, to me. And when stilts party, they really party.

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Mexico Breeding California Groups 250

10,000 Birds

JULY 8, 2020

One of the ways I could describe the unique mix of birds I can see here in southwestern Mexico, would be to divide our species into five categories. We also have many species that we share with the rest of Mexico, Central America, and/or the southwest of the United States. You have to know where to look for them.

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Mexico Birds Honduras United States 260

10,000 Birds

JULY 12, 2024

As I have mentioned repeatedly over the past months, life this spring has gone topsy-turvy in central Mexico, as we experience what has certainly been one of our driest years in history. We had good sightings of a pair of Sulphur-bellied Flycatchers , one of central Mexico’s few summer-only migrants.

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Mexico South America 2020 America 246

10,000 Birds

MAY 21, 2012

The spill that keeps on giving – now petroleum compounds and the chemicals used to clean up the oil from BP’s massive spill two years ago in the Gulf of Mexico are showing up in eggs of breeding birds in Minnesota.

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Minnesota Eggs Mexico Birds 225

10,000 Birds

JUNE 24, 2020

The Yellow-green Vireo is another of those rare birds that winter in South America but only travels north as far as Mexico to breed. Three years ago, when I had the privilege of showing one of my favorite sites to Mexico’s top birder couple, they noticed a Yellow-green Vireo in the brush and pointed it out to me.

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Mexico Nicaragua Lamb Sparrows 264

10,000 Birds

AUGUST 4, 2021

Those infinitely patient saints who read all my ramblings know that over the past year I have been obsessed with the gradual disappearance of Mexico’s second-largest lake, Lake Cuitzeo, just north of my home city of Morelia. The good news is that this summer central Mexico is experiencing its best rains since 2018.

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San Francisco 2018 Mexico Ducks 264

10,000 Birds

FEBRUARY 15, 2024

Here in Mexico, I can almost always count on Black Vultures and Turkey Vultures to pad each outing’s list by two species. Occasionally I have been lucky enough to see Lesser Yellow-headed Vultures in tropical Mexico. Alas, although I was once a California boy, I have never seen a California Condor.

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California Condor Turkey Mexico Meat 246

10,000 Birds

APRIL 29, 2020

Both are beginning to show their reproductive plumage, which is a rare sight here in Mexico. But it was the Long-billed Dowitchers who were really rocking their breeding plumage. How on earth do they breed so quickly up north?) I leave you with a few of these images: This White-faced Ibis is also rocking its breeding plumage.

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Mexico Breeding Ducks North America 227

10,000 Birds

JULY 5, 2024

Sinaloa Martin By 2015, I had discovered the tiny town or Paso Ancho, Michoacán, as my nearest option for seeing the many endemics of Mexico’s Hot Country/ Tierra Caliente. Only on its way north in late spring does it stop at different points to rest and feed, mostly near the western shore of the Gulf of Mexico.

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Squirrels Mexico Kansas South America 246

10,000 Birds

MARCH 17, 2022

American White Pelicans spend their winter months along the Gulf states, California, parts of Arizona, and Mexico down into Central America. They migrate north through the Western United States, breeding in pockets all the way up through Canada.

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Pelicans United States Arizona Canada 264

10,000 Birds

FEBRUARY 24, 2021

The Colima Warbler has a distinction shared with no other species in the world: It is fully migratory, but both its summer reproductive range and its winter range are almost entirely within Mexico. (A A few breed in Texas’ Big Bend area.) All of our other migratory species either breed mostly in the U.S. So, lucky me!

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Mexico South America Birds Turkey 203

10,000 Birds

JANUARY 5, 2022

Cedar Waxwing: For most birders in Mexico, 2021 will be remembered as the year of the Waxwings. This is the only migratory warbler to live entirely within Mexico, breeding in the northeast and wintering in the southwest. White Ibises belong down on the coast of Mexico, which requires a 4-5 hour drive that I rarely make.

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Mexico Virginia Barn Owls Birds 264

10,000 Birds

APRIL 21, 2013

King Rails occur widely in eastern North America, in eastern and central Mexico, and in Cuba. These are brightly colored birds that breed in freshwater environments. Perhaps tenuirostris of Central Mexico is proposed as a full species, instead of being lumped with the endangered Pacific and Baja populations? What do you think?

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Species Cuba North America Louisiana 265

10,000 Birds

MAY 10, 2012

Warbling Vireos are found breeding in open deciduous woods, often riparian, across Mexico, the United States, and southern Canada. Their fondness for open woods means that they often adapt well to breeding in parks and it was Van Saun Park in New Jersey’s Bergen County that I found the individual shown in this blog post.

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New Jersey Philadelphia United States Canada 244

10,000 Birds

JULY 21, 2021

The first words describing this species in Wikipedia are “poorly-documented” Before 2015, when I first saw it in Paso Ancho, it had only been reported twice on eBird outside of its Sierra Madre Occidental breeding range: once from Taxco, Mexico, and another report from Nicaragua. This is the Cacique. And this is its nest.

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Nicaragua 2015 2016 Mexico 264

10,000 Birds

APRIL 23, 2013

Isla Isabel, a picturesque volcanic island situated 15 miles off Mexico’s Riviera Nayarit coast, is just such a place. It was made a National Park in the 1980s and is a major breeding and nesting area for over 30,000 seabirds. A male Magnificent Frigatebird in full breeding regalia. If you like boobies (no giggles please!),

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Whaling Whales Sharks Marine Life 267

10,000 Birds

JANUARY 18, 2024

Which means that the large country of Mexico boasts (according to one list) 127 endemic bird species, while the famous birders’ destination of Costa Rica has only 6. I’ve seen about a fifth of Mexico’s endemic birds, almost all of them right here in the state of Michoacán. It doesn’t seem fair at all.

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Costa Rica Mexico Lions North America 245

10,000 Birds

APRIL 17, 2012

This week marks the 2-year anniversary of the Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill in the Gulf of Mexico. Oil begins to wash up on the beaches throughout May and June of 2010 May 6, 2010 Oil washes ashore on the Chandeleur Islands off the Louisiana coast, an important nesting and breeding area for many bird species.

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2010 Louisiana 2012 2011 269

10,000 Birds

SEPTEMBER 12, 2012

Like many warblers the Nashville Warbler breeds in North America and winters in Mexico. I feel rather fortunate having this visitor to my yard as Birds of North America Online states that they are an “uncommon fall migrant in California” usually in August and September.

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Nashville North America Jordan Mississippi 238

10,000 Birds

MARCH 21, 2024

Being a westerner — raised in California, and now living in western Mexico — I was perhaps most excited about the migratory birds that breed in eastern North America. And the Baltimore Oriole is an iconic eastern bird, which winters along Mexico’s east coast, but never in the west. Then, around 4:00 p.m.,

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Mexico Birds Raccoons Baltimore 246

10,000 Birds

MAY 17, 2013

Three of those — the Black-chinned , Calliope , and Rufous Hummingbirds — breed in the Missoula area. That is, in extremely precise mathematical terms, three times more species of hummingbirds than breed near the Olde Homestead. It breeds into Alaska. I’m not mad at you, Calliope Hummingbird.

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Montana Alaska Stray Cats 257

10,000 Birds

MAY 12, 2022

Jonathan is originally from San Blas on Mexico’s west coast, a birder’s paradise I have yet to visit. Snowy Plovers also breed half an hour north of my home, so we have those in common. With so few birding “boots on the ground”, many of Mexico’s best spots are yet to be discovered.

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San Diego Turtles Mexico Sparrows 264

10,000 Birds

DECEMBER 1, 2015

In fact, they are central to many Mexican and Native American spiritual beliefs, and have been named the state bird of New Mexico. million breeding birds, Greater Roadrunners have a stable population (according to Partners in Flight). However, in real life Greater Roadrunners are quite different.

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New Mexico Mexico Coyotes Rattlesnake 110

10,000 Birds

NOVEMBER 18, 2020

For us, it’s all about birds moving north during the warm season to breed, and south to escape the winter cold. Those that move south to Mexico in the fall come as much for the abundance of winter food sources, as for winter warmth. I suspect that for hummingbirds, temperature is not the only factor.

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Mexico Alaska Falcons Raised 251

10,000 Birds

APRIL 13, 2022

The only one that occurs in western Mexico, where I live, is the Gray-breasted Wood-Wren. Central Mexico has a resident high-altitude population of these tiny birds, a full 1,000 miles (1,600 km) south of their nearest breeding relatives in the U.S. Still, its song is memorable when heard.

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Mexico South America America Species 260

10,000 Birds

JULY 7, 2021

and Canada and winter in northeastern Mexico, while the sedentary wrens of central Mexico, Central America, and South America are now to be identified as Grass Wrens. But its two mixed-breed children would make an 80’s British soccer club proud, with their punk hairstyles. It is quite old, and quite, well, hairless.

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Barn Owls Owls Leopards Mexico 264

10,000 Birds

DECEMBER 7, 2011

While I often tease Corey about how many albatrosses we have down here in New Zealand, the fact is that the United States has three species of Albatross that breed within its boundaries, albeit one of them only very rarely, and visit the western shores of North America. It is also a very attractive bird, as I hope you will agree.

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Albatross Hawaii New Zealand Japan 221

10,000 Birds

MARCH 17, 2021

The most common one, Manila tamarind, is wildly inaccurate, since the tree is native to southwestern Mexico, not Manila, and its only connection to tamarind trees is that both are in different subfamilies of the huge legume family. I go there every year around this time, because in 2016 I saw Sinaloa Martins migrating north to breed.

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2020 Mexico 2016 California 279

10,000 Birds

FEBRUARY 18, 2012

The Yellow-throated Warbler is a wood-warbler that breeds almost exclusively in the southeastern United States. They winter in Florida, the Caribbean, Mexico, and Central America.

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Florida New York City Dominica United States 219

10,000 Birds

AUGUST 1, 2013

Similar observation have been made in Cuba and the Yucatan Peninsula in Mexico where up to 47,000 migrating Mississippi Kites are counted every season as they fly south. Of all migratory birds breeding in North America, Swallow-tailed Kites are among the first to leave for the wintering grounds.

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Florida Cuba Colombia 2004 262

10,000 Birds

OCTOBER 9, 2013

Unlike the more common American Goldfinch, the Lesser Goldfinch’s ( Spinus psaltria ) plumage does not change color during breeding season. Eastward, frequency of individuals with black on auriculars, neck, and back increases; southward into Mexico, nearly all adult males have completely black upperparts 1.

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California Species North America Oregon 210

10,000 Birds

DECEMBER 16, 2020

It was the month of March, 2017, when I went to Lake Cuitzeo to check up on our migratory waterfowl and shorebirds one last time before they travelled north to breed. Lake Cuitzeo is Mexico’s second largest lake, and its uniformly shallow waters make it a powerful magnet for dabbling ducks and shorebirds. Which is a good thing.

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Rights 2017 2020 Blackbirds 264

10,000 Birds

MAY 4, 2022

A pair of male Western Tanagers , colored up for courtship when it arrives up north … Unfortunately for me, they only get this colorful when they are about to leave central Mexico. This species, however, sticks around to breed. A female Hepatic Tanager. And a male Hepatic Tanager , also in his prenuptial finery.

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Humane Mexico Wildlife Breeding 263

10,000 Birds

SEPTEMBER 21, 2011

The species ranges widely across the Pacific, as its scientific name suggests, from the Revillagigedo Islands off Mexico to the Japanese Bonin Islands to New South Wales in Australia. Another difference is that the Christmas Shearwater is a surface breeder whereas the Wedgie breeds in burrows. Pale and dark morph side-by side.

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Albatross Madagascar Breeders Mexico 213