10,000 Birds

SEPTEMBER 25, 2015

These arid hills, cloaked in a mosaic of deciduous scrub and desert vegetation, form a northern outpost for several Neotropical species while also harboring several key endemics and southwestern Nearctic species. Mexico is great for those who love biogeography! Think Arizona meets Costa Rica with a Mexican twist.

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Mexico Costa Rica Arizona Bats 235

10,000 Birds

MARCH 21, 2015

These and several other species might end up being armchair ticks if and when we take a closer look at their evolutionary history. Taxa that could end up being split into one species occurring north of the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, and one south of the isthmus. (2). Two subspecies of the same species that differ within Costa Rica. (4).

Costa Rica 252

Costa Rica Species South America America 252

10,000 Birds

JANUARY 28, 2024

I have been slowly working up to my latest life list benchmark (2,000 bird species) and scoured eBird for a location within an 8-hour flight to get some lifers. Our local friend was already busy and everyone that had been suggested had to be flown in from either nearby Huatulco or Mexico City, which significantly added to the guiding fee.

Mexico 240

Mexico Birds Oregon Puffins 240

10,000 Birds

JULY 4, 2017

Raptors of Mexico and Central America by William S. This is the first identification guide that I know of that covers Mexico (technically North America but rarely included in North American raptor guides) and Central America. Wheeler and William S. Clark and N. That’s a lot of visual information!

Mexico 189

Mexico America North America Falcons 189

10,000 Birds

JULY 3, 2019

One of the things I love about birding around Morelia, in central Mexico, is the wide variety of habitats I have nearby. Now, something odd happens when you go really high in central Mexico: the countryside begins to look more and more like the United States’ Pacific Northwest.

Mexico 159

Mexico Washington United States Oregon 159

10,000 Birds

NOVEMBER 6, 2019

For most avian migrants heading south towards Mexico, Central and South America, crossing thru the Arizona desert areas can provide very few water, food and resting areas. If they are passing thru Pima County, and the Tucson area, Arivaca Lake is the last stop for water before crossing the US/Mexico border.

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Mexico Tucson Arizona Ducks 154

10,000 Birds

JULY 4, 2020

Whether you happen to be more interested in music or birds, you may love “A Guide to the Birdsong of Mexico, Central America, and the Caribbean” Since this is a music project rather than an actual guide of bird vocalizations, there won’t be a catalog of antbird trills and toucan yelps.

Costa Rica 277

Costa Rica Nicaragua Cuba Mexico 277

10,000 Birds

JUNE 1, 2023

Tabasco is probably the wettest state in Mexico. During Mexico’s dry season (which is just now ending), most of the country turns brown, as our plants survive the annual drought by dropping their leaves. By week’s end I had 30 new species on my life list. As such, it offers some unique birding experiences.

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Mexico Tigers Cows Birds 130

10,000 Birds

MAY 4, 2021

Adventures of a Louisiana Birder: One Year, Two Wings, Three Hundred Species is an enjoyable memoir about birding, birding strategies, birding people, community, life and death, and Louisiana (with some Alabama thrown into the mix). Adventures of a Louisiana Birder: One Year, Two Wings, Three Hundred Species. by Marybeth Lima.

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Louisiana Species Mississippi Alabama 264

10,000 Birds

MAY 7, 2022

In April 2022, the Collaborative submitted 216 checklists from 4 countries ( Costa Rica , United States , Mexico , and the United Kingdom ) and observed 735 species. The 2022 year list stands at 1,023, and the life rises by a single species ( Great Swallow-tailed Swift seen in Mexico) to 4,114.

United Kingdom 263

United Kingdom Costa Rica Ireland United States 263

10,000 Birds

MAY 16, 2024

Last week, I returned to Morelia, Mexico, my home for the past 30 years, from twelve days in the San Francisco Bay Area, where I spent my childhood and teenage years. This considerable distance is why I am always surprised to see so many of the same species in both places. While in California on this trip, I saw 75 species.

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San Francisco California Mexico Advocacy 226

10,000 Birds

APRIL 2, 2022

In March 2022, the Collaborative submitted 184 checklists from 4 countries ( Costa Rica , United States , Mexico , and the United Kingdom ) and they included 637 species. Mexico ranks sixth on the Collaborative’s country list with 425 species observed. The top eBirder has seen a remarkable 1,027 species!

Costa Rica 251

Costa Rica United Kingdom United States Mexico 251

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. I have now seen the species in eight different years. Of course, Paso Ancho is also a hotspot for many other beautiful species and endemics.

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Mexico South America 2020 America 246

10,000 Birds

JUNE 24, 2020

This sort of biozone mixing can create a tremendous richness of species. Each of these habitats attracts its own group of species. I mentioned last week the Jamaican Nettletree, whose tiny fruit was attracting all kinds of species — even some I thought did not eat fruit or seeds. This one was a true lifer for me.

Mexico 264

Mexico Nicaragua Lamb Sparrows 264

10,000 Birds

AUGUST 8, 2024

For years, I had hoped to see a Lesser Ground-Cuckoo, one of Mexico’s more exotic and difficult species. And I even had this species on… Source (When they actually afford you a whole new blog subject to write about, that is certainly an extra bonus.)

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Mexico Birds Species 245

10,000 Birds

APRIL 28, 2021

As I mention each year at this time, the beginning of the birding year, up north, is the end of Mexico’s peak birding season. Only a month ago, a good morning spent gazing at my garden could yield 20 species; but now, suddenly, my goal is 10. So how did the winter of 2020-2021 shape up down here?

Mexico 264

Mexico Trafficking Sparrows Virginia 264

10,000 Birds

JANUARY 5, 2022

Cedar Waxwing: For most birders in Mexico, 2021 will be remembered as the year of the Waxwings. I had only seen this species once here, in 2018. Virginia Warbler: The Virginia Warbler is a common species in the thorn forest of the Balsas River Basin, so I had seen it often. How did I miss that? I don’t care. In my garden!

Mexico 263

Mexico Virginia Barn Owls Birds 263

10,000 Birds

AUGUST 11, 2021

Many thrushes live or winter in Mexico, but their taxonomy is mostly quite simple. Eight of our large thrushes (the American Robin , western Mexico’s own Rufous-backed Robin , and eastern Mexico’s ubiquitous Clay-colored Thrush , among others) belong to the genus Turdus. Why are Aztec Thrushes so hard to see?

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Mexico North America 2018 2017 264

10,000 Birds

FEBRUARY 14, 2023

In 2022, the 10,000 Birds eBird Collaborative submitted 1,837 checklists from 9 countries ( Australia , China , Costa Rica , Mexico , Saint Lucia , Serbia , Trinidad and Tobago , United Kingdom , and the United States ) and observed 1,273 species. The Collaborative life list increased to 4,140.

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Saint Lucia Costa Rica United Kingdom Trinidad 252

10,000 Birds

JUNE 30, 2021

After 38 years of life in Mexico, I rarely have the sort of stomach trouble tourists supposedly get here. My first trip into non-touristy Mexico, I was so worried about the Tijuana Two-Step that, let’s just say, I had the opposite problem for a week. It’s always nice when Mexico gets its due.

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Mexico Groups Species Birds 264

10,000 Birds

JUNE 11, 2023

I even made one trip with the specific purpose of birding on Mexico’s much wetter eastern coast, visiting different sites along the very stretched-out state of Veracruz. That is because, like the skin of the gringos who visit Mexico’s beaches, the Palo de Gringo’s bark is red, and peels.

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Mexico Woodpeckers South America Species 224

10,000 Birds

JULY 14, 2021

But it does offer plenty of the endemics and other species that make our area distinctive, and many of them were waiting for me on this latest visit. For the taxonomy fans out there, the American Ornithological Society just announce that this species should be moved to the Chlorophonia genus. My guess is that they are still mating.

Mexico 263

Mexico Sparrows United States Virginia 263

10,000 Birds

MAY 24, 2020

North America is home to many amazing bird species, including several which require a special effort to see and appreciate. New Mexico Nature & Culture. These colorful songbirds occur in two populations, a western one which winters in Mexico and Central America and an eastern one which winters in South Florida and Cuba.

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America Arizona North America Texas 264

10,000 Birds

FEBRUARY 15, 2024

I have been lucky enough to get close views of two massive Old World Vulture species, the Eurasian Griffon and the Egyptian Vulture. Here in Mexico, I can almost always count on Black Vultures and Turkey Vultures to pad each outing’s list by two species. Black Vultures are a bit smaller than all these other species.

California Condor 244

California Condor Turkey Mexico Meat 244

10,000 Birds

APRIL 11, 2023

While our compatriots seem only to want to visit Mexico’s touristy beach cities, we would rather go anywhere else in this country. Indeed, even though I just celebrated 40 years of living in Mexico, we have never been to Cabo San Lucas, and our only experience with Cancún was going though immigration in that city’s airport.

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Mexico Birds Turkey Sparrows 264

10,000 Birds

NOVEMBER 30, 2014

There’s a new proposal before the American Ornithologists’ Union’s North American Classification Committee to split Painted Bunting into two species (yay! — maybe, more later) and to name the new species “Eastern Painted Bunting” and “Western Painted Bunting” (no!).

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Mississippi Mexico Alabama North Carolina 278

10,000 Birds

JULY 5, 2024

These species are not only beautiful or charming, but have a personal resonance for me. It turns out this species is very difficult to see — everywhere except in my territory, since to date I have now seen it 64 times within an hour of Morelia. I could not test this theory in 2024, as by that month the lake had disappeared.

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Squirrels Mexico Kansas South America 246

10,000 Birds

MARCH 30, 2022

So here are some numbers: As I write this, on March 24th, my 2022 list includes 239 species, all from within the state of Michoacán. The latest species I picked up is the Spotted Wren , a rather common endemic here that I had somehow managed to not see, until three turned up in my garden this morning.

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Mexico Arizona Horses Texas 244

10,000 Birds

JUNE 13, 2024

If you have birded very long, you are probably aware that members of closely related bird species, when their ranges overlap, sometimes love each other very much, and have babies. When this happens particularly often, such hybridization processes can result in entirely new species.

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Mexico United States 2019 Research 246

10,000 Birds

MARCH 11, 2013

San Blas, situated on the north-western coastline of Mexico’s Riviera Nayarit is one such place. The San Blas Christmas Bird Count is a popular event amongst international birders and close to 300 species have been recorded during a single day. The beaches and coves provide sanctuary to a nice variety of seabirds.

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Mexico United States Woodpeckers Sanctuary 264

10,000 Birds

OCTOBER 13, 2021

Some 50 species of salvias grow in Michoacán, according to one estimate. And I have personally observed 16 species of hummingbirds in the state. Like Salvia mexicana , this species is common in open areas close to (and in) Morelia itself; but it loves steep slopes, while S. I don’t know the latter’s species.

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Mexico California Morals Species 263

10,000 Birds

NOVEMBER 17, 2021

Still, the outing did not produce any new species for the year, or enough good photos for a post here. Instead, I have chosen to write about an idea I’ve had percolating for a while: to tell you what the most common species are down here. I’ll take the most common native species in taxonomic order.

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Woodpeckers Mexico Cattle Turkey 363

10,000 Birds

MARCH 6, 2022

In February 2022, the Collaborative submitted 127 checklists in 7 countries ( Costa Rica , United States , Mexico , Trinidad and Tobago , United Kingdom , and Serbia ). The Collaborative’s all-time country with the most species observed is Costa Rica , with 784 species, out of 911 observed on eBird overall!

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Costa Rica United Kingdom Trinidad United States 262

10,000 Birds

APRIL 19, 2024

Still, I did manage to see a decent 65 species in 6 hours, and many of them stayed quite close to me, allowing for some nice photos. It looks frustratingly similar to the Rufous-crowned Sparrow of the western United States and Mexico, but is much larger and has a heavier bill. I am always down for the day when I get home.

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Mexico Squirrels Turtles Sparrows 246

10,000 Birds

MAY 27, 2020

Because of our age, Mexico’s rising COVID-19 numbers, and my wife’s anxiety about infectious diseases in general, we have been in total lockdown at the Lewis home. Since the migratory season ended down here, I have not managed to see more than 20 species in any single day from my yard. TOTAL lockdown. Nice forest!

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Turkey Mexico Uruguay Guatemala 246

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.,

Mexico 243

Mexico Birds Raccoons Baltimore 243

10,000 Birds

JANUARY 18, 2024

When a birder uses the word, we usually refer to a species that canbe mostly or exclusively found in a single country. 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. It doesn’t seem fair at all.

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Costa Rica Mexico Lions North America 240