Yardbird Data Compilation Tools

     Several years ago while watching White-Throated Sparrows in my yard I noted the date and realized that it was the earliest spring date that I had ever seen them in my yard.  At the time I thought that in order to know the latest spring date for them and other species, I would have to keep track of every species that I saw everyday in my yard.  My solution was to create an Excel worksheet that I call BIRDLIST. 
    The first sheet of BIRDLIST is a general comment page that list the species, followed by a comment column that usually contains the first date I ever saw the bird in my yard and any other significant sightings.  The last 12 columns represent the months of the year, with the months that the species has been seen in my yard highlighted in yellow.

  Sheet two of BIRDLIST is a narrowed version of the first sheet minus the comment column.  Its purpose is to allow me to fit 150 species on to one sheet printed in landscape format, that I can  fold in thirds and leave in field guide that I use primarily in my yard.  Here is a zoomed in view of sheet2. 

 The third sheet of BIRDLIST is the meat and potatoes, the dog that herds the sheep, the trashcan that catches the puke in the data gathering process. It lists the species, followed by the numbers 1 thru 0 three times followed by a fourth 1.  Any guesses to what these numbers represent?  Answer : the days of the month, the first 1-0 represent the days of the 1st-10th, the second group of numbers represent the days 11th-20th and so on.  The dates were abbreviated due to space restrictions.  I print one out each month and mark with a pen the days that I see each bird. At the end of the month I total all the days I saw each species.

 

 

   Here are 3 photos of the sheet I used in September with explanations of the marks I made on it.

 

 


The data gathered monthly is totaled and entered into another Excel worksheet I call "BIRD SURVEY", that totals the number of days a species is seen for the year and compared to previous years.

	NAME	J	F	M	A	M	J	J	A	S	O	N	D	2012	2011	2010	2009	2008
1	HOUSE SPARROW	24	26	31	30	21	30	31	26	27	31	30		307	355	364	270	246
2	NORTHERN CARDINAL	24	25	26	29	19	22	25	24	24	24	28		270	282	315	217	209
3	MOURNING DOVE	14	23	29	30	19	22	15	20	26	20	19		237	252	247	196	205
4	EUROPEAN STARLING	21	25	31	30	21	30	29	24	25	29	28		293	295	278	226	223
5	ROCK DOVE	13	14	26	28	21	26	19	16	20	15	27		225	279	280	238	177
6	DOWNY WOODPECKER	1		10	5	8	1	3	9	16	16	20		89	76	57	107	144
7	HOUSE FINCH	5	11	23	30	21	20	8	12	20	11	13		174	138	111	94	143
8	RING BILLED GULL	20	14	29	30	21	28	21	18	22	16	24		243	203	179	164	139
9	AMERICAN CROW	4	10	16	17	10			1	3	2	1		64	71	81	40	32
10	CANADA GOOSE	2	9	11	8	2	1		1	5	3	1		43	39	35	24	16

    If anyone is interested in more info, I can send you my excel files that may make more sense than what is depicted here. You can contact me at markwlo@aol.com.

Lawn Lion

Soft kitty

Warm kitty

Little ball of fur

Happy kitty

Sleepy kitty



Purr, purr, purr

CBC Recon pt. 2 (with meteors)

 

    Went to work a little early last night and spent the extra few minutes trying to photograph the Geminid meteor shower.  I was able to capture a couple of them with my camera's sensitivity set to ISO 8000.

 

 

 

see answer below

Faint meteor passing between Jupiter and the Pleiades star cluster

 

The zoomed in inset shows Jupiter with its moon Ganymede

    Now the birds.....

Adult Black-crowned Night Heron

 

Immature Black-crowned Night Heron

 

 

Male Wood Ducks

Pair of Hooded Mergansers

Belted Kingfisher

Tree Sparrow

Brown Creeper

Golden-crowned Kinglet

CBC Reconnaissance

 The 2012 Monroe, MI  Christmas Bird Count (CBC) will take place this Sunday December 16.  Christmas Bird Counts have been an annual event since Christmas 1900.  It replaced the traditional annual Christmas Bird Shoot because of legislation pushed through during a literal lame duck session(independent verification needed). 
  Work obligations will prevent my participation in the CBC this year but this morning I did a little bit of advance scouting of one of the covered sites in the 15-mile diameter count circle.   No rarities but here are a few photos I took.


Great Blue Heron......not as warm as it looks

Ring-billed Gulls.......not as cold as it looks

Herring Gull



American Goldfinch

 

Canada Goose

Golden-Crowned Kinglet

 

     The best photo opportunity of the morning came from this cooperative 4 year old Bald Eagle. It zigzagged toward me until it passed almost directly overhead.  All the while attempting to keep its sunlit face toward the camera.