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NYSARC |
A
Committee of the
New York State Ornithological Association |
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NYSARC |
A
Committee of the
New York State Ornithological Association |
| Species List
UPDATED
9/5/06 NYSARC Reports & Decisions Summary INTRODUCTION This page provides a gateway into a database or inventory of submissions to the New York State Avian Records Committee (NYSARC) since our inception in 1974. It should be stressed from the outset that this not a database of all 'reported occurrences' in New York State. In an ideal world, these should be one and the same but in reality there are many instances where adequate documentation of important sightings has not been submitted to us. We strongly encourage all observers to browse the individual species entries by following the links or downloading the PDF file and where possible help us to fill the obvious gaps. Think to yourself, what rare or uncommon birds have I seen over the years? Are they already represented in the database or not? There is no 'statute of limitations' on submission to NYSARC and we are happy to receive descriptions of birds from years gone by, especially if you can refer to some form of documentation (field notes, photos, sketches etc.) rather than rely on memory alone. As any student of psychology, or crime novels for that matter, can tell you, it is all too easy for memories to become 'contaminated' by later sightings or images from books and magazines. Thus contemporaneous notes are an invaluable tool for accurately recalling past events. BRIEF NOTES ON FORMATTING OF INDIVIDUAL ENTRIES - See below FEEDBACK PLEASE We would like to hear from users of this database and other components of the NYSARC web site. Your feedback will help us arrange the information in such a way as to be most useful to birders and ornithologists alike. We very much want to hear from you if there are errors - spelling mistakes, dates, incorrect county assignments etc. - some of which may trace back to the original committee reports. One beauty of the Internet is that things can be readily corrected and updated. So please with your comments and corrections. Lastly, these pages would not exist without the unstinting efforts of Jeanne Skelly and Carena Pooth - we owe them both our deep-felt thanks and appreciation!
To see the list of reports submitted to NYSARC for any species below, click on the name of the species. You may also view the entire list of reports: NYSARC_records_2007_0921.pdf (pdf format, 98KB)(Requires Adobe Acrobat Reader.....Download Adobe Reader now) Listed in AOU Check-list
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BRIEF NOTES ON FORMATTING OF INDIVIDUAL ENTRIES
Each database entry contains (i) the NYSARC reference number, (ii) the first date of the sighting, (iii) the county involved, (iv) the status ('accepted' or 'not accepted' by the review committee), (v) the issue of The Kingbird (KB) that contains the relevant NYSARC Annual Report with more details (plus a link to the online Annual Report) and lastly, (vi) the names of the persons who contributed 'accepted' reports (we rarely include the names of contributors of reports that were not 'accepted' after review). The NYSARC number provides the least ambiguous way to refer to a given submission and should be used in any correspondence. When written or photographic materials are received, the NYSARC Secretary - currently Jeanne Skelly - assigns a unique identifier number (e.g. 1986-3-A) representing the year of observation (1986), an arbitrary number (36) reflecting the order of receipt and a single letter code (A) that is used to keep track of multiple submissions that pertain to the same bird or birds. The majority of entries represent species that are truly rare in New York State and the committee expects documentation of all occurrences (see Review List for details). In some cases, the sightings become frequent enough for us to drop the species from the official review list. Good examples are Sandhill Crane and Black Vulture, which have become sufficiently regular across much of the state that they no longer require NYSARC review although they may still require documentation at the local level. Other entries (e.g. Wilson's Phalarope) reflect species that are not as rare but are extremely irregular breeders. Lastly there are species that are occasionally recorded outside the usual seasons. Examples of this loosely defined category include wintering Neotropical migrants (e.g. Veery) or summering arctic breeders (e.g. Rough-legged Hawk). As a general rule these correspond to sightings made at least four weeks before or after normal range of occurrence as described in Bull's Birds of New York edited by Manny Levine.
These web pages are very much a work in progress and we will soon add data for species that are not currently on the New York State Checklist or were submitted but not reviewed. In time, it is hoped that members of the committee will prepare short commentaries discussing the status of each species in New York State, in some cases including appropriately documented pre-NYSARC records. Our ultimate goal is to provide an expansive summary of the rare or uncommon species that have occurred in the state that will be accessible to everyone. We hope this database will also encourage birders to document their rarity sightings as a matter of course and step forward to plug holes in our archive of materials. In general, we wish to encourage all birders to take a greater role in documenting the avifauna of our state, in particular the rare and uncommon visitors.
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All
contents copyright © 1998, 2001-2008 New York State Ornithological
Association.
All rights reserved. |
New York State
Avian Records Committee, May 2005