Good day all! What a year it has been! Indeed 2020 will be a year not too quickly forgotten for a number of reasons. For me, it was a year which provided a lot of extra time to go out birding, and having significantly fewer plans for my weekends meant I could get out a bunch more and enjoy God's creation.
As such, I had an incredible year of birding, smashing my records for most species seen in a year, and my record for every single month as well! I finished the year with a list of 217 species (nearly all of which were seen in Manitoba). In addition I was able to add 33 species to my Life List, jumping it from 218 to 251 over the course of the year. Here is the list of birds which I added to my Life List this year (from in order they were seen):
- American Black Duck
- Red Crossbill
- Boreal Chickadee
- Bohemian Waxwing
- Swamp Sparrow
- Greater White-fronted Goose
- Worm-eating Warbler
- Red-breasted Merganser
- Red-throated Loon
- Nashville Warbler
- White-rumped Sandpiper
- Dunlin
- Hudsonian Godwit
- Blackpoll Warbler
- Olive-sided Flycatcher
- Eastern Towhee
- Black-crowned Night-heron
- Caspian Tern
- Red-necked Phalarope
- Ruddy Turnstone
- Upland Sandpiper
- Chestnut-collared Longspur
- Loggerhead Shrike
- Baird's Sparrow
- Great Gray Owl
- Great Crested Flycatcher
- Indigo Bunting
- Gray-cheeked Thrush
- Blue-headed Vireo
- Canada Warbler
- Philadelphia Vireo
- Lapland Longspur
- White-winged Scoter
This year I made a commitment to submit at least one checklist a day on eBird and was successful in meeting that goal. But I did not limit myself to one checklist a day... no, in fact I submitted 635 checklists and along the way I reached a bit of a milestone, on November 2nd, as I submitted my 1000th eBird Checklist in my life. At the time of this writing I am only one complete checklist short of 500. A complete checklist is a checklist wherein you can confirm your list contains all of the species you could identify during a certain time of intentional birding (for example while going for a walk whereas a checklist recording a bird you saw as you were driving should not be labelled as a complete checklist as it would have been impossible for you to see or hear as many of the birds around you as you could).
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| Ruby-throated Hummingbird (taken at Assiniboine Park on September 8, 2020) |
While none of us can be sure what 2021 will bring, I am looking forward to another year full of opportunities to get outside and discover the beautiful creatures that God has placed around us. I would like to wish all of you a Happy New Year and all the best in 2021! I look forward to continuing to share my birding adventures with you via this blog and also possibly in person!
Thanks for following along this year!
Joel G.
