Hello Ohio Birders,

A thought in reaction to Bill's comments: The "initial discoveries" noted
by Bill may have been concentrated in central Ohio not only because of
relative ease of observation/collection but also might reflect the
distribution of competent observers.  Not to take anything away from
Cleveland, Toledo, Dayton or Cincinnati area birders but central Ohio has
long been a bastion of birding expertise (Wheaton, Trautman, Claugus et
al.), and more birding effort was expended closer to home in the days
before Interstate highways.  (I commenced my birding career in the Boston
area and in the early 1950s and if a rarity showed up on the Rhode Island
coast one simply would not, and could not, make a "chase" and return in a
single day.)

Happy birding!

Dave Horn
Columbus OH
Worcester, MA

On Fri, Dec 2, 2016 at 2:03 PM, Bill Whan <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> I'm just finishing a final run through my work on the 382 bird
> species of central Ohio (
> http://columbusaudubon.org/resources/checklists-and-indexes-coh/ ), and
> I notice among other anomalies the number of Ohio water-loving species
> which were said to have been first recorded from central Ohio and not
> Lake Erie. They include:
>        both eiders, king and common
>        all three scoters, black, white-winged, surf
>        cinnamon teal
>        Eurasian wigeon
>        magnificent frigatebird
>        long-tailed jaeger
>        gulls: kittiwake and Franklin's gull, Sabine's gull
> Check the dates at
> http://columbusaudubon.org/resources/checklists-and-indexes-coh/ to see
> the dates, or have a look at Peterjohn's "The Birds of Ohio.". All I can
> think is that central Ohio's lakes and reservoirs were far more easy to
> search for these water-loving species. Perhaps these species were hard
> to see well or collect (some were collected but lost in museum fires up
> north) from the lake and the shore. Certainly central Ohio does not
> truly deserve recognition as the first-discovery location of these birds...
> Bill Whan
> Columbus
>
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