The 2016 Kachemak Bay Shorebird Festival took place May 12-15. The attached checklist shows the species seen during the festival- 140 species were seen over the four festival days.
This list has been compiled from the Checklist of Birds of Kachemak Bay (April 2002) with some revisions (April 2005). Like the original checklist, it covers the Anchor River drainage, the watersheds draining into Kachemak Bay including Kachemak Bay State Park and the Bay itself between Anchor Point and Point Pogibshi. It features species and their historical likelihood of occurrence in the spring only, i.e., those birds likely to be seen during the Kachemak Bay Shorebird Festival, which has taken place on the first or second weekend of May since 1993.
2016 Homer Spit / Anchor River Shorebird Monitoring Times and Tides
Starting time is based on the quarter hour before the receding tide reaches 15.0 feet, or high tide if it doesn’t reach 15.0 feet using Seldovia tide tables. The tide correction between Seldovia and Homer is only +5 minutes.
2016 Kasilof River Shorebird Monitoring Times and Tides
Monitoring is based on when the incoming tide is about half way between low tide and high tide. This corresponds to beginning an hour before the tide at the Kenai River.
Entrance is at +10.0 feet. Monitoring last one and a half hours.
What a fantastic Christmas Bird Count here in Homer! There were 66 species seen and three of these species had never been seen before on a Christmas Bird Count:Red-breasted Sapsucker, Anna’s Hummingbird and Ancient Murrelet. During the Count Week (which is three days before and three days after the Count Day), an additional nine species were found, including a Great Blue Heron and a Chestnut-backed Chickadee, both very uncommon on this side of the Bay. Participants, including myself, did their best during the short daylight hours searching hard and long to find the latter two on the Count Day itself, as they had been seen the previous few days and would have been wonderful finds.
Nearly 8000 birds were counted in all. The most numerous species were Rock Sandpipers (2000), Pine Siskin (871), and Black Scoter (845); also hundreds of Mallards, Common Mergansers, Pelagic Cormorants, Common Murre, American Robins, Black-capped Chickadees, Northwestern Crows and Glaucous-winged Gulls. Species of note were six European Starlings, White-throated Sparrow, Townsend’s Solitaire, and—love them or not—there were 13 Ring Necked Pheasants (last year only one could be found).
The weather cooperated and the snow that was predicted thankfully did not fall. This was a huge help although the heavy clouds meant the day was very short. A big thank you to over thirty volunteers who participated, plus other feeder watchers. Thank you to Dave Erikson as coordinator of the Count; this was the 39th consecutive Christmas Bird Count he has coordinated here in Homer! And a big thank you to Islands and Ocean Visitor Center for allowing us to use their wonderful facility.
The Christmas Bird Count is the longest-running citizen science project in our nation, and in Homer it is always held on the first Saturday in the window (Dec. 14th to Jan. 5th).
The center of the 15-mile-diameter count circle is the intersection of Kachemak Drive and the Spit Rd. The circle extends east to Fritz Creek, south past the end of the Spit, west to the mouth of Diamond Creek and to the north where there are few roads. We do not go out in boats for our count.
Participants meet at 8:30 am at IOVC for coffee/tea/breakfast foods, get assigned to teams and areas, and then go out to count all the daylight hours. At 4:30 teams return and compile results and enjoy a warm potluck supper.
A few days before the event, Dave Erikson always teaches a class on “Winter Bird Identification”. This class is valuable for new birders as well as being an excellent opportunity for more experienced birders to brush up on what birds are in Homer in the winter.
The final version of the 2015 Kachemak Bay Shorebird Monitoring Project report has been completed by George Matz. The report can be downloaded by clicking the file link below.
The results of the 2014 Homer Christmas Bird Count have been tallied: 67 species (9,483 birds) were counted on the day of the count, and 8 more species were seen during the count week.