Rare bird prompts RSPB to step up objections

A NATURE charity has stepped up its opposition to a huge new wind farm earmarked near Strathy by highlighting the threat it claims the venture would have on one of the area’s rare but not popularly highlighted birds.

Objections from ornithologists to SSE’s 47 turbine proposal on a forested area 12 kilometres south of the village in the heart of the Flow Country have centred on species such as golden eagle, hen harrier, merlin and golden plover.

In its latest broadside against the developers, RSPB Scotland has focused on the damage the wind farm could do to the wood sandpiper.

And the conservation charity has accused SSE of failing to properly assess the importance the site has for the species, of which there are reckoned to be fewer than 30 breeding pairs in the UK.

Continued

Bird watchers descend on Rhode Island for rare sighting

Reuters

October 26, 2012

Scores of bird watchers have descended on Rhode Island to glimpse a bird rarely seen on the U.S. mainland and that may have flown from as far away as Siberia.

The wood sandpiper, a migratory bird commonly found in Europe, Asia and North Africa, was first spotted 10 days ago in a marshy area in Jamestown, George Armistead, events coordinator for the American Birding Association, said on Tuesday.

The brown-and-white medium-size shore bird has been seen and recorded only a few times in the lower 48 states, he said, adding that it is seen almost annually on a small island in Alaska.

Most shore birds that turn up in the mid-Atlantic or East Coast region are believed to have bred in Siberia, Armistead said. The one in Jamestown very likely is a juvenile born this year and "just doesn't know its way around yet," he said in a telephone interview from his home in Philadelphia.

"You do get these birds that stray," he said. "This one probably strayed from someplace in Eastern Russia, would have cut across Canada and ended up here on the Northeast coast."

The animal has attracted scores of bird enthusiasts from New England and beyond in recent days.

Ed Hughes, a harbour master in nearby North Kingstown, said he has gone to see the bird and take photos three or four times. Traffic in the area was backed up for at least half a mile, he said, with cars with license plates from Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia and throughout New England.

One day he watched along with about 70 others, he said.

Armistead said he wouldn't be surprised if one or two birders had flown in from the West Coast to see the wood sandpiper.

"It's a pretty big deal," he said. "For a lot of people that haven't had the opportunity to travel, this might be their only chance to see this thing."

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Birders flock to island for rare find

Wood sandpiper has never before been seen in region

Nobody is quite sure when the wood sandpiper will leave Conanicut Island or how it got here, but with the colder weather approaching, most think the sandpiper won’t be around much longer.  Jamestown received an unexpected swarm of tourists over the weekend, and the reason for the uptick was the most unforeseen guest of all: a 2-ounce bird.

To the average person, the visitor was nothing more than a shorebird whose length was shorter than a standard ruler. But to birders, it was the opportunity of a lifetime: This is just the seventh time in the history of the Lower 48 states that the wood sandpiper has been confi rmed, according to Rachel Farrell, the state’s unofficial record keeper of birds. It’s also the first time it’s been spotted in New England.

Farrell was the person who got the news out that the sandpiper was spotted. For 11 years she has run a private daily listserv that allows her to email hundreds of birders with updates on where and when rare birds can be located.

Continued:  http://www.jamestownpress.com/news/2012-10-18/News/Birders_flock_to_island_for_rare_find.html