Rhode Island Species Record broken in 2022!

   

Tim and Erin Metcalf on the pelagic
where we saw a Northern Pulmar.

   Under the category of better late than never, this blog post should have been written the first week of January. 

  Last year, the record for the number of species seen by a birder was broken by Tim Metcalf. The previous record was held by Carlos Pedro . Carlos ended up getting three hundred and nine species in 2020. This broke the previous record of 306 which was held by Jan StJean for many years.

   Tim shattered the record getting an unheard of number of 313. In December he tied the record with an Eared Grebe. After the grebe he got Red Crossbills, Ross's Goose, Tundra Swan,  and Sabine's Gull to end up at 313.

   I did two Rhode Island Big Year's and I chased every bird I could in 2019 and 2020. Those two years I ended up with 291 and 294 respectively. I can not tell you the level of commitment it took for me to reach those numbers. So it goes without saying, to get over three hundred species really is a year long commitment. So getting another thirteen species after reaching the holy grail of 300 is truly an epic year. 

  It is one thing to chase birds that other's have found but Tim is out just about everyday birding. His wife Erin told me that around 4 am Tim starts getting fidgety and restless in bed because he wants to be birding. The best bird Tim found on his own along with many others was a Sabine's Gull which I believe he saw at Pier 5 in Narragansett.

  Along with seeing birds on land, Tim was on the water a lot. He took the Block Island Ferry eleven times, not to visit the Block, but just look for birds in the water (best and really only place to see Black Guillemot are the waters below the cliffs at the north end while on the ferry). He took a dedicated pelagic on the Francis Fleet where he saw Norther Fulmar (I was on that trip and it was a lifer for me). He also went on multiple whale watches out of Galilee, again, not for whales but for birds. Between the dedicated pelagics and whale watches, he went out in the open ocean five times.

   Tim is a good friend of mine and we bird a lot. I had Friday's off from work in the spring and three weeks in a row we went to Great Swamp in the afternoon looking for early migrants. Each week while we were at the swamp we would get a message that a rare bird was reported. The rarest of these was a Common Gull found by Sam Miller at the Narragansett Sea Wall. We had to double time it back to our cars to go for these birds. We got very lucky with the Common Gull. We just made it to the seawall in time to see it. We watched for about 15 minutes then it decided to fly in a southernly direction. We were the last two to see it. I stuck around for another 90 minutes trying to help other birders that showed up to find it but it was no use. The bird was gone.

   I do not know if Tim's record will be broken any time soon. Anyone going for the record would need a lot of luck. First off, it would have to be a good finch year. Many years Crossbills, Grosbeaks, and Pine Siskins just don't come south. You'd need all the waterfowl to show including Canvasback and Tundra Swans along with rare geese such as Cackling and Ross's. You would also need quite a few rarities that you can never predict such as the Sabine's Gull Tim found.

   Lastly, you would need the burning drive to follow through all year. You can't take days off. Sure you might not plan on birding a particular day, but if that text comes in that there is a Tropical Kingbird at Watch Hill or a Pink Footed Goose in Tiverton you jump in the car and go try for it. You dip on one hundred percent of the birds you don't chase. Tim got lucky with so many rarities showing up, but he chased them all along with the finches. Most importantly, he put in his time. So this may be two months too late but congratulations to Tim Metcalf!