Who we are, the birds around here

Welcome to the Reno County Birdmen! 

 

This blog was created with the goal of chronicling our wildlife observations. We (Joseph, Andrew and Bryant Miller) are avid birders, wildlife watchers and amateur photographers. 

     

Since our uncle first took us birdwatching in 2009, we have found that Reno County is a great place to bird, and its proximity to Quivira National Wildlife Refuge has proved helpful for chasing rarities that show up there.

Nobody expected this Red-necked Stint to show up at Quivira in 2012.
We successfully located it the next day and got great looks at this
stunning Asian rarity. Photo by Bryant.

Reno County is located ideally in the center of the state for a variety of habitats, and the county list shows it! From Chuck-will's-widows and American Woodcocks nesting in the eastern part of the county to Cassin's Sparrows in the west, Reno currently has 328 species on its checklist, which is the 14^th highest total in the state! We have discovered that some species formerly not on the checklist (Chestnut-collared Longspur, Sprague's Pipit, and Black-headed Grosbeak to name a few), were actually regular, and in some cases, common migrants.We get both eastern and western migrants here on a regular basis. This leads to cool species combos, like finding both Mourning and MacGillivray's warblers in the same grove in the same morning. Or perhaps Lark Buntings and Black-and-white Warblers.

A good example of an eastern stray, this stunning male Cape May Warbler we found at Quivira was the first record for the refuge!

I (Joseph) have also been keeping track of the birds I see in a 25 square mile block around our farm. So far my neighbor Dwight, his son Anthony and I have found 245 species of birds in the last few years. That's bigger than the lists of forty Kansas counties!

Lately we have all become obsessed with gulls as well. Luckily for us the gulls from Cheney Reservoir commute every day up to a sandpit near the county landfill. So far this winter we have found at least 7 species of gulls and a couple of intermediate and hybrid birds as well. Andrew photographed a gull last week that eBird staff confirmed was a "Cook Inlet Gull" (a hybrid between Glaucous-winged and Herring gulls). That's a first state record! A hybrid, but still exciting. Gulls never fail to fascinate me, they can have so much variation within a single species and even age.

Anyway, I'm looking forward to posting on this blog and hopefully improving my writing skills in the future. Thanks for reading our blog and check back soon!           

Joseph