Outdoor Ontario
Birding Reports => Toronto Reports => Topic started by: Shortsighted on May 19, 2019, 08:00:01 PM
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Went for a walk at East Point and the southern part of Highland creek this morning
and spotted a Cuckoo. Never seen one before. Which is more common, the Yellow-billed
or the Black-billed?
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Generally Black-billed are probably more common but it also depends on the week. During migration you sometimes get waves of one species which might rarer than other species but they just happen to be more common during that one week. Yesterday at Ashbridges Bay was a good example. Generally Tennessee Warblers are rarer than Yellow-rumped Warblers but yesterday there must have been 30 or more Tennessees at the park and maybe 1 or 2 Yellow-rumpeds.
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Thanks for the info. I did notice the crazy # of Tennessee report at Ashbridges.
I almost never get to see a Tennessee except perhaps during the fall migration.
Would have liked to be at Ashbridges to maybe see and photograph one but
I can't be there every day, although I would like to be. I wish that I had a long
lens to train on that BB Cuckoo to get more pixels on the bird but I haven't lost
sight of my shear good luck to have been at the right place at the right time
with any lens. I was just looking for a Phoebe when I spotted the Cuckoo.
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Went for a walk at East Point and the southern part of Highland creek this morning
and spotted a Cuckoo. Never seen one before. Which is more common, the Yellow-billed
or the Black-billed?
Over the years I certainly have seen more Black-billed than the Yellow-billed during my birding expeditions. Interestingly I didn't see a Yellow-billed prior to last year and since then I have seen them at least four times. Cornell Lab cites that Black-billed has declined by 68% since 1970 whereas the Yellow-billed has declined by 52%; however, this number may not be indicative of which one you see the most. As Elias explained it might just be the matter of migration window and their habitat preference.