The Christmas Bird Counts—2024-25

Barry Langdon-Lassagne—Aggregator

Every December and January SCVBA sponsors four Christmas Bird Counts (CBCs), part of a long-running nationwide community science project coordinated by the National Audubon Society. Hundreds of volunteers scour circular regions 15 miles in diameter, identifying and counting every single bird they can find. This winter more than 350 volunteers tallied 204,258 birds across 194 species, also identifying many subspecies and hybrid birds. See the table “2024-2025 SANTA CLARA COUNTY CHRISTMAS BIRD COUNTS” for a detailed listing of the observations.

Below are accounts written by each of the compilers of their respective Christmas Bird Count circle.

San Jose

On Saturday, December 15, 117 volunteers headed into the field to take part in the San Jose Christmas Bird Count.

We found 174 species including what long-time birder Ann Verdi has declared the “best bird” prize winner. Steve Rottenborn found it along Alviso Slough Trail. From Ann: “The Yellow Rail is a very rare bird for Santa Clara County - In my opinion, the San Jose CBC gets the prize for the "best" bird seen on any of our local CBC's this year. This bird has been given a "6" rating which is the highest rating for any bird seen in our county.”

Thank you, Ann, for that. The Yellow Rail was very cool, but not our only good bird! Alviso sector normally has write-up birds and this was no exception, with Snow Goose, Blue Winged Teal, Eurasian Wigeon, Eurasian (Green-Winged) Teal, Barrow’s Goldeneye, Ridgway’s Rail and Glaucous Gull. But they didn’t stop there. Alviso crews also found a Hermit Warbler and Yellow Warbler.

Cackling Goose was seen by Santa Clara/Sunnyvale crews, along with a Western Tanager. A second Western Tanager was found at Alum Rock sector. Calaveras sector had a few write-up birds as well, seeing Blue-Gray Gnatcatcher and Ferruginous Hawk. Evergreen sector birders found a Yellow-bellied Sapsucker as well as Violet-green and Barn Swallows. Tree Swallows were seen all over and the decision has been made to remove them from write-up requirements next year.

Some birds we don’t hear from very often showed up this year. Osprey (at Alum Rock), Ring-necked Pheasant (pond A5, 7, 8 in Alviso), Virginia Rail (Alviso), American Bittern (pond A16, Alviso), and thankfully, Burrowing Owl, which has been turning up missing more and more, was seen at Calaveras and Alum Rock Park.

Nine brand-new birders took part in the Guadalupe River Conservancy’s party for novice birdwatchers. And we have to remember what we did this year, because we had a lot of experienced birders who volunteered to join us for the first time. A big thank you to all who participated!

Mike Azevedo

Also check out Mike Azevedo’s CBC Countdown video:

Sue Welch, Linda Sue Johnson, Alice Liu, San Tomas Aquino Trail, San Jose CBC—Photo by Ann Hepenstal

Palo Alto

The Palo Alto CBC was held on Monday, December 16 in conditions of variable rain, for the second year in a row. The 142 participants found 165 species. Over the previous 15 years that total has ranged between 155 and 173, with an average of 166.

Of the species we have usually observed over that period, we missed Greater White-fronted Goose, Cackling Goose, White-throated Swift, Ruddy Turnstone, Brown Pelican, Swamp Sparrow and Great-tailed Grackle. (The swift and pelican were seen during count week.) Loggerhead Shrike seems to be just hanging on in this count, with only one found. And the 3 Downy Woodpeckers (like last year's 4) compared to a 15-year average of about 12. Even if these are just downward fluctuations, there does seem to be a slow decrease in recent years, while Hairy Woodpecker numbers have soared. This was not a year for irruptive species, with only a few scattered small groups of Pine Siskins and just 3 Red-breasted Nuthatches (2 from one feeder watch).

Lesser Yellowlegs - Carter Gasiorowski, Palo Alto CBC

It is hard to detect trends from a casual look at the count results. Numbers of many species, especially waterbirds, are highly variable year to year. And the weather can have its effects. Perhaps it is not significant that Western Meadowlark was at the high end of past numbers, and Hooded Merganser and Hutton's Vireo at the low end. But a few things do stand out. Marbled Godwits reached a new high by a substantial margin (even when normalized by effort, at least since the 1960's). And the number of American Robins was the lowest by far since that same era. The number of California Scrub-Jays was for the first time lower than that of Steller's Jays. The Scrub-Jay has declined by about a factor of 2 over the past 20 to 25 counts, while the Steller's has held pretty steady.

Phainopepla - Noah Eckman, Palo Alto CBC

New to the count was a Costa's Hummingbird, which had been hanging out on the Stanford campus for two months. Black Rail appeared for only the fourth time, but the second year in a row (after a long gap). A stakeout Phainopepla at the Stanford Dish was likewise a fourth-time species, the second time at this location. Black Skimmers at Mountain View Shoreline Park were our first in over a decade, after years of annual wintering in the circle. Two Barn Swallows at separate locations near the Bay marked a sixth appearance, while a Yellow-bellied Sapsucker in Los Altos was the seventh in count history. Also rare was a Ferruginous Hawk at Felt Lake (private property). Several less-rare but still notable species were a female Blue-winged Teal, a Sanderling (at the edge of the count circle near Dumbarton Point in Alameda Co.), three Lesser Yellowlegs, and a House Wren (at Shoreline Park). There were three Western Tanagers, a species which has become more regular. Lastly, the Shoreline Lake Common Loon did not stay for count day, but made it into count week.

Sanderling with other shorebirds - George Chrisman, Palo Alto CBC

Ann Hepenstal, Sue Welch, Linda Sue Johnson, Joyce Zhang, Palo Alto CBC

Thanks to Ann Hepenstal for organizing the counting effort, to our eight sector coordinators, and to all who participated and persevered through the weather. Next year of course will be better!

Al Eisner

Calero-Morgan Hill

Saturday, December 28 was dry and mild, a pleasant birding day for the 97 participants who turned out for the Calero-Morgan Hill Christmas Bird Count. We tallied 140 species this year. In the 25 years of this count, species counts have ranged from 136 to 150. This year duck and shorebird numbers were down—Laguna Seca in north Coyote Valley, for example, is dry so far this season. However, Ring-necked Duck numbers were high (348), seeming to be in every small stock pond.

Janna Pauser once again added a new species to the circle list: Pygmy Nuthatch. Two wintering Burrowing Owls were found on Coyote Ridge. Howard Friedman found Grasshopper Sparrows at Stile Ranch—nice to see it wintering west of the valley. Snow and Ross’s Goose were again near the Gavilan College campus on Bailey Avenue. Numbers of Western (340) and Clark’s Grebes (25) have been growing steadily, with highs of both this year. Swallows are being found almost every winter now, with record high numbers of Tree (178) and Violet-green (48) reported this year. We had a trio of sapsuckers - Red-breasted, Red-naped, and Yellow-bellied. And we had several reports of the Slate-colored Junco form.

During count week Western Kingbird and Chipping Sparrows were reported. The Western Kingbird, found by Carter Gasiorowski, is another new bird for the count and totally unexpected.

Ferruginous Hawk by Chris Overington, Calero-Morgan Hill CBC

Thanks to the 14 sector leaders who put together great teams. This count now relies heavily on eBird for collecting and reporting what we find. It takes extra work to provide eBird some of the information required for the census, including names of party participants and time and mileage information. Several sector leaders did an especially great job adding this information to eBird. Dani Christensen in Coyote Valley (https://ebird.org/tripreport/310733) and Michael Hawk at Rancho Canada del Oro (https://ebird.org/tripreport/311421) are great examples and their trip reports are worth seeing.

Rick Herder

Mount Hamilton

We had our count on Saturday, January 4, 2025 and welcomed clear but chilly weather. We had very little weather-related access problems since the roads were open and dry. This year we had access to all our regular ranches plus San Antonio Valley Ecological Reserve (SAVER).

The result was a complete count. We had an all-time high species count coming in at 106 species, but with an average count of 7,344 individual birds. As to individual species that are specialties of this count we had 50 Lawrence’s Goldfinches tallied, but none in publicly accessible areas. One special target was the Lewis’ Woodpecker and we had a total of 32 but only 5 were viewable from San Antonio Valley Road.

Compilation dinner at Elinor Gates home on Mount Hamilton

Since we have varied habitats, each area produces some specialties. Our compilation host, Elinor Gates’ team of Andy Bradvica, Ann and Dan Espinosa, Christine Grimaldi, Howard Higley and John Tsortos did the top of Mount Hamilton and had 31 species. They found the count’s only Brown Creepers, Pine Siskins, a Townsend’s Warbler and surprisingly an American Pipit.

Howard Friedman along with Carolyn Straub and Steve McHenry, and Vicki Silvas-Young birded from Skye Ranch east down Mount Hamilton Road and the southern part of San Antonio Valley Road to the Gehri bridge. They had 42 species and the count’s only Red-shouldered Hawks.

Pete Dunten soloed the Mule trail (private) again and had 32 species including the count only Bell’s Sparrows. He also found a few (3) Thick-billed forms of the Fox Sparrow on his arduous hike.

Wood Ducks by Bob Hirt, Mount Hamilton CBC

Bob Hirt and Dave Stocks did the Arnold Ranch (private) and were joined for an hour or so by the owner Julie Marie Rench and her friend Megan. It’s great to meet the property owners and share the experience with them. Bob and Dave birded two other canyons and the A to Z Ranch. They had 49 species for the day including the count’s only Song sparrows (3), Wood Ducks and a Sora. At one of the back reed-lined ponds they were joined by a friendly neighborhood goat. Dave’s truck was essential on some of the back roads and creek fordings. He also often needed to clear fallen branches.

Isabel Ranch (private) was birded by the powerhouse team of Mike Rogers, Richard Jeffers, Mike Mammoser and Steve Rottenborn, They have a large reservoir and varied habitats to cover and found 85 species including the only Canada Geese (10), a Northern Shoveler, Hooded (15) and Common Mergansers (26), Eared Grebes (20), a Green Heron, Black-crowned Night Herons (7), a Sharp-shinned Hawk, Northern Pygmy Owls (3) and astonishingly a Long-eared Owl and a Peregrine Falcon. The owl and falcon were only found once prior on this 45-year old count. They also contributed the only Loggerhead Shrike, and Lawrences’s Goldfinches (50).

The San Antonio Valley Ecological Reserve (SAVER) (private) was birded by Leighton Nakata, James Yurchenco and Amy Lauterbach and they had 40 species including 8 Lewis’ Woodpeckers.

Dave Stocks and a Goat by Bob Hirt, Mount Hamilton CBC

The Hurner-Stoddard Ranch was led again by Kirsten Holmquist joined by Linda Pors and Erin Fisher-Collins. They walked nearly 9 miles on the ranch and found 52 species including the only American Green-winged Teal (4) and Eurasian Collared-Doves (24).

The Mines Road Team led by Mike Azevedo was joined by his daughter, Kristen and Bill Walker and Mary Wisniewski. They found 47 species along Mines road from the county line to the Junction and down Del Puerto Canyon road a bit and then San Antonio Road to the Gehri bridge. They did owling early in the morning and had 11 Great-horned and 5 Western Screech-Owls. They also had the count’s only Hutton’s Vireo.

San Antonio Valley Ecological Reserve by Nakata Leighton, Mount Hamilton CBC

At day’s end we assembled at Elinor’s Gates home and enjoyed tasty potluck appetizers, salads, dessert and wonderful meal that Elinor provided. Thank you Elinor and all you participants.

Bob Hirt

Banner Photo: Burrowing Owl by Chris Overington, Calero-Morgan Hill CBC