Year-in-Review: 2008

Month by Month: The rules of this exercise are simple: As in 2006 and 2007, I reviewed my monthly archives and posted the first sentence of the first post of each month in 2008.

January: The Complete Chicken: A Book Review—I’ve always looked askance at the Domestic Chicken (Gallus domesticus) and it's evolutionary progenitor (G. gallus), as if they were not worthy of being considered real birds. (…more)

February: My January BiGBY List—This expands on an earlier preliminary list of birds recorded on a Walking BiGBY (Big Green Bird Year) count that I am conducting in Buchanan Township, Berrien County, Michigan. (…more)

March: My February BiGBY List—This report continues my monthly tally of species observed on a BiGBY (Big Green Big Year) being conducted in Buchanan, Michigan. (…more)

April: My March BiGBY List—The Big Green Big Year (known as BiGBY, for short) challenges birders to compile a Big Year list without the aid of fossil fuel-burning vehicles. (…more)

May: Field Notes from the Past #10—Being a continuation of field-journal entries from the springs of 1962 and 1963 when I was a budding ornithologist of just 15 or 16 growing up in the rural village of Galien in Berrien County, Michigan. (…more)

June: Pleistocene Vertebrates of Berrien County, Michigan-- The Pleistocene epoch lasted from about 1.8 million years ago until 10,000 years ago. (…more)

July: CoCoRaHS in Michigan: The First 15 Days—CoCoRaHS (the Community Collaborative Rain, Hail, and Snow Network) was initiated in Michigan beginning July 1st (see here). (…more)

August: Fresh-Frozen Chickens—The following description of the effects of an unusual meteorological event on domestic chickens is excerpted from the History of Weather Observations : Indianapolis, Indiana, 1861-1948 (.pdf), by Glen Conner. (…more)

September: Emu on Pennsylvania Turnpike--Yes, that’s right. You read correctly. (…more)

October: Diagramming Sarah: A Bird Analogy--In an article that examines Sarah Palin’s convoluted speech patterns, grammarian Kitty Burns Florey provides this delightful bird analogy. (…more)

November: Unusual Field of View-- It’s not often that one encounters Wood Ducks and American Robins in the same binocular view, but that’s what happened to me yesterday, probably for the first time in my life. (…more)

December: Sparrow Wars-- If (like me) you enjoy attracting wild birds to your yard by providing food and shelter for them, and if (like me) your enjoyment of this activity has been diminished by the arrival of noisy and quarrelsome (and non-native and invasive) House Sparrows, then I may have found the solution to your (and my) problem. (…more)

Personal Favorite:

Towhee Madness—This story begins in a most unlikely way. Standing by the dining room window and looking out at the usual assembly of birds gathering at the feeders on the morning of January 31, I said to Marj, almost in jest, “I want to see something new.” (...more)

Most Popular (as determined by reader comments):

The "Other" Field Guide to Birds—I am speaking, of course, of the National Wildlife Federation field guide to birds of North America, by Edward S. Brinkley. (…more)

Ghost Bird—The Movie (Trailer)—Here’s a little something to whet your appetite. (…more)

Mantra for True Believers—This would seem to be the perfect mantra for folks in hot pursuit of rarities such as the Ivory-billed Woodpecker or creatures of a more crytological nature such as Bigfoots and Thunderbirds. (…more)

Summary: While the total of 179 entries posted during 2008 (an average of 15/month; range: 3 to 37) was down from the 263 posted in 2007, I continue to pride myself on the quality of my posts.