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Posted by Bill Pranty on 23:36:09 02/21/06
In Reply to: Budgerigars in South Florida posted by Vince Lucas
I'm quite happy to let locals respond, but I'll throw in my $0.02 also, since I wrote detailed paper on Budgie occurrence in Florida several years ago ("The Budgerigar in Florida: Rise and fall of an exotic psittacid," _North American Birds_ 55: 389-397, 2001).
Budgies have never really been a part of the southeastern Florida avifauna. If we exclude the GBBC data for a moment, the largest count reported in the region was 11 on the 1978 Fort Lauderdale CBC, when Budgie populations along the central Gulf coast also peaked. And there hasn't been a published report of more than one Budgie in the region since 1988 (Fort Lauderdale CBC report of 5).
Again, if we temporarily ignore GBBC data and the questionable claim by Anne Shapiro (1980) that Budgies were "common" at Miami in the 1970s (a claim based on unreferenced hearsay that is not supported by CBC or other data such as _Audubon Field Notes_ or _American Birds_ reports), the highest count of Budgies in Miami-Dade County _ever_ has been one!
I agree that reports of Budgies at Ocala are almost certainly erroneous. I couldn't find any Budgie data from Florida for the current GBBC (I must have overlooked something), but there are several observations from Florida in previous years.
At Ocala in 2004, there were 17 Budgies reported --http://gbbc.birdsource.org/gbbcApps/report?cmd=showReport&reportName=CitySummary&city=Ocala&state=US-FL&year=2004 -- but also reported were 5 White-winged Parakeets and 1 Spot-breasted Oriole (!). This makes me wonder if an Ocala birder visited Miami and erroneously listed his/her sightings as Ocala.
Other recent GBBC data purporting Budgies -- including 35 at Palm Bay in 2004 -- http://gbbc.birdsource.org/gbbcApps/report?cmd=showReport&reportName=CitySummary&city=Palm%20Bay&state=US-FL&year=2004 -- are also probably erroneous -- note again the White-winged Parakeet and the American Black Ducks (with no Mottleds) and Yellow Warbler.
Even data from St. Petersburg, where Budgies were abundant through the late 1970s, contain clear problems. In 2003, 20 Budgies were reported -- http://gbbc.birdsource.org/gbbcApps/report?cmd=showReport&reportName=CitySummary&city=Saint%20Petersburg&state=US-FL&year=2003 -- but so were 1 Snail Kite (!), 1 Short-tailed Hawk, 5 Purple Swamphens (!), 5 Least Terns (!), 1 Rusty Blackbird, and 8 Brewer's Blackbirds.
And there are other examples that I see little reason to mention, as I think I have made my point.
With respects to those of us who participate in the GBBC, there are clear problems with the database from the lack of quality control. Unfortunately, the GBBC database is unvetted and regrettably simply cannot be trusted in many cases, IMHO including Budgie reports.
One would hope that Cornell and Audubon someday will treat the GBBC data with the same care and attention that they give to the CBC and BBS data. Unfortunately, that day clearly is not yet here.
I think the reason that we never (?; I did not search the TAS archives) have seen reports of multiple Budgies in the region by the likes of John Boyd, Larry Manfredi, Paul Bithorn et al. is that Budgies have been extirpated for 15 or more years (with the obvious exception of fairly frequently reported escapees, which seen to survive poorly and disappear quickly), and that the reports of Budgies from GBBC are based on inexperienced observed viewing other psittacids, or perhaps (as in the 2004 Ocala data) some other type of clear errors.
No disrespect toward anybody is intended in this post.
Best regards,
Bill Pranty
Bayonet Point, Florida
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