Posted by Bill Pranty on October 31, 2003 at 16:22:25:
In Reply to: Psittacid status posted by Dan Scheiman on October 31, 2003 at 00:56:30:
Hi Dan,
Although some listers may disagree, I believe that THE list to use for determining "official" birds in Florida is the list kept by the Florida Ornithological Society Records Committee (FOSRC). A somewhat outdated version (i.e., not including ~10 species added in the past 2-3 years) is found at http://www.fosbirds.org/RecordCommittee/StateListJuly2001.htm. (Let's see if the list allows me to post the URL...).
Muscovy Duck is on this list and is therefore countable throughout Florida.
For the record, there are only 3 countable psittacids in Florida: the Budgerigar, Monk Parakeet, and White-winged Parakeet. The Yellow-chevroned Parakeet is NOT countable becuase it has not been ratified by any state committee within the ABA Area. (Even though it has recently been added to the ABA Checklist as a "countable" bird, it's not "listable" anywhere. ... Long story about that one...).
The FOSRC requires that at least one study be conducted and a peer-reviewed paper be published before the Committee will vote to consider adding a new exotic to the Florida list. They also prefer exotics with fairly large populations, "at least several hundred breeding pairs" according to their guidelines.
Under these criteria, most exotics - even those present for 20+ years, will likely never be countable because of the issue of population size. (Also, some currently listable exotics -- Red-whiskered Bulbul and Spot-breasted Oriole come to mind -- would NOT meet the size criteria if the species were not "grandfathered in" from pre-FOSRC lists). I understand that the FOSRC is looking at revising their guidelines for determining when exotics can be counted, but I'm sure they'll retain the requirement of a study and peer-reviewed publication. (At least I hope they do -- we certainly don't want to repeat any more Blue-gray Tanager debacles in the future).
Unfortunately, virtually nobody in Florida is willing to do the work necessary to document potentially established populations of exotic birds (which typically would necessitate spending hundreds of hours observing birds in urban settings, ideally for 1-2 years). A friend and I have submitted a manuscript documenting the population increase and range expansion of Black-hooded Parakeets along the central Gulf coast (Pasco to Sarasota counties) using Christmas Bird Count data, but I'm not aware of any other exotic being studied sufficiently to get to manuscript form.
Monitoring populations of certain exotic birds (Common Myna is perhaps the most obvious example) would be an excellent project for TAS to coordinate.
BTW, my book is in revision as I write this, with a projected publication date of mid-2004.
Best regards,
Bill Pranty
Avon Park, Florida