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Posted by Paul Bithorn on 15:45:07 02/21/12
This morning I heard the loud screeching of a parrot from the 13th green at the Miami Springs Country Club. I soon located a stunningly, beautiful male Eclectus Parrot. I was so stunned, that I three-putted for a bogey six!
It was a good week for the Family Psittacidae in Miami-Dade County. While birding last Sunday, February 19th with friends Jan and David Conley from Wisconsin, we spotted fourteen (14) species of macaw, parrots and parakeets. I would harbor a guess, that there is no place in the world where you can see that many free-flying members of that family.
We started the day with Crimson-fronted Parakeets in the Burger King parking lot in Virginia Gardens. Next stop was South Miami, where a Red-crowned Parrot, two White-fronted Parrots and two Hill mynas adorned the power lines on S.W. 62nd Ave. and S.W. 65th St. We shot over to the Doc Thomas House, Tropical Audubon s office on Sunset Drive, and had two Chestnut-fronted Macaws, and a small flock of Red-masked and White-winged Parakeets feeding in a magnificent Ceiba Pentandra.
Baptist Hospital had a large flock of Mitred Parakeets, two Egyptian Geese, Chinese Swan Geese, feral Mallards, Eurasian Collared-Doves, European Starlings and House Sparrows. Nearby, Kendallwood had Monk Parakeets nesting under an FPL transformer.
Another spin into South Miami had the omnipresent flock of Common Peafowl and the Ocean Bank building, on N.W. 7th St. and N.W. 42nd Ave. in Little Havana, had a single White-winged Parakeet feeding in a Canary Island Date Palm.
The parking lot of Palm Springs Mile at W. 49th St. and West 4th Ave. in Hialeah had three Common Mynas mixed in with a flock of Bronzed Cowbirds. A stop at Hialeah Race Track had two-hundred American Flamingos, introduced from Cuba in the 1920 s, and three feral Canada Geese. A Cuban Jazz Band was playing a classic song by Cuban Jazz legend, Cachao, as we enjoyed sunning at this historic landmark.
We closed out the day in Miami Springs with White-eyed, Scarlet-fronted and Green Parakeets and three Orange-winged Parrots and a single Yellow-crowned Parrot.
Life is good urban birding in beautiful South Florida. It s really not such a miserable place to live, as those knuckleheads at Forbes Magazine might have you think! Including all of the parrots, feral and introduced birds, we saw an amazing (27) species. Dave and I quaffed an Arrogant Bustard Ale from the Stone Brewing Company and an Innis and Gunn Scottish Ale as our celebratory libations.
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