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#ABArare – Fieldfare – Nova Scotia
On January 31, Kathleen Spicer discovered an ABA Code 4 Fieldfare visiting a fruiting apple tree in her garden in Apple River, Nova Scotia. It has continued through today (2/2).
Photo by Kathleen F. Spicer, used with permission
Kathleen is open to visitors coming to see the bird, though she does ask that people be considerate of the road conditions before making the journey. Her contact information has been posted on the Nova Scotia listserv here. Apple River is in the north of Nova Scotia, about 80 km from Amherst in the New Brunswick border.
Fieldfare is a nomadic Turdus thrush of northern Europe and Asia. They are regular winter visitors to Iceland, and most vagrants to the ABA Area are thought to be birds blown by poor weather to Atlantic Canada, which holds the vast majority of ABA Area records of the species. Fieldfares were more commonly seen in the 1970s and 1980s. Since then, the number of sightings in the ABA Area has slowed. Exceptional North American records of Fieldfare include one in Minnesota (1991) and Delaware (1969), which illustrates the ability of this species to wander quite widely.
In addition to the eastern records, there are also four accounts of Fieldfare in Alaska and one in British Columbia.
For birders potentially traveling to see this bird, note that the Eurasian Kestrel, found at the end of last November, is still present near Halifax.
Join the American Birding Association at www.aba.org!
Source: http://blog.aba.org/2015/02/abarare-fieldfare-nova-scotia.html
