Three Rivers Birding Club Southwestern Pennsylvania

Our Next Three Rivers Meeting

FUTURE PROGRAMS:

• April 8, 2026 (the second Wednesday) - SCOTT ROBINSON - What Birds Need During Migration
• June 3, 2026 - AMANDA HANEY - Trinidad and Tobago
• August 5, 2026 - FRANK IZAGUIRRE - TBA
• October 7, 2026 - BRIAN SHEMA - Chimney Swift Research

Last Updated on 12/3/2025

Items of Interest

   VIEW THE NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2025 EDITION OF OUR NEWSLETTER -- THE PEREGRINE

The November/Decemober edition of The Peregrine (in full color) is avaiable here: November/December 2025.
See also Tom Moeller's photo gallery to accompany his "Observations" column:
San Joaquin Marsh.

   THE WRITTEN MINUTES AND VIDEO OF OUR OCTOBER 8, 2025 MEETING WITH DAVE BROOKE ARE AVAILABLE!

Read the Meeting Minutes for our October 8, 2025 hybrid membership meeting featuring Dave Brooke and his program "The Sandhill Cranes of Bosque del Apache" here: October Minutes.

You can see the video of the October 8 meeting here: October Meeting.

   ANOTHER FALL OUTING HAS BEEN ADDED IN DECEMBER!

One outing is left this fall. Our last this season comes on December 6, 2025, featuring TED FLOYD, an iconic Pittsburgh native and preeminant author and editor of birding literature, as one of the leaders.

Find the details here: Outings page.

   IT'S CHRISTMAS BIRD COUNT TIME!

When you join a local Christmas Bird Count (CBC), you are taking part in a community science project that has been running since 1900! The data from the annual count is used to show changes in bird populations and inform conservation decisions.

Why not start (or continue) an end -of-year tradition? Counts must take place within pre-determined count circles. Bird feeder counts within circles are welcome. The Pittsburgh Area count will take place on Saturday, December 27th, but our region hosts several counts between December 14th and December 27th. For more information on how to participate, visit aswp.org/the-christmas-bird-count.

For more information on count circles, count data, and other information go to the National Audubon site here: Join the Christmas Bird Count.

   TOM AND JANET KUEHL REMIND US THE 2025-2026 WINTER ATLAS BEGINS ON DECEMBER 1, 2025

The time to get back to Atlas-Work is now at hand as the 2025-26 Winter Atlas begins on December 1 and runs through February 28, 2026. So, make sure your phone eBird app is set on the Pennsylvania Bird Atlas and get birding! Please, of course! There are very few opportunities for breeding codes (not much more than a Rock Pigeon in appropriate habit), so just enjoy the birding. Think safety first - so a caution, especially early on during White-tailed Deer Rifle Season, don't be shy about packing and wearing that blaze orange vest.

A major change in the Winter Atlas is that the Water Body Survey requirements have been dropped, so just enjoy your favorite waterfowl hot spot without the burden of the survey requirements. Here is a link to the revised Winter Atlas Handbook.

Just one major point from Tom Kuehl is with respect to the One-hour Walking Survey. While the Atlas objective is to complete the walking surveys in all Priority Blocks over the course of the Five-year Atlas Project, my point to share is that the one-hour surveys are welcomed and helpful to be done at any time and in any Block. Why? The data from these one-hour walks will be included in a winter species distribution analysis. If you will be walking for an hour or more on your favorite bike trail or in a park, you can do a checklist that will be included in the data analysis - no special naming of the location is needed. Just cut off the time of your checklist within a few minutes of one hour (60 minutes), and the checklist will be included. Note that you must be walking (not driving or stationary), and that will be determined by an appropriate distance for your "traveling" checklist.

For an article on the First Winter Season look under the All Atlas News tab on the eBird Atlas Webpage or use this direct link: Early Look at Results From the First Winter Atlas Season.

And for easy access in the Handbook on Page 7 - TIMED ONE-HOUR SURVEYS

All birding observations are useful for understanding species distributions. However, surveys with standardized effort are needed to help us understand how numerous a given species is. During the Breeding Atlas, birders conduct point counts for this purpose. For the Winter Atlas, birders will conduct traveling (on foot) surveys of precisely one hour. Data from these 1-hour surveys will be especially useful for making comparisons across blocks.

ONE-HOUR SURVEY PROTOCOL:

• Study the block ahead of time and identify suitable habitat patches for conducting surveys in. Ideally, each 1-hour survey will cover one habitat patch or type. For example, a 1-hour survey could take place along a forested trail, through a shrubby meadow, or around an urban neighborhood.


• Survey the designated habitat patch on foot, identifying and counting all birds seen and heard.


• Don't worry about the distance covered, but do try to keep the checklist to precisely one hour. Set a timer if needed to ensure that you end your survey on time.


• Only record the birds detected during the 1-hour survey on your checklist. If you want to record other birds detected outside of the survey window, start a new checklist once the 1-hour survey is over, or record additional birds as incidentals. This will help ensure that the data used for estimating relative abundance is accurate.


• One-hour surveys can be conducted at any time of day, except the first hour after dawn and the hour before dusk, when birds may be traveling from or to roost sites. Find your local sunset and sunrise times at www.suncalc.org. Multiple 1-hour surveys can be completed in a day, but make sure that each survey is recorded as a unique checklist.


• As with other types of surveys, avoid conducting 1-hour surveys during inclement weather that will impact your ability to see or hear birds.


• Unlike the volunteer point count surveys conducted for the Breeding Atlas, you do not need to assign a specific name to your 1-hour survey checklists (although you may, if it helps with keeping track of your personal effort). Additionally, do not share these checklists with the 'PA Bird Atlas' eBird account like you do with the volunteer point counts.

All are welcome to help, if not in your home county then in other Southwest Regions and across the Commonwealth as many of our rural counties are struggling to get these SE Priority Block survey work completed. Janet and Tom Kuehl might also welcome help in the late winter season as they will be busy running WRS routes, so please let them know if you would be willing to survey in Westmoreland County. Their email is tjkuehl@comcast.net.

Longer Articles Highlighted in THE PEREGRINE

Longer articles and a photo gallery that members contributed to The Peregine have been assembled in this compilation. We hope you enjoy them again:

Oscar Miller's recent article "Blue Grosbeaks in Southwestern Pennsylvania," referred to in the September/October 2024 edition of The Peregrine, has moved from this Main page to its own page: Blue Grosbeaks.

Frank Izaguirre wrote an article for the January 2021 edition of Birding magazine. With permission of the magazine and its editor Ted Floyd, we can present a PDF of the article at this link: Celebrating the Stumpbreaker of Squirrel Hill.

Tom Moeller had a two-part article in subsequent editions issues of The Peregrine during 2020 on Cedar Waxwings. Here are the two parts as one: Here's the Background on a Backyard Beauty.

Frank Izaguirre's adventure in exploring snowy Canada for winter birds in February 2020 was also a two-part article in two editions of The Peregrine. Again, the two parts appear here as one: Frigid Canada's Birds Warmed a Pair of Birders.

The stunning gallery of birds and scenery from Northwest Argentina, which is an adjunct to Claire Staples' article "A Very High Adventure: Birding to 15,000 Feet in Argentina's Andes" [The Peregrine Vol. 18, No. 2, March/April 2019], can still be enjoyed: Northwest Argentina.

David Yeany II and his friends took a side trip from Magee Marsh one rainy day in 2018 to find a Kirtland's Warbler in his narrative Saving the Best for Last: A Kirtland's Warbler Adventure.

Other Important Items

2024 WAS A PRODUCTIVE YEAR AS WE BECAME A NON-PROFIT CORPORATION

Our 2024 activities included our usual winter, spring, and fall outings, and membership meetings continued as hybrid in-person/Zoom formats, except in the winter months. Steve Thomas was able to compile the six meetings we had, the full sets of spring and fall migration outings, and other events in our full 2024 calendar. See the year's history as a PDF here: 2024 Events.

A NEW ERA FOR THREE RIVERS BIRDING CLUB IS SPELLED OUT

As you know by now, the Three Rivers Birding Club has formed into a 501(c)(3) non-profit corporation governed by a nine-member Board of Directors. Our organization has an official set of Bylaws, which spell out many details of the make-up of the "new" club, including the responsibilities of the Board of Directors, choosing of officers and their terms and duties, financial reporting to the IRS, standing committees, an annual election meeting, voting procedures, and so on. The members can read these Bylaws by following the link found at the top of each page of this website: Three Rivers Bylaws

FOLLOW US ON FACEBOOK!

Be sure to visit our club's Facebook page for up-to-date news on happenings with the club, member photos, or links to other birding articles and sites.

WE'RE ON INSTAGRAM TOO!

Our social media presence has expanded. Thanks to member, Malcolm Kurtz, we now have a site on Instagram. You can check for developments on our website 3rbc.org, upload photos, or comment on bird sightings, photos, or outings. Check out our Instagram site here: https://www.instagram.com/3rbcpgh/.

PSO's "PENNSYLVANIA BIRDS" MAGAZINE: SEE WHAT YOU'VE BEEN MISSING

The Pennsylvania Society for Ornithology (PSO) publishes previews of the current issue of Pennsylvania Birds online, which consist of the cover, table of contents, and a featured article. Now anyone who does not subscribe or perhaps does not even know about PSO can actually see a little bit of what they've been missing, and hopefully be encouraged to join PSO! Click on the following link for an example of an article from the latest edition of Pennsylvania Birds: sample article.

Pennsylvania Birds is an all-volunteer effort, created and maintained by a group of Pennsylvania's most dedicated birders, but it is not an exclusive club. Anyone may contribute, whether a member of PSO or not, any original work related to birds or birding in Pennsylvania. If you have photos, article ideas, letters to the editor... as long as it is original work and related to birds or birding in Pennsylvania.

Consider joining PSO if you haven't already. They especially encourage the "beginners" out there, those of you who are just starting to discover the wonderful hobby of birding. In addition to being relatively inexpensive, membership buys you a year's subscription to Pennsylvania Birds and The Pileated, the PSO newsletter.

Find the Home page of the Pennsylvania Society for Ornithology here: PSO.

"BIRD WATCHER'S DIGEST" BRINGS BIRDING NEWS AS "BWD"

Bird Watcher's Digest, the birding magazine that suddenly closed in December 2021, resumed publication with its July/August 2022 edition under its new title BWD.
Two new publishers, Rich Luhr and Mike Sacopulos, have taken on the task of resurrecting BWD. Many of the magazine's former staff have returned to revamp the style and size of the publication. A welcome return of a vital birding publication.

For more information on the magazine, visit the BWD website here: BWD.