Date: 10/24/26 5:28 pm From: Harry LeGrand (via carolinabirds Mailing List) <carolinabirds...> Subject: New species and new species' names added/updated on the Birds of NC website
This afternoon, Tom Howard and I worked hard to get the hot-off-the-press American Ornithological Society's annual supplement (67th) taxonomy onto the Birds of North Carolina website. As I mentioned a few days ago, this has added two new species for NC -- the split-off Prairie Willet and the split-off Eurasian Whimbrel. I personally don't see a need for the NC Bird Records Committee (BRC) to hold a vote on the Prairie Willet, as it is a common winter bird along the coast. As Kent Fiala reminded me, the NC BRC a good while ago voted on and accepted photos of a "Whimbrel -- European subspecies". So, NC went from 488 species on its Definitive List to now 490. I see just now that the CBC webmaster has made these 8-9 changes -- the two species that were added to the Definitive List, and the roughly 6 other species with common or scientific name changes:
As for the species accounts themselves, I have completed them. However, the question "Which species of Willet do all of the inland records refer to?" will remain difficult to clarify. What I did was move ALL of the Mountain province records to the Prairie Willet, I copied the former text of the Willet to BOTH the Prairie Willet and the Saltmarsh Willet for the Piedmont province, and kept the inland Coastal Plain records in the Saltmarsh Willet. So, no data were lost in these moves, but certainly most far inland records in both Carolinas SHOULD be migrating Prairie Willets, whereas we would expect at least some inland records for the coastal-nesting Saltmarsh Willet to occur during or right after a tropical storm, for example -- a la inland records for Laughing Gull, or Royal Tern, etc. Of course, I had to re-write the coastal status, as we now know that the Saltmarsh Willet clears out of the Carolinas in fall and it winters in the Caribbean area, and are "replaced" from mid-fall to mid-spring by the Prairie Willet. We all hope that, over time, there will be some clarification of the migration status inland for these two similar-looking species. This IS an important consideration for many of us, as those who keep county lists will want to know where to place their record of a "Willet" at Jordan Lake or Enka Lake, for example -- and it might be more prudent to call those as Prairie Willet (unless photos can be examined).
Lastly, the county maps for these 8-9 species will still retain the older names. And, there are no maps for Eurasian Whimbrel or Prairie Willet. We hope that several map-makers who helped populate the species accounts will be able to revise maps, or generate new maps fairly soon.
