Tulsa roost watch, Aug 10 & Aug 24

[Louise Chambers]

http://www.tulsaaudubon.org/purple-martins.htm

Thanks to Tulsa Audubon for again sponsoring roost watch events!

Everyone is also invited to join TAS members to talk about Purple Martins and have dinner/drinks/snacks at 6:00 p.m. at the Seven West Cafe in the Doubletree Hotel befroe each watch.

Our annual Purple Martin Roost Watch is on Saturday, August 10 at 8:00 p.m. We have added a second Roost Watch on August 24 also at 8:00 p.m. We will meet on the top level of the Doubletree Hotel parking garage, 616 W. Seventh St., which provides a perfect overview of downtown Tulsa. You may park on the street and take the elevator to the top level, or park in the garage itself. You will need to pay to park in the garage, though if you join us for dinner they will validate your parking ticket.

We again want to say thank you to the Doubletree Hotel for allowing us to use their parking garage, and being tolerant of the birds, which do leave behind a big mess every morning.

[Dick Sherry]

Thanks, Louise, for helping get the word out.

[MamaBruff]

That sounds like a real good way for me to get a last Purple Martin "fix" before fall! Tulsa is just a couple hours down the interstate from Joplin!

[akp]

Heading down there this evening...Anyone know what the Doubletree charges to enter the parking garage?

[Dick Sherry]

I believe it is $2/hour. You could park in a lot just to the west of the garage and take the elevator from the ground floor of the garage to the roof. The elevators are in the northeast part of the garage. You will enjoy seeing all the birds.

[akp]

Looking forward to it. I took my little boy to a Drillers game last night and noticed several birds enjoying the bugs around the lights.

[Dick Sherry]

There are a lot of "flys"caught around that ball park.

[akp]

Just got back. It was quite a sight! If you go, you will not be disappointed. How are the numbers estimated? If I were to guess, I would have to say well over 100,000 birds. Maybe closer to 300,000??? It was incredible. That poor tree right up next to the parking garage at the Doubletree looked like it was about to crumble to the ground. There wasn't room for any more in it when we left. Limbs hanging low under the weight of the martins.

[Dick Sherry]

I am glad you got to see the roost Friday night. There were huge numbers on Saturday night, and a good turnout of people to see the spectacle. Some came from out of town and stayed at the hotel, plus quite a few ate dinner in the hotel's restaurant, so the Doubletree did get some business due to the martins roosting there.

It is very difficult to estimate the number of martins there. In years past I have tried to get an estimate of how many birds are at the staging areas that they use before heading to the roost at dusk. The best estimate was by using the odometer on my car to measure how many feet of electrical lines were covered with martins at the Newblock Park area west of downtown. I figured 4 to 5 martins per foot times the number of strands of wire times the total distance, which was about a mile and a half. With three wires, and 4 martins per foot, the total is 95,040. At 5 birds per foot, the total is 118,800. So the actual was probably somewhere in between. All these birds would have gone to the roost, plus the birds that gathered at Lake Yahola, about 10 miles northest of downtown, and the number of martins there can be 50 to 100 thousand depending on the point in the summer. Again, many of the martins at Yahola are perching on electric lines coming into a large water treatment plant. You can count how much space it takes for 100 martins, and then multiply that times the amount of wire that is covered with martins. There are most likely other gathering points that I am not aware of that also provide some of the martins that end up at the roost.

Whatever the number is, the sight of all these martins is amazing! It should go on for a few more weeks, so if you have any interest in martins, this is something you have to see.

[Louise Chambers]

Reminder - one more Tulsa roost watch is coming this Sat, Aug 24

[Dick Sherry]

The Roost Watch II event on Saturday night went very well. Over 100 people were there, and many were from Jenks High School as part of their Ornithology class. There were still a huge number of martins, probably well over 100,000.

I got a chance to talk to one of the hotel staff members while I was waiting for dinner, and I was glad to see that he knew quite a bit about the martins.

The martins will likely be here for a few more weeks, but the numbers will start dropping quickly when we get into September. So anyone wanting a farewell experience with the martins still have a chance.

[DornCounty]

Hello Dick,

Great news so many folks were out. I logged my visit on eBird and it flagged the 100k count as too high for purple martins. It also looks like the reviewer for OK rejected it. (don't know who that is) Even the so called bird experts can't believe it.

lol.

[Dick Sherry]

It is somewhat amusing to me that people who have not seen this rroost can dismiss the estimate of how many martins are present. I am glad you got to see it in person, and thanks for posting information on those sites. When you consider that this roost may contain birds from five or more states and possibly Canada, we are seeing birds that are not just local martins, and there may not even be any local birds at this point in the migration. Any and all high potentates of birding websites are welcome to come see the roost and I will even buy them dinner beforehand.

[DornCounty]

It is somewhat amusing to me that people who have not seen this rroost can dismiss the estimate of how many martins are present. I am glad you got to see it in person, and thanks for posting information on those sites. When you consider that this roost may contain birds from five or more states and possibly Canada, we are seeing birds that are not just local martins, and there may not even be any local birds at this point in the migration. Any and all high potentates of birding websites are welcome to come see the roost and I will even buy them dinner beforehand.

I am pretty certain that the count is closer to 200k but I estimated it much lower.. in case I was off at all.

Wish I knew who the reviewer was.. I added a bunch of photos to the entry... maybe they will consider it now.

Glad you are down their being a watch keeper!

[Don Troha]

The best estimate was by using the odometer on my car to measure how many feet of electrical lines were covered with martins at the Newblock Park area west of downtown. I figured 4 to 5 martins per foot times the number of strands of wire times the total distance, which was about a mile and a half.

I'm doing some similar estimates on the roost here & observing the Martins on power lines, there's usually some daylight between the birds so I've estimated 3-4 birds per foot. Wonder if my estimates might be too low... dt

[Dick Sherry]

Don, it is hard to know what will give you the best estimate. Maybe using a range of 3 to 5 birds per foot, and then using the resulting totals as the estimated possible number. This method is far more accurate than trying to count birds in the air, and if you can find several staging areas where most of the birds are perched on wires for a while, the totals from several locations will give a good base number for how many martins are using a roost.

Part of me wants to come up with a definite number of how many are at the roost, and another part knows that the total isn't all that important because this is just a huge number of martins that are a spectacular sight and they have all been part of making a lot of people's Spring and Summer very enjoyable.

[Don Troha]

Dick, thanks for your insight. Although my numbers might be off, by using the same method of estimating day-to-day or week-to-week, I think it provides a good indication whether the roost is growing or shrinking & when it has peaked.

btw, I enjoyed reading the recent newspaper article on the Tulsa roost. Here's the link in case anyone here missed it:
http://www.tulsaworld.com/article.aspx/ ... TLIN586948

[Dick Sherry]

Don, thanks very much for posting the link to the story.

[Don Troha]

DornCounty, I was sorting thru some eBird historical data on Purple Martins looking for large observation counts (roosts) and noticed they accepted your report for the 2013 Tulsa roost after initially rejecting it. Great to hear that this observation has been added to the eBird database. http://ebird.org/ebird/view/checklist?subID=S14955938

[DornCounty]

DornCounty, I was sorting thru some eBird historical data on Purple Martins looking for large observation counts (roosts) and noticed they accepted your report for the 2013 Tulsa roost after initially rejecting it. Great to hear that this observation has been added to the eBird database. http://ebird.org/ebird/view/checklist?subID=S14955938

Sweet.. I added Larry's video to the report also. I also wrote a rather long winded e-mail when they finally replied to my inquiry as to why they didn't take it. I must have convinced them. Still feel pretty good about it being closer to 200k when both roosting locations were added. I've been making bird estimates for quite some time so it's not like that was the first ever flock of birds I have seen. Even the video Larry created doesn't do it justice. I told the reviewer he could contact you if he needed another opinion. I guess he didn't.

Will be interesting to see if it's that big this year. I looked at radar from that time period all around OK, AR, KS & MO... The only sigs that show up are Tulsa, OKC, Wichita, & one by Springdale. Tulsa seemed to be the biggest and most reliable signature.