This checklist is without copyright and can be used by anyone as they wish. Click on page, use magnification tool, click drag. Note that it is made to print, fold, and staple as a booklet. This and the BC Checklist will be totally 'revamped" next year. No major changes will occur.
The total has climbed to 416 species as of April 15, 2012.
The accidental status of Pink-footed Shearwater on this checklist may seem outlandish considering the drastic change in status during the late summer and fall of 2008 and 2009 in the Juan de Fuca Straits. Once extremely rare, if unrecorded in the straits before 2008, the tubenose was fairly common from August though early October during that period. However, this trend has changed back to the original status with only two reports received in 2010 and none in 2011. One off Shirley by Don Cecile (E-Fauna photo gallery ID #7790) and one off Victoria taken by Rich Mooney http://www.flickr.com/photos/gonebirding/4020688913
Campbell et al states that the population of Brandt's Cormorants fluctuates greatly from year to year along our coast and that the numbers are especially low during El Nino years. This species has decreased in the waters around Victoria in recent summers but the bar graphs on the British Columbia and Vancouver Island Checklists for July through August will remain as is to wait for any change that might occur in the cormorant’s status should the phenomenon reverse. As predicted, the numbers have built in the summer of 2011 but they are still very uncommon at this point in time. https://picasaweb.google.com/116613508683518614971/Ranges#5638896593746736978
As the http://birdinfo.com website is no longer housing rare bird photos, the Victoria Natural History Society accepts such images at: http://www.vicnhs.bc.ca/rarebird.htm
Hermit Thrushes summer within a thin slice of the Victoria Checklist area in the western hills. Most are found from the higher Sooke hills to the Weeks Lake Plateau. Insertion of a bar across summer to symbolize this separate group would be a misrepresentation of the general status in the checklist region as a whole. Summering is a rare occurrence as a rule in most of the checklist area.
Biogeoclimatic Zones of Vancouver Island. The Southeast Coastal Lowlands extend from Sooke to Campbell River; The East Coast Zone from China Beach through Shirley to Sooke and northward to Sayward; The West Coast from China Beach to Telegraph Cove. The Northern Inland Mountains are usually included in the West Coast Zone that almost reaches the Southeast Coastal Lowlands near Courtenay. Compare with the map on page 4 that conforms to the Biogeoclimatic map produced at the Royal BC Museum (see text as well). The southwestern boundary of the Southeast Coastal Lowlands begins at Gordon Bay (Otter Point to merge with the Victoria Checklist area). The East Coast Zone is more irregular in the central interior and extends along the northeastern coast to Telegraph Cove on the museum's map. This variation is reproduced on my map. The Southwest Coast (which begins at China Beach and extends along the coast to Port Renfrew) is a division simply created for ornithological interest and has no merit as a true zone.
