2010 Annual Meeting

2010 Annual Meeting

The 2010 annual meeting of the Texas Bird Records Committee (hereafter committee or TBRC) was held via conference call at 1:30 PM on 14 August 2010. Eric Carpenter arranged the conference call. In attendance were:

Members

• Randy Pinkston, Chair

• Mark Lockwood, Secretary

• Keith Arnold, Academician

• Martin Reid

• Mary Gustafson

• Eric Carpenter

• Ron Weeks

• Tim Fennell

TBRC member Willie Sekula was unable to participate in the meeting. The meeting was convened at 1:35 PM.

Election of Members

The second terms of Eric Carpenter and Willie Sekula expired at the end of the annual meeting. This left two vacancies to be filled. Byron Stone and Jim Paton were elected as voting members. Lockwood and Arnold were nominated for the positions of Secretary and Academician respectively and re-elected.

Current membership and term of service are as follows:

• Randy Pinkston, Chair - term expires fall 2011; can be re-elected

• Mark Lockwood, Secretary - term is as listed for Chair; can be re-elected

• Keith Arnold, Academician - term is as listed for Chair; can be re-elected

• Ron Weeks - 2nd term expires fall 2012

• Martin Reid - 1st term expires fall 2011, can be re-elected

• Tim Fennell - 1st term expires fall 2012, can be re-elected

• Mary Gustafson - 1st term expires fall 2012, can be re-elected

• Byron Stone - 1st term expires fall 2013, can be re-elected

• Jim Paton - 1st term expires fall 2013, can be re-elected

Regular Agenda Items

Fourth Round Records

1. 2009-25 Pacific Golden-Plover

Hidalgo Co., 26 March 2009

not accepted 2-6

Sequence of Members for Voting Tallies

Lockwood

Paton

Fennell

Stone

Reid

Weeks

Gustafson

Pinkston

Arnold

Motion to Add Herring (Vega) Gull to the list of Review Species under category B

Reid pointed out a discrepancy between the website and TBRC documents concerning the placement of Herring (Vega) Gull on Review List B and requested that Committee consider officially adding the taxon to the list of Review Species. Lockwood asked the committee to consider the request. Discussion of the issue centered on the need to document rare taxa within the state and the process of adding subspecies to the B list. Pinkston moved to add Herring (Vega) Gull to the B list (Reid second) and it passed 8-0.

Review of TPRF 567

Reid mentioned to the Secretary that the images of the lone state record of Wilson’s Storm-Petrel (TPRF 567) may not be clearly identifiable. The Secretary asked Arnold to provide the available documentation for Committee review at the annual meeting. There was brief discussion of the identification of the storm-petrel and the process of reviewing previously accepted records. Lockwood mentioned that this particular record had been grandfathered onto the state list without being circulated through the Committee. Arnold reported that he thought this particular record had actually gone through a formal circulation. Arnold requested circulating the record under the normal process after he had another opportunity to search for supporting documentation. The Committee agreed with that approach.

Status of Pacific Wren in Texas

Lockwood brought before the Committee the need to discuss the status of the newly elevated Pacific Wren (Troglodytes pacificus) in Texas. The discussion centered on the likely case that the species occurred in Texas, particularly the western portions of the state, at least casually. Photographs of potential Pacific Wrens taken in Texas (provided by Lockwood and Carpenter) were discussed and the need for higher quality images and, more importantly, audio recordings of calling birds to unequivocally document the species in the state. It was the Committees’ opinion that the increased attention on “Winter” Wrens would result in this level of documentation. No motion to add Pacific Wren to the state list was made.

Motion to Remove Dusky-capped Flycatcher from the list of Review Species

Lockwood asked the committee to consider removing Dusky-capped Flycatcher from the Review List. Discussion centered on the establishment of what appears to be a stable breeding population in the Davis Mountains and the regular occurrence in the Chisos Mountains. The status of the species as a winter visitor in the Lower Rio Grande Valley was also discussed and whether there was a need to continue to collect documentation in that region. Lockwood moved to remove Dusky-capped Flycatcher from the Review List (Pinkston seconded) and the motion passed 8-0. Reid (Weeks seconded) moved to add the northeastern Mexico population (M. t. lawrenceii) be added to the B category of the Review List. The motion passed 7-1 with Gustafson voting against.

Review and Revision of By-laws

The bylaws of the TBRC were reviewed. In 2007 the Committee made revisions to the by-laws to allow for conference calls rather than physical meeting. Reid determined that a section of the by-laws that needed to be changed was overlooked. Reid moved (Pinkston seconded) that the following change be made:

IV.C (Meetings/Quorum): "QUORUM. Five Voting Members in good standing, present in person physically or virtually, not by proxy, shall constitute a quorum for any meeting of the Committee.

During the 2009 annual meeting Carpenter volunteered to review minutes from previous annual meetings and determine what decisions should be reflected in the by-laws. His review of these materials resulted in three changes.

VI.B (between paragraph 9 and 10) changed to:

10. From time to time, there may be records considered that can not be identified to species but are worth documenting. Records in this category include those records where the identity might only be determinable to a genus-level or a particular species-pair. For these records, the submission would name the genus-level or species pair that the record pertains to, and the committee would treat the record at that level, not at a specific species-level. Which genus-level and species-pair records that are considered is at the discretion of the committee and is subject to change."

VI.E.4 changed to:

4. Potential First State Records and the Presumptive List. This is for records submitted for species that are not currently on the official Texas State List.

a. Records submitted for species that are not on the official Texas State List where there is no physical evidence supplied with the record will only be considered for the Presumptive List. The Secretary must indicate on the Validation Form (see Voting) that the record being circulated is only a candidate for the Presumptive List. It is otherwise handled in the same manner as other records except that, if accepted, it will only appear on the Presumptive List.

b. Records submitted for species that are not on the official Texas State List where there is physical evidence supplied with the record will initially be considered for inclusion on the official Texas State List. The Secretary and Voting Members shall vote on these based upon the criteria (see Section VI.B.7) to add it to the official Texas State List. If, after the normal voting procedures are completed and the record is Rejected, any member may request that the record be recirculated for inclusion on the Presumptive List. The Secretary will then Recirculate the record with the targeted list being the Presumptive List only (as described in the previous paragraph)."

VI.E.1.E. be eliminated from the by-laws

The Secretary, at his discretion, may accepted on behalf of the Committee, well-documented records with obviously identifiable photographs or audio recordings without circulation through the Committee. The Secretary will notify the entire Committee of records proposed for this "Fast Tracking" method of acceptance. Any Committee member may request full circulation of any record proposed for Fast Tracking and the Secretary shall circulate such records in normal manner.

No committee member suggested additional changes to the bylaws and the amended by-laws were accepted.

Adjournment

With no other formal business on the agenda, the meeting was adjourned at 2:45 PM.

Respectfully submitted,

Mark W. Lockwood

Secretary, Texas Bird Records Committee