Wild Turkey, Nebraska. Photo: Rick Wright.

The first Wild Turkeys brought to Europe were sent back from Mexico by Cortés in 1519. According to the Handbook of the Birds of the World, domestic turkeys were “well established” in Spain and in England by 1541–so well established, in fact, that the Jamestown colonists actually brought turkeys along with them when they sailed for Virginia in 1607, making that the first North American bird to travel west across the Atlantic.

Happy Thanksgiving!

What was the first native North American bird species to be transported west across the Atlantic Ocean from Europe?

Submit your answer as a comment here at The Wingbeat. The first correct answer, and the wittiest, most cogent, or most startling incorrect answer, will win a dapper new WINGS cap. We’ll include our answer and the names of the winners in the December 2009 e-newsletter.

Oaxaca is famed the world ’round for its richly historic culture and for some of the best birding in Mexico. This year’s Oaxaca Birding Marathon, held over the last of October and the first of November, provided eloquent testimony to the area’s birding potential, with 406 species (!) recorded over two and a half days by 23 participants led by our friends Eric Antonio, Roque Antonio, Edgar del Valle, and Manuel Grosselet.

Among the birds tallied were 39 endemic and 28 nearly endemic species.

Lesser Ground-Cuckoo. Photo: Manuel Grosselet.

The weekend’s list was a riotous jumble of great birds: Boucard’s Wren, Dwarf Jay, Dwarf Vireo, Aztec Thrush, Chesnut-sided Shrike -Vireo, Townsend’s Shearwater, Rosita’s Bunting, Red-breasted Chat, Sparkling-tailed Hummingbird, and on and on.

Rosita's Bunting. Photo: Manuel Grosselet.

Manuel and his colleagues are already planning their next marathon. And here at WINGS we’re looking forward ourselves to our next visit to Oaxaca and Chiapas with Steve Howell and Rich Hoyer in March.

Today’s NYT points out that Florence, birthplace of the Renaissance,  remains one of the most culturally vibrant cities in Italy, as we’ll discover in Tuscany next May.

Join us!

The world’s last wild flock of Whooping Cranes is headed south to its Texas wintering grounds.

Whooping Cranes. Photo: Steve Hillebrand/USFWS.

As many as 36 cranes were seen over the weekend in the area of Cheyenne Bottoms and Quivira NWR in Kansas. The next days and weeks will see virtually all of the mid-continent flock arriving on the Texas coast, where they’ll be waiting on Gavin Bieber’s February tour, Whooping Cranes and the Rio Grande Valley.

The Portland Press Herald published a good article about the three Pink-footed Geese discovered by Derek Lovitch in Maine.

Pink-footed Geese, Maine. Photo: Derek Lovitch.

With birders from the East Coast and the West–even from as far as Alaska–coming to see them, the geese are another powerful demonstration of the economic clout of birding in North America.