On May 25th at around 6:00 pm I was just sitting on the couch working on my bird lists. I looked out the window and I saw a dove sitting near one of the feeders. It’s back was faced towards me, so I couldn’t see the front of the bird, but I realized that it had a rounded tail and not a pointed like a Mourning Dove. I quickly ran to my room and grabbed my camera and took probably 20 pictures of this bird (see photos).
I quickly uploaded my pictures and submitted a report to eBird. This White-winged Dove was the 2nd record for Delaware County according to eBird. It was a state first for me, I’ve only seen them in FL. It also brought my yard list to 125 and my “patch” list to 196.
The next day the bird was still present, so I posted it on the Ohio Birds email list when I got home from school. Within 10 minutes I had received about 30 emails about the dove. The next morning people started arriving at 6:00 am. I had to go to school, so I wasn’t there the whole day, but I had received emails saying that it was still there. When I got home (4:00 pm) there were a few birders there. I stood out with the birders till the dove arrived at 7:00 pm. On Saturday a few birders came by, but the dove was not seen.
I really enjoyed having the White-winged Dove at my house not just because it was rare, but because I got to meet a lot of new birders!
Adriana Losey is a member of the Central Ohio Chapter of the Ohio Young Birders Club, sponsored by Columbus Audubon.