BBC Snippets

Link: http://www.freelists.org/archives/bristol-birds/02-2008/msg00067.html

Perhaps the last thing that would cross your mind is that Johnny Wood, the likeable anchor of WCYB-TV's Newscenter 5 This Morning with Johnny Wood, has several years taken part in the Bristol Christmas bird count.

That is a fact many will never stumble across. Most of you know him as the morning news guy who has one of the highest rated morning newscast in America. That means he has a higher percentage of his audience during that morning time slot than any other local anchor in the country. If not now, at least for many years, no one had a higher rating.

Johnny is well known for his fishing and his fishing reports which he has probably aired constantly since he joined the WCYB-TV5 team in 1968. That may come to a close this spring because the chatter on the street has it he is retiring in May. Wow. More than 40 years in broadcasting !

He entered the bird scene as Wallace Coffey's friend since the two first met in college and in the days when he and Coffey's sister worked together in radio. Two other birders at WCYB-TV, where Coffey directed evening newscasts in the late 1960's, were very active. Among them was Roger Stone, who was with Coffey when they found Tennessee's first and only Northern Shrike in November 1964. A popular news anchor of that time, Gerry Delantonas, was also active on the bird scene. He was compiler of the Bristol Christmas Bird Count in 1967.

The BBC has always hustled to make the Bristol Christmas Bird Count more productive and enjoyable for all. So unique ways of covering the count area were adopted from unique things going on around its members.

The most early use of boats by BBC was Hank Woodward and Coffey kayaking the length of Stonemill Marsh at Abingdon with the weather blazing cold and ice hanging from all the vegetation during the Dec 30,1961 Bristol Christmas count.

The most recent is the June 14-15-16, 2002 weekend at the Rikemo Lodge of The Nature Conservancy when the BBC took nine canoes for a 9-mile birding trip down the Clinch River from Cleveland, Va. Some 19 birders took part, including Ed Talbott and Michelle Talbot who had just joined the BBC. We were great river runners until Janice Martin sank in a rapids after turning her boat over by grabbing a limb.

Snippet has accounted the club's use of boats for various events as well as field trips at South Holston Lake. We'll tell you later about boating and birding with the Bob Parker family at Watauga Lake.

Early on the BBC began using motorboats to cover South Holston Lake during the Bristol Christmas count. The first adventure was with a borrowed rental boat from Laurel Yacht Club in 1967.

In 1969 Johnny Wood joined the count and worked waterfowl from his boat on South Holston Lake. He was on the count for several years and some of the reports indicate up to 58 miles of lake and shoreline coverage and as much as 7 hours aboard the boat.

Bristol Christmas Bird Count used boats for a period of 7 or 8 years over a decade from the late 1960s into the late 1970s.

In 1976, road conditions were bad, the weather dangerous. It cleared and the sun was out on count day. Dr. Phil Shelton of Clinch Valley College at Wise, Va. flew from Lonesome Pine Airport to Bristol and provided some 40 miles of air coverage to count birds, including waterfowl. Most of us might call it harsh conditions but Shelton has vast experience flying in various types of weather in isolated and primitive wilderness. He enrolled at Perdue University in 1960 and spent years working on his Ph.D. studying beavers at Isle Royale, located in the northwest portion of Lake Superior. He had flown many trips in and out and about some 400 square miles of an area accessible only by boat or plane. He has flown widely throughout the Southern Appalachians in his private plane since he moved here. He is, perhaps, our living expert on the birds of Mount Rogers-Whitetop. He certainly has spent more time there than any birder in history.

Charlie Smith, a member of the Lee & Lois Herndon TOS Chapter in the late 1960's, applied for a grant from the Tennessee Academy of Science to experiment with aerial counts of waterfowl at Boone and Patrick Henry lakes in Sullivan County. The grant funded a winter-long series of weekly flights from Tri-City Airport using a rented plane and pilot from the Appalachian Flying Service. Coffey was a mentor to Smith and was on board for those air counts each week and helped design the project. Some of that was carried over to later BBC activities. Charlie earned his Ph.D. at Cornell University and was on the staff at the Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology. He was the fist technical editor for the Lab's outstanding magazine Living Bird. He is still at Cornell and nearing retirement.

The use of planes to survey birds and their habitat extended itself into the 1970's with Jim Bowdoin of Bristol, a long-time member of the Tri-City Airport Commission, flying Coffey frequently on all types of air searches. Included in these were the first air survey and photos of the Slagle Creek Natural Area which is the southwestern half of Steele Creek Park in the city of Bristol.

Bowdoin also flew author Michael Frome and Coffey over hundreds of miles, including Mount Rogers-Whitetop and Roan Mountain. Frome authored two excellent books, "Strangers In High Places. The Story of the Great Smoky Mountain" (1966) and "Whose Woods These Are. The Story of the National Forest" (1962). He was the past editor of the Society of American Foresters' magazine and a columnist with Field & Stream. Jim was a star halfback for the Alabama Crimson Tied, 1954-55-56. He is well known throughout this region as an active college and high school football official.

The Bristol Herald Courier made available to Coffey, in the early 1970s, its corporate plane to survey habitat of the mountains from Roanoke to Knoxville. That was followed by the U.S. Forest Service providing its Region 8 plane from Atlanta for Coffey and Jefferson National Forest Supervisor Mike Penfold to survey areas from Bristol to Newfound Gap in the Smokies.

In the early 1970's, Dr. Fred Alsop arrived in Northeast Tennessee on the faculty of East Tennessee State University at the Kingsport Campus. A well-known birder, author, artist and lecture on birds, he soon had his own airplane which was used widely across the region, state and other parts of the country. Dr. Tom Laughlin and Rick Phillips, his students, joined him on some trips.

In the late 1990's, Dr. Jim Lapis, a gastroenterologist with Gastroenterology Associates of Bristol, offered the use of his airplane to fly Bald Eagle counts of Upper East Tennessee reservoirs each January. He flew the first trip and then his wife, Dr. Susan Lapis, flew two trips. Susan is secretary of the Asheville based SouthWings, a non-profit conservation organization that provides skilled pilots and aerial education to enhance conservation efforts across the Southeast. Susan is a 1000-plus hour instrument-rated pilot who has flown her Cessna 182 for SouthWings since 1999. She is a PhD biochemist who has worked in enzymology and cancer research. Susan has also taught various pre-med chemistry courses and still teaches in winter at the Southwest Virginia Higher Education Center in Abingdon as a volunteer.

Jim Lapis took over for her and flew another flight or two. Among those who helped with the aerial surveys of the Bald Eagles and flew on board these flights were Larry McDaniel, Rick Knight, Dave Worley and Coffey. The data from these surveys is part of the annual mid-winter eagle counts made each year by the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency. The local flights for the eagles were based out of Virginia Highlands Airport and included surveys of South Holston Lake, Watauga Lake, Boone Lake, Patrick Henry Lake, the Holston River to Cherokee Dam and back to Abingdon.

When the U.S. Forest Service thought they may have evidence of a Bald Eagle nesting near Little Oak Campground on South Holston Lake but could not find a nest, Dr. Jim Lapis and Coffey flew a treetop search but nothing was found.

McDaniel will remember the cold January morning with snow on the ground and heavy frost on the wings when he stood on a step ladder and swept and brushed the frost off the wings of the Cessna 182. Jim Lapis spent nearly and hour getting the engine started on a plane that had a bad battery. Worley will never forget flying over all the devastation of flooding along the river in Carter County near Hampton where homes were widely destroyed. Nor will he forget a treetop pass below the ridge at Roan Creek on the upper end of Watauga Lake as he made video of an adult Bald Eagle perched on a branch above the water. Knight will remember discovering the Great Blue Heron nesting colony on an island in Cherokee Lake. He also photographed Orchard Bog from the air on a return trip.

In more recent years James Brooks, a staff writer with the Johnson City Press and a bird columnist, earned his pilot license and frequently flew out of the Greeneville area. James has led bird tours in many parts of the world and has been a lister and birder of much note.

From the archives of the Bristol Bird Club

Link: http://www.freelists.org/archives/bristol-birds/02-2008/msg00010.html

March 6, 1938 Among the special egg sets in the East Tennessee State University Biology Department's specimen collections is what modern day birders and ornithologists believe may be the last documented nesting of the Peregrine Falcon (Duck Hawk of old) in Northeast Tennessee or Southwest Virginia.

The eggs are known as the Robert B. Lyle collection, given to ETSU in the early '70s by the Johnson City resident who collected them over a 40-year period when collecting eggs was a hobby among some naturalist.

Lyle (1888-1971), in his years of failing health, had become a close friend of Wallace Coffey who often visited with him in his home and corresponded with him while in a VA hospital in North Carolina. The two spent many days and long hours talking about egg collecting, localities and birding records of the region.

Coffey had a U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service scientific collecting permit for birds, eggs and such. He also held state permits for Tennessee and Virginia. Since Coffey was the only person in the region, outside of a university or qualified museum, who could legally take and possess the eggs. Lyle gave the collection to Coffey on a promise that it would eventually be moved to a teaching collection somewhere in the region.

Coffey's inventory of the collection found it contained 2,776 eggs in 641 clutches (egg sets) contained in 566 boxes. A 1972 inventory by Dr. Jerry Nagel reported 3,092 eggs in 637 clutches, representing 392 species.

In addition, Lyle gave Coffey many color slides of birds, photo albums of bird's nest and eggs and, at his death, left him his personal nature library.

The now famous photo of the Peregrine nest is only owned as copies by a handful of people who have prints given in honor of their contribution to regional ornithology and bird study.


One original is known to exist. The 8X10 was given to Rick Knight for his work with area bird records and his hacking of Peregrines, both at Roan Mountain and in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park.

Coffey owns what appears to be a 4X5 and a 5X7 copy of the original which has the personal notes made by Lyle both on the face and on the back of the black and white print.

Lyle, and his birding companion, Bruce P. Tyler (1874-1975) of Johnson City, are believed to be the first bird photographers in the Mountain Empire Region.

Also among Lyle's photo collection is one of the great Devil's Looking Glass on the Nolichucky River just downstream from the I-26 bridge at Erwin in Unicoi County, TN.


His ink notes on the back say:

"nesting site of Duck Hawk 'Devil's Looking Glass' Unicoi Co., Tennessee" The same information appears at the bottom of the photo on the front. This photo was pasted in an album of his bird pictures and he may have added that information on the front so it could be seen. However, the ink notes on the back are still in good shape and very clear after having been removed from the pages. A second photo is looking down on the nest.

In this second photo two people can be seen below. Both of these pictures appear to have been made the same day or same season.


Some of the details on the back have been damaged from removing this print from the album. It apparently says that this is a photo looking down from above the nest but words which are clear and easily read:

".....river from 'Devils Looking Glass' directly above nest of Duck Hawk"

Lyle told Coffey (Bristol Herald Courier, Mar 7, 1971, p 8 that he well remembered the Slaughter's Bluff nest in of March 6, 1938, on the South Fork Holston River in Sullivan Co.

"It was a beautiful day and it had been cold just like in the past few days and the snow had melted," he remembered. "We had discovered the nest by throwing pebbles over a ledge where we thought she had her nest and the falcon flew out. It was about ten or 12 feet down and I went over on a rope ladder. There I found a nest depression scratched out in the dirt and the eggs were beautiful. They were cream colored and had specks all over them that gave an almost brick red color. There was a rock overhang that practically covered the nest to protect the eggs. The ground wasn't sandy but more like clay where the depression was made."

Lyle went on to explain that "these were the last eggs and the last nest ever found in the region as far as I know."

While Coffey has not found a location on maps of a locality called Slaughter's Bluff in Sullivan Co., he did learn from Lyle that the nest was in the cliff face where Patrick Henry Lake is today. It is now known as Dorn's Bluff. That cliff face is south facing and just upstream from the I-81 bridge over the S.F. Holston River ( Patrick Henry Lake). He also collected eggs of the Black Vulture from holes in that cliff.

In The Migrant for June 1933, F. M. Jones, describes two nests examined by himself and R. B. Lyle, the finder, near Johnson City, Tenn. B. P. Tyler of that city, wrote to Albert F. Ganier that "a third pair has been located on Roan Mountain." The Peregrines were nesting all through the North Carolina mountains and Sprunt and Murray, in The Auk (1930, p. 563) recorded seven of them on August 1, 1930, from the top of Grandfather Mountain, Avery Co., North Carolina.

Jones wrote in the December, 1933, The Migrant, page 43, that pairs are known in the Johnson City area and "have been visited by myself." He credits Lyle with finding them. The first was in an area found to be inaccessible due to a tremendous overhang of the steep rock cliffs. The second pair of located by Lyle on "April 2nd of this year-1933". They went to the site on April 5, 1933 and found birds present. Finally Jones returned April 14th. He went over the cliffs and found one egg in the hole which the hawk had rounded out. They went back on the 22nd and there was still just one egg.

Three weeks later (May 14) they returned and saw the male present. The rocks at that particular spot were well whitened with excrement. Jones went down on a rope to the nesting ledge and found a set of three eggs. The nest was on a flat ledge 24 inches broad, the female hawk flew around constantly, making a considerable fuss, and at one time coming in very close. Jones collected the eggs which proved to be perfectly fresh, and measured as follows: 2.25x1.74, 2.17x1.80, and 2.12x1.74. Jones signed the published note in 1933 stating that his residence was Independence, Va.

FOOT NOTE: The Lyle egg collection, was stored at Coffey's home in Bristol for more than a year. Many of the eggs were studied there by Dan W. Anderson, a graduate student from the University of Wisconsin, who used the raptor eggs to determine their egg shell thickness. Many of the eggs were prior to the use of DDT and the measurements were used to establish a "control." Anderson flew to Tri-City Airport and spent the day of March 1, 1968 with Coffey and the collection taking measurements of the egg shell thickness and egg weights. With Dr. Joseph J. Hickey (author of Peregrine Falcon Population, 1969) Anderson published Chlorinated Hydrocarbons and Eggshell Changes in Raptorial and Fish-Eating Birds (Science 11 October 1968: Vol 162, pp 271-273). Their paper: Eggshell changes for certain North American birds, 1972, Proceedings of the International Ornithological Congress 15:514-540, followed.

from the archives of the Bristol Bird Club