Pipits and Wagtails — Family Motacillidae
Red-throated Pipit Anthus cervinus
An Old World species, the Red-throated Pipit barely crosses the Bering Strait as a breeding bird to reach the coast of western Alaska. Yet it is remarkably regular, almost annual, as a fall vagrant to California, the most frequent Asian songbird in the lower 48 states. In California, the Red-throated Pipit’s habits and habitats are similar to those of the American Pipit, and it often flocks with that species.
Migration: In San Diego County, the Red-throated Pipit has been found in 21 of the 40 years from 1964, when McCaskie (1966a) first discovered it, through 2003. Almost all the birds have been in cultivated fields in the Tijuana River valley, the only exceptions being two at Point Loma (S7; 25–28 October 1981, D. Rawlins, Binford 1985; 27 September 2003, S. E. Smith), one at Kate Sessions Park (Q8; 21 October–27 November 2003, C. G. Edwards), and one in the floodplain of San Mateo Creek at San Onofre State Beach (C1; 13 October 1995, R. A. Erickson, NASFN 50:116, 1996). Occasionally multiple Red-throateds are found together; the largest numbers recorded in a year are 10 in 1966 and 1967, 12 in 1964, and 15 in 1991. Until 2003, the occurrences were clustered in an interval only 38 days long from 4 October (1994) to 11 November (1991). The three preserved specimens were collected 13 October 1964 (SDNHM 35097, MVZ 145172) and 19 October 1966 (LACM 46029).
Conservation: In California, Red-throated Pipits occur largely in agricultural fields along the coast—a land use being ousted by urbanization. In the Tijuana River valley the only habitat remaining are fields of sod, an environment sterile in comparison to the fields of alfalfa, tomato, and other crops that the birds once visited.
American Pipit Anthus rubescens
Breeding above timberline, the American Pipit reaches San Diego County as a winter visitor only. It is a bird of open county, visiting pastures, lawns, lakeshores, beaches, and expanses of bare dirt. In winter it is gregarious, flocks occasionally numbering in the hundreds. The pipit takes advantage of many of man’s alterations of the environment: agriculture, reservoirs, city parks, ball fields, and golf courses. It is an opportunist, moving in to exploit habitats that are suitable only intermittently, like dry desert playas coaxed to life by rare winter rains.
Winter: The American Pipit is widespread on the coastal slope wherever there are large areas of its habitats. The largest numbers frequent lakeshores, with up to 750 at Sweetwater Reservoir (S12) 16 December 2000 (P. Famolaro) and 400 at Lake Henshaw (G17) 18 December 2000 (J. Coker). Pipits can be abundant in agricultural areas, too, with up to 200 near the Santa Margarita River mouth (G4) 28 February 1998 (P. A. Ginsburg), 300 at San Pasqual (J13) 15 January 2000 (D. and D. Bylin), and 200 in the Tijuana River valley (W11) 16 January 2000 (P. Unitt). In the higher mountains, we noted them fairly regularly at 5400–5500 feet elevation in Laguna Meadow (O22/O23; up to 50 on 14 January 1998, P. Unitt) and once at 4900 feet near San Ignacio on the east slope of Hot Springs Mountain (E21; two on 11 December 1999, when one to three inches of snow lay on the ground, K. L. Weaver, C. R. Mahrdt).
In the Anza–Borrego Desert, the pipit occurs mainly on lawns and at sewage ponds (up to 50 in north Borrego Springs, F24, 21 December 1997, R. Thériault). It visits other habitats there—dry lake beds and plowed fields—only rarely. In the wet winter of 1997–1998, however, large numbers occurred in Little Blair Valley (L24), up to 196 on 20 February (R. Thériault).
Migration: American Pipits arrive in San Diego County occasionally as early as mid September, in numbers in early October. They depart largely in April. During the five-year atlas period, the dates on which the species was last reported ranged from 16 to 30 April (1999, Sweetwater Reservoir, P. Famolaro). There are few records for May, the latest of one at Point Loma (S7) 21 May 1984 (R. E. Webster, AB 38:961, 1984). The nearest sites where the American Pipit summers are the summit of San Gorgonio Peak in the San Bernardino Mountains (Miller and Green 1987) and the high plateau of the Sierra San Pedro Mártir, Baja California (Howell and Webb 1992).
Conservation: In its winter range in southern California, the American Pipit benefits from many human activities, especially water storage, irrigation, and the clearing of scrub. Conversion of agricultural land to cities, however, is negative. San Diego County Christmas bird count results suggest no trend, just irregularity, probably due to the randomness of birders encountering flocks. The American Pipit’s recent spread as a breeding bird to California’s highest mountains (Miller and Green 1987) suggests an increase, though these colonizers are not the same subspecies as the pipits wintering in California.
Taxonomy: The only subspecies of American Pipit collected in San Diego County is A. r. pacificus Todd, 1935, which breeds in northwestern North America. In fall 1991, sightings of the more heavily streaked east Asian A. r. japonicus Temminck and Schlegel, 1847, were reported, from the Tijuana River Valley 26 October–11 November (at least two individuals) and from Mission Bay 23 November (G. McCaskie, R. E. Webster, AB 46:151, 1991). Confirmation with a specimen is appropriate before this subspecies is added to the list of California birds. Though the lightly streaked A. r. alticola Todd, 1935, breeds in California’s high mountains, on migration it apparently skips over southern California’s lower elevations.
Sprague’s Pipit Anthus spragueii
From a breeding range in the northern Great Plains, Sprague’s Pipit migrates for the winter to the south-central United States and mainland Mexico. In California it occurs primarily as a rare fall vagrant, though the introduction of Bermuda grass to the Imperial Valley as a major crop may enable small numbers to winter there, as seen in 1997–98 and 2002–03.
Migration: The California Bird Records Committee has accepted only four records of Sprague’s Pipit from San Diego County. Three are from the Tijuana River valley: up to three birds in an alfalfa field 19–27 October 1974, McCaskie (1975), SDNHM 38980; one in a pasture 22 November 1974 (Luther et al. 1979); one in a field of bare dirt 22 November 1977 (Binford 1985). One is from weedy brush on Fiesta Island, Mission Bay, 19 December 1977 (Luther et al. 1983). The committee rejected two later reports.
Conservation: Like many birds of native prairie, Sprague’s Pipit is on the decline. Changing land use in the Tijuana River valley has eliminated dense but low vegetation like alfalfa that Sprague’s Pipits seek.