William Dreuth's Study of Bird Migration in Lincoln Park, Chicago

Introduction

William Dreuth (1874 - 1944) was a naturalist and amateur ornithologist who lived in Chicago, Illinois. From 1928 to 1943 he conducted an intensive study of bird migration in Chicago's Lincoln Park*. Fellow Chicago ornithologists Charles T. Clark (1912 - 2004) and Margaret Morse Nice (1883 - 1974) summarized and tabulated Dreuth's field notes from this study into a booklet, "William Dreuth's Study of Bird Migration in Lincoln Park, Chicago." The booklet was published in 1950 by The Chicago Academy of Sciences. The information presented here is based on that publication. I've updated the taxononomy and nomenclature to reflect changes made by the American Ornithologists' Union (AOU) in their seventh edition checklist (1998) and its supplements (through the 57th supplement, issued in July 2016). Otherwise, the information is presented as it appears in the booklet, with a strong emphasis on the tabular migration data. The purpose of this website is to let birders, ornithologists, and other naturalists compare and contrast Dreuth's sightings with current status information on the birds of the Chicago area. As of 2017 taxonomy, Dreuth recorded 254 species in his 16 year study.

For more and detailed information about William Dreuth and his study, please refer to the Related Resources section at the bottom of this page.

Questions or comments about this website? Contact Robert D. Hughes

About the Content

The data in the tables is organized into 7 columns (as they appear in the booklet):

• Species
• Earliest Date of Arrival
• Average Date of Arrival
• Average Date Last Seen
• Latest Date Seen
• Number of Days Seen
• Number of Years Seen

Pay particular attention to the last 2 columns as they give a good idea of status in Dreuth's study. I've included Dreuth's status information on subspecies – Dreuth was a careful, meticulous observer and he kept detailed notes about his bird sightings, including subspecies, so I only thought it right to preserve this information. The content has been divided into 5 sections; use the navigation tabs to move between the sections.

Note: On smaller devices such as a cell phone, the tabular data may not display in its entirety and will require horizontal scrolling to view.

Legend

• Birds that were full species in Dreuth's time, but are no longer so, have quotation marks around their common and scientific names, e.g., "Blue Goose", "Chen caerulescens"
• Subspecies have quotation marks around the first modyfying part of their common names, e.g., "Gambel's" White-crowned Sparrow
• Dates in parenthesis represent other dates, e.g., (Aug 21, 1936)

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Part 1: Snow Goose to Killdeer

Footnotes

¹Blue Goose was considered a separate species in Dreuth's time, Chen caerulescens. It's now considered a color morph of the Snow Goose.

²Dreuth recorded both Greater and Lesser Scaup, but the booklet doesn't give enough detailed information about dates.

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Related Resources

• Birds Recorded at Montrose Point in Chicago
  A list of the birds that have been recorded at Montrose Point in Chicago, Illinois. Status information is also given. From The Orniphile website.
• The Birds of Illinois
  A three part list of the birds that have been officially recorded in Illinois. Status information is also included. From The Orniphile website.
• William Dreuth's Study of Bird Migration in Lincoln Park, Chicago
  Digital version of the original booklet. From The Chicago Academy of Sciences page on Internet Archives (opens in a new browser tab or window).

Header Image: Snowy Owl at Montrose Beach in Chicago