Acknowledgements

We would like to extend a sincere thank you to all the Virginia (and beyond!) birders who submitted their Next Dozen picks, without whom this report would not have been possible. Next Dozen submitters are: Bob Ake, Andrew Baldelli, Lewis Barnett, Nancy Barnhart, Baxter Beamer, Rob Bielawski, Mike Boatwright, Arun Bose, Ned Brinkley, Rexanne Bruno, Drew Chaney, David Clark, Adam D’Onofrio, Amanda Dymacek, Wendy Ealding, Andrew Elgin, Conor Farrell, James Fox, Paul Glass, Matt Hafner, Bill Hohenstein, Marshall Iliff, Steve Johnson, Will McPhail, Holly Merker, Chris Monahan, Ellison Orcutt, Paul Pisano, Andrew Rapp, John Rowlett, Ty Smith, Evan Spears, Mike Stinson, Brain Taber, Wes Teets, Ian Topolsky, Bill Williams, and the authors, Matt Anthony, Todd Day, and Nick Newberry.

We would also like to thank all of the photographers who graciously allowed us the use of their photos. Some of the finest bird photography in North America graces this report, and we certainly could not have done that without their generous contributions. Next Dozen photographers are: George L. Armistead, Tucker Beamer, Willie D’Anna, Ian Davies, Doug Gochfeld, Cory Gregory, Bill Hubick, Eric Hynes, Tom Johnson, Steve Keith, Jay McGowan, Holly Merker, Steven G. Mlodinow, Max Nootbaar, Brian Patteson, Luke Seitz, Jeffrey H. Skevington, Theo Staengl, Brian L. Sullivan, and Corinna Wilson.

A few instances of special thanks are in order. First of all, we must tip our hats to Matt Hafner and Dave Powell, compilers of “Maryland’s Next 10 Bird Species - 3rd Edition.” Their excellent report served as a source of inspiration in compiling ours, and also provided a much-needed impetus to stop kicking around the idea of Virginia’s Next Dozen and actually make it happen. Special thanks goes to Matt Hafner, who shared valuable insights into the process behind the Maryland report. Additionally, thanks to Ned Brinkley, whose previous reports prompted us to take a closer look at species that did not receive votes, ultimately resulting in the addendum. Also thanks to Marshall Iliff for feedback and valuable insights into previous continental records. Lastly, special thanks also go to our BirdingVirginia.org partner, James Fox, who provided his technical expertise on parts of the website presentation that were beyond our knowledge.

Finally, these two sources proved to be invaluable when compiling many of the species annotations:

  • Birds of the World (S. M. Billerman, B. K. Keeney, P. G. Rodewald, and T. S. Schulenberg, Editors). Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology, Ithaca, NY, USA. https://birdsoftheworld.org/bow/home

  • Sullivan, B.L., C.L. Wood, M.J. Iliff, R.E. Bonney, D. Fink, and S. Kelling. 2009. eBird: a citizen-based bird observation network in the biological sciences. Biological Conservation 142: 2282-2292.