For those who list birds, January 1 starts a fresh new list for the new year.  What bird will be the first of 2015?

If you live in the suburbs or countryside yours may be a songbird at the feeder — a cardinal, a chickadee, a dark-eyed junco — but where I live in the city the most likely first bird is a European import: a house sparrow, a starling, a pigeon.

Sometimes I make the list better by not looking outside until I think there’s a “good” bird outdoors.  This usually requires a little cheating in which I ignore the hordes of foreigners to pick out the one native bird and call it my first.

Birding by ear is more successful at finding natives.  Pigeons don’t coo on early January mornings, starlings are silent at dawn, and house sparrows are late risers.  This method can give me a First Bird of song sparrow or Carolina wren but the most likely is American crow, cawing as they fly over my neighborhood on their way from the roost.

Today I shouldn’t cheat. I’ll just see what I come up with.

What’s your First Bird of 2015?

(photo by Chuck Tague)