 Jon
Dunn was (and remains today) a major force in California birding, particularly
in southern California and for his impacts on the California Bird Records
Committee (CBRC). Born in Los Angeles County and birding by the age of
ten, Dunn was an early protégé of Guy McCaskie and learned
extensively from birding with him in the late 1960s and early 1970s. He
and fellow Los Angelino Kimball Garrett emerged as leading experts in southern
California by the early 1970s. He began serving of the CBRC in 1977 and
remained a constant presence there throughout the period, except for enforced
absences (11 years during our period of review).
By the 1980s he was considered one of the primary experts on field identification
in North America, an expertise that would eventually earn him positions
on both the American Birding Association (ABA) and American Ornithologists'
Union (AOU) Checklist Committees. Perhaps his most notable achievement
was as the "chief consultant" of the widely popular National Geographic
Field Guide (1983), a revolutionary volume at the time of its publication
and now available several editions later. It entirely changed the way observers
looked at birds and birding.
Dunn joined the WINGS tour group in the 1980s and has been a professional
bird tour leader ever since. He moved to Ohio for a time in the 1990s but
has now returned to California and resides near Bishop, Inyo County. Throughout
the period under consideration here, he was at the forefront in learning
about and disseminating knowledge about the status and distribution of
southern California birds. The Birds of Southern California, co-authored
with Kimball Garrett (1981), is now an out-of-print classic. Earlier, in
the 1970s, he authored a series of identification papers in the Western
Tanager, the newsletter of the Los Angeles Audubon Society, that were
widely read and influential. His Field Guide to Warblers of North
America, co-authored with Kimball Garrett and published in the Peterson
series in 1997 (after the close of our period), is considered the definitive
work on that identification topic.
photo (right or above): 20 Sep 1974 on a
trip to Santa Barbara I. © D. Roberson
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 Dunn
was a very active California birder in the 1970s, rising quickly on the
State list until he reached #2, behind Guy McCaskie, by 1977, a position
he held through the late 1980s when he finally was away so much on bird
tours that he began to miss crucial State birds. By then, however, Dunn
was a professional tour leader and no longer formally submitted bird lists.
In the '70s, however, he participated in several impressive Big Day efforts,
including the still current non-airplane State record on 29 Apr 1978: 231
species [with K.L. Garrett, J.V. Remsen, and R.E. Webster].
His career as a bird tour leader has sent him throughout North America
and across much of the globe, with an emphasis on southeast Asia. Dunn
has led many tours to Malaysia and Thailand, and his experiences with Asian
migrants have been invaluable in evaluating North American claims of Siberian
vagrants. His expertise on bird identification has led to many projects,
including a two-volume video set on gull identification.
Dunn was among those who pioneered the potential of vagrant traps in
Kern County and discovered the importance of wetlands in the Antelope Valley
of Los Angeles County. Since moving to Bishop, east of the Sierran divide,
he has birded Mono and Inyo counties more extensively, and today has the
top list in Mono County.
photo (right) 15 Jan 1975 Hog Lake TEH © Van
Remsen
photo [below] 9 Oct 1978 Goleta SBA © Brad
Schram — Jon Dunn (left) and Richard Webster run for a White Wagtail
as the story goes, Richard drove from Ventura to Encino
to pick up Jon before heading north to chase the wagtail — what a guy!
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| In the photo (above), Jon Dunn sits next to Wally
Sumner (center) and Van Remsen (left) at a birders' party at Lake Arrowhead
in July 1976. These three await their 'just desserts' for doing a Big Year
in 1976. Unbeknownst to them, that will be a whipped cream pie in the face
to be delivered by (L to R) Donna Dittmann, Jolee DeLew, and Susanne Luther.
This shot (© B.B. Roberson) is before that delivery, and only Van,
of the three of them, appears concerned. |
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Official Bird Name: White-necked Puffbird
Significant bird records: Numerous and extensive records of local interest.
Among those of Statewide importance were
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Gray-tailed Tattler 23 July 1981 Lancaster LA —1st CA record
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Lesser Black-backed Gull 18 Dec 1984 south end Salton Sea IMP
— 2nd CA record
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Louisiana Waterthrush 7 Aug 1985 Deep Springs INY — 2nd CA
record
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Red-faced Warbler 14 June 1973 San Gabriel Mts. LA — 2nd CA
record [co-finder]
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White-rumped Sandpiper 16 June 1976 south end Salton Sea IMP
— 2nd CA record [co-finder]
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Black-headed Gull 14 June 1973 Arcata HUM — 3rd CA record [co-finder]
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Hudsonian Godwit 9 May 1980 Edwards AFB, LA — 3rd CA record,
first chasable
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Yellow Wagtail 19 Sep 1982 Pt. Pinos MTY — 4th CA record
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Streak-backed Oriole 6 Nov 1977 Furnace Creek Ranch INY — 6th
CA record, 1st for interior
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Yellow-bellied Flycatcher 27 Sep 1989 Gaileo Hill KER — 6th
CA record, 1st chasable
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Pyrrhuloxia 7 May 1983 east of Lancaster LA — 8th CA record
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Sharp-tailed Sandpiper 5 May 1982 Lancaster LA — 1st spring
CA record
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Yellow-throated Warbler 23 Apr 1974 San Diego SD — 2nd spring
CA record
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American Oystercatcher (3 birds) 14 Aug 1977 Salton Sea IMP
— 1st inland record in CA
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other important inland birds include Laysan Albatross (5 May 1976) &
Leach's Storm-Petrel (15 Sep 1976)
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Least Flycatcher 26 Nov 1978 Brock Ranch IMP — remained to winter, 2nd
to winter in CA
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Selected publications 1963-1989:
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Dunn, J.L. 1975-1979. A series of identification articles in Western
Tanager, L.A. Audubon Soc. [many specifics are listed in the bibliography
in Roberson (1980) Rare Birds of West Coast
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Luther, J. S., McCaskie, G., and Dunn, J. 1979. Third report of the California
Bird Records Committee. West. Birds 10:169-187.
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Garrett, K.L, and Dunn, J.L. 1981. Birds of Southern California: Status
and Distribution. Los Angeles Audubon Soc., Los Angeles.
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Dunn, J.L., and E. A. T. Blom, chief consultants. 1983. National Geographic
Society Field Guide of the Birds of North America. Nat. Geogr. Soc., Washington,
D. C., and as sole 'chief consultant' in succeeding editions
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Lehman, P., and Dunn, J.L. 1985. A little-known species reaches North America.
Am. Birds 39:247-250.
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Dunn, J.L., Morlan, J., and Wilds, C.P. 1987. Field identification of forms
of Lesser Golden-Plover. Proc. 4th Intern. Identification Meeting Eilat
1st-8th November 1986.
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Dunn, J. L. 1988. Tenth report of the California Bird Records Committee.
West. Birds 19:129-163.
Selected publications since 1989:
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Dunn, J. L., and Garrett, K. L. 1990. Identification of Ruddy and Common
Ground-Doves. Birding 22:138-145.
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McCaskie, G., Dunn, J.L., Roberts, C., and Sibley, D.A. 1990. Notes on
identifying Arctic and Pacific Loons in alternate plumage. Birding 22:
70-73.
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Dunn, J.L., and Rose, B.J. 1992. A further note on Arctic Loon identification.
Birding 24: 106-107.
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Dunn, J.L. 1993. The identification of Semipalmated and Common Ringed Plovers
in alternate plumage. Birding 25: 238-243.
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Dunn, J. L., K. L. Garrett, and J. Alderfer. 1995. White-crowned Sparrow
subspecies: identification and distribution. Birding 27: 182-201.
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Dunn, J. L., and K. L. Garrett. 1997. A Field Guide to Warblers of North
America. Houghton Mifflin, New York.
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