How An Attentive Nashville Birdwatcher Spotted A Species Not Seen Here In 60 Years

It all began with a casual glimpse out the window. It could have been like so many others during these work-from-home times.

But on Monday morning, the bird that Ariel Dunham noticed in the backyard was unlike any she’d seen.

“I just went, ‘That’s a green bird with a red hat. What is that!?’ ” she says.

As a casual birder, Dunham’s gut told her to snap a photo and to start asking around. Her mom — an avid birder and the secretary of the Nashville chapter of the Tennessee Ornithological Society — was the first to confirm her hunch.

It looked like a green-tailed towhee, a bird that lives way out west. Once Dunham posted online to a birding group, it took mere minutes for the experts to catch on. This type of towhee hadn’t been seen in Tennessee since 1957.

“So basically no birder alive, that’s recording birds right now, has this on their Tennessee list,” Dunham says. “It’s a ‘life list’ [bird] for a lot of people, which means the first time they’ve ever seen this bird at all.”

Astonished comments started popping up, like “OMG” and “Epic!!!!!!!!!” Within a half hour, avid birders were hopping in their cars — including from as far as Chattanooga — to come get a look.

Dunham, who jokes that she’s hardly seen anyone while working from home for the past 17 months, suddenly opened her yard to dozens of strangers.

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This green-tailed towhee appears dependably every few minutes, happily eating and chasing off other ground-feeding birds.

For the past three days, she has played host to world-renowned birders. They arrive with binoculars and long-lens cameras to add another to their logs with thousands of species. They also let others know if the bird is “continuing.”

This towhee has. Dunham has been putting out food to keep him happy.

And, yes­ — it’s a him. The key clue is that he has been singing. At the urging of visitors, Dunham picked a name for him — “Tony the Towhee” — and she’s been getting ample mileage out of her moment of fame by creating delightful social media updates about his whereabouts.

“It’s been pretty surreal,” Dunham says.

The pace of visitors has slowed. But Dunham is keeping up her efforts because of one particular birder: her mom. She’s been away on a trip this whole time, but still hopes to get her chance this weekend to see a green-tailed towhee in Tennessee.