| 95:115 | 2023-05-18 | | private residence, Prior Lake | Scott | | | (record #2023-087, vote 0-10). Not only is the bar very high for acceptance of a first state record, but the extreme vagrancy of the purported species adds an even higher level of caution required to evaluate the observation. Several members expressed that the totality of the circumstances surrounding the observation, and exclusive of the audio recordings themselves, casts doubt on the observation. The audio recordings, containing what clearly appear to be Clay-colored Thrush vocalizations, were the subject of extreme scrutiny. An audio recording analysis by a Committee member with expertise in the field, as well as a second analysis by Cornell University's eBird group both concluded that there was no detection in the recordings of other bird vocalizations that would necessarily preclude the recording as having been made in Minnesota. That said, the Committee has no reliable independent corroborating evidence, such as meta data, that the recordings were in fact made within the state of Minnesota. The lack of such corroborating evidence gave pause to members who would require such evidence prior to acceptance of the extreme record. | Not Accepted |