You Just Never Know Who Else Birds

Grazing on sagebrush

I was in Spokane, Washington two weeks ago for an evening meeting with scientists from our Agency who were attending the Society for Range Management annual conference. While at dinner with my administrator, one of the area directors, and another program leader, the topic of bird hunting came up. As it turned out, my agency's boss knows quite a bit about birds in general, beyond the rules-of-the-road for identifying species and sexes in flight that are required for a duck hunter to successfully hunt. I think the discussion began around talk of raptors - hawks in particular.

I asked whether he knew where the annual hawk count is conducted in the East?

"Yes, Hawk Mountain in Pennsylvania."

I had remembered reading about Hawk Mountain in the Roger Tory Peterson biography I have just about finished - but not the specific place or the state where it is found. Migratory hawks make their way past it en route back to northern summer habitat.

Peregrine Falcon book

He also mentioned a fellow named Al Nye who was known for raising hawks - this was back when my Administrator was a young fellow. Back at my hotel room later that night, I did a little Web-searching and found a citation about Nye on page 135 in Peregrine Falcon – Stories of the Blue Meanie by Jim Enderson, published in 2005 by University of Texas Press. (click here) 

Getting it right. Among the earliest North American falconers to systematically use duck hawks to catch wild gave was Al Nye. His unorthodox technique in the late 1930s was to put the falcon in the sky, then to run through the fields, hoping for some unseen bird to flush to its doom. Nye was a runner, both in the fields and on the football gridiron at Penn.

Other falconers with peregrines began to get it right. After the war, Morley Nelson settled in Boise. His skill on skis with the Tenth Mountain Division in Italy landed him a job measuring alpine snow depth for the Soil Conservation Service. Nelson obtained a female duck hawk named Blackie that made a strong impression on ducks on the numerous ponds around Boise. Nowhere else on the continent did ducks hear, day after day, the harmonic sound of the lightweight bells placed on falcons to help the falconer keep track of his hunter.

During our dinner discussion, specific information Ed remembered about Nye: "Al Nye, who lived in Arlington and McLean, Virginia, was quite an innovator.  I accompanied him on several rabbit hunts with his falcons. Actually, they were broad-winged hawks, a Goshawk and a Harris Hawk, not true falcons.  Quite exciting.  Al was an All-American football player at the University of Pennsylvania in his early days.  He worked at the Pentagon as a civilian CFO-type person before his retirement and passing."
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Western Sage Grouse

It is interesting how birding not only intersects with hunting, but with range management as well. In a meeting a week later in Portland, I met with a few folks from eastern Oregon to discuss possible ways to restore range habitat quality for Western Sage Grouse and grasses for grazing, by removing invasive western juniper trees and using the biomass to make jet fuel. Whether cattle or bison, grasslands and grazing are tied together, and some folks have looked at how grazers on the range shift different kinds of bird populations (here). The juniper has an avian twist in the story, as the tree encroaches on the sagebrush-dominated rangeland, it provide elevated perch for raptors - the grouse exit as they are more in peril from their predators. All of this makes for imagining how the way things are today, could be changed in the future to look more the way they were in the past. (2)
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Falcon breeding hat

As a another side note, I know a fellow from my laboratory back in Oregon who raised falcons as a side business. He occasionally told stories of middle east princes coming to the United States to purchase his product - fascinating. But what was funny was hearing the story about a party he and his wife had once attended where all of the guests were to wear some kind of hat. Doug wore a "hat" used to breed falcons - true, you can read about it here.

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(1) Review shown in Google Books: A superb success as a bird, combining great speed, aeronautical grace, and fearlessness...inhabitant of wild places, inaccessible cliffs, and skyscrapers...worldwide dweller, trans-equatorial migrant, and docile captive—the peregrine falcon stands alone among all others of its kind. Perhaps this is why so many varied people rushed to its aid when it faced decimation by pesticide poisoning. In this personal and highly entertaining memoir, Jim Enderson tells stories of a lifetime spent studying, training, breeding, and simply enjoying peregrine falcons. He recalls how his boyhood interest in raptors grew into an ornithological career in which he became one of the leading experts who helped identity DDT as the cause of the peregrine falcon's sudden and massive decline across the United States. His stories reveal both the dedication that he and fellow researchers brought to the task of studying and restoring the peregrine and the hair-raising adventures that sometimes befell them along the way. Enderson also seamlessly weaves in the biology and natural history of the peregrine, as well as anecdotes about its traditional and widespread use in falconry as an aggressive yet tractable hunter, to offer a broad portrait of this splendid and intriguing falcon.

(2) Purposeful management of the range vegetation for multiple purposes could help restore the habitat for the grouse. Click here.

West of the Cascades

The check-off list results of a couple of hours of walking the board walk through Jackson-Frazier Wetland, and other environs between Portland and Corvallis are shown below.

a. Brewer's blackbird
b. Red-winged blackbird (female)
c. American crow
d. Western scrub jay
e. Dark-eyed junco
f. Bewick's wren
g. Glaucus-winged gull
h. Mallard duck
i. Rough-legged hawk
j. Rock pigeon
k. Dusky goose
l. Purple finch
m. Red-tailed hawk
n. American robin

It was a nice late-morning to slowly work my way around the wetland between 10:00 and noon. The view was difficult for the birds perched high in the trees when I faced east and south. Since I hadn't been to the wetland before, I didn't know what to expect. The meandering board walk "trails" were great, and since they are elevated, it would be easy to move through the area any time of the year. There were a number of vegetation assemblages in this western Oregon wetland habitat to observe that ranged from a brush woodland to Willamette Valley Wet Prairie.

I had taken my National Geographic Field Guide of Birds of North America (hard cover version) - that was a mistake. It was too large to fit easily in my coat pocket, and had too many choices to look through when I tried to make an identification. There were a number of small-sized species that I hadn't seen before, and the female red-winged blackbird through me off for a while. Mallards among the cat tail reeds played hide-and-seek as I tried to get close to them. The male red-winged blackbird had a distinctive call that I was able to learn by watching and listening. There were a lot of other calls that I didn't know - it would have been helpful to have an experienced birder along for the watching (and listening). After getting back to my car, I drove to the Border's Bookstore on Ninth Street, and bought copies of Birds of Oregon Field Guide, and Field Guide to Birds: Washington & Oregon - the later was on sale and only cost $2.99. Either would have been helpful and easy to handle while watching - next time.

Birding by Dawn's Early Light

I was able to sleep in until 8:00 AM again today, being it's a Federal holiday. I make a habit of looking out the upstairs bathroom window in the morning to see if there is any activity at the bird feeder in the backyard. This morning paid off very well - a very large bird that looked reddish was foraging at the base of the feeder support pole. I quickly

Brown Thrasher

made it downstairs, grabbed the binoculars, and peeked out between the drapes over the patio glass door window. This was a new sighting, I thought at first it was some sort of thrush. A male Northern Cardinal was perched on the fence above, and provided a good size scaling for reference - one whole size smaller than the bird on the ground. Viewed close up with the binoculars, the bird had very distinctive mottling on the breast. I went and grabbed my Nikon D3100 with the AF-S DX VR Zoom-Nikkor 55-200mm f/4-5.6G IF-ED lense already attached from the night before picture taking of the boeuf bourguignon dinner, but by the time I got back to the window, the bird was gone. So out came the Peterson Field Guide: thrushes - too small, only 7 inches long, the same as the cardinal; Fieldfare - from Iceland, has been see in the Northeast, looks large enough, but the coloring is not red enough; Brown Thrasher - 11 1/2 inches long, bright rufous above, heavily streaked below. Rather curved bill, long tail. Habitats thickets, brush, shrubbery. This may have been the bird I saw out the bedroom window the other day that was in the tree in the neighbor's yard.

Back Creek Canards sur la Glace

I haven't gone out of my way to view water fowl in our area. I know what Canada Geese are, also Mallard ducks, and Herring and Great Black-Backed gulls, but as for whatever else are out there on the water, I really do not have a clue about what to expect. Today my wife surprised me with a lunch reservation at Sam's Waterfront Restaurant near where we live. From our table-for-two next to the window above one of the inlets of Back Creek, we could look down on the water and out through the docks of Chesapeake Harbour Marina, where many sail
boats are parked for the winter. Near where we sat, there was a part of the harbor next to the bank where the water was still frozen over from the cold weather the past weeks. As we sat and talked, I noticed a pair of ducks swimming our way - no idea of what they were. I watched them dive and surface again and again, obviously feeding on something below the surface. It is amazing how these animals can live with the cold. These is another restaurant that we like that is on another inlet, but it is closed for the season because there is only outside dining (1). After a while, more ducks came our way, these different than the first pair, but also strikingly beautiful. After a warm bowl of Maryland cream of crab soup, and a Belgian endive salad served with julienne cut pears, blue cheese, spiced walnuts, and walnut vinaigrette (2), we headed home - Jan to the kitchen (3) and me to my laptop to identify the birds I saw on the water. As it turned out, what I saw were Red Headed (a) and Hooded Merganser (b) ducks. The Website that helped me with the identification was the Waterfowl Identification page on the Ducks Unlimited site. Not expecting to see as beautiful birds as these close to home, I can now see myself beginning to look around a little bit to find a place to watch for more kinds of ducks and waterfowl - what has taken me so long to pay attention to the likes of these?
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(1) Ken's Back Porch Cafe. We didn't know it existed until Commissioning Week at the Naval Academy this past May. Jan's sister-in-law and brother from Charlotte, North Carolina had found it on the Web while here for graduation - it's funny how out-of-towner's can find the best places to eat.

(2) Jan had the creamed crab soup as well, and the Sam's Chopped Salad: blue cheese, romaine lettuce, spinach, cucumbers, red onion, bacon, and roasted corn, with an add-on of chicken.

(3) Dinner tonight will be Julia Child's recipe for Boeuf Bourguignon - we will watch Julie and Julia afterward. (as it turned out, we watched the original version of Tron.)

First Atlantic Bird Sightings

I don't know sea shore birds at all - only paying attention to those of fields and forests. On the recent road trip, I had the opportunity to identify my first shore bird while waiting in line for the Fort Fisher-Southport Ferry (1). The birds were flocking all over the parking lot in an Alfred Hitchcock'esque manner, much in part due to the lady in the car next to our car who kept throwing bread crumbs out her window - some even hitting the side of our car - mouthing "Oh, excuse me" and then kept on doing it.

Calling for my trusty copy of Peterson's A Field Guide to Eastern Birds, I had no clue what I was looking at. I turned through the pages of Terns, Petrels, Shearwaters, and Gannets. What are these critters? We only had to wait five minutes for the 5:30 ferry, so were quickly on board and parked. The birds followed us, or the lady throwing the bread crumbs. Finally, with time to spare, and magnification of one of the photos I took in the queue... the Laughing Gull, or is it a Black-headed Gull? Finally, it was sure - a Laughing.

It just happened that there was a news report on the radio that birds in the Gulf of Mexico being rescued included Laughing Gulls, with an image of an oil-coated one making the rounds. Cool looking birds in real life. At ease on ferry docks and decks and around people - willing to strike a pose like fashion models, and only for bread crumbs. The coincidence of making my first identification in the same day as seeing ones soaring over me, and hearing about ones held earth-bound in oil is ironic. The politics of the blame casting goes on about the Gulf spill - at least today another player was brought into the mix at whom to have stones thrown.
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As we drove down the coast, there were many estuaries in Georgia that I pictured myself navigating through in a kayak - silent, anticipating what I would see around the next bend. Only a dream, but something to do some time in the future. For this trip, I was only able to do the window survey along the highways. The most notables were Red Wing Blackbird, Wood Stork, and possibly a Whooping Crane - though that would be a rare find given any along the Atlantic coast have been re-introduced. The black wing tip on the Whooping Crane distinguishes it from the Wood Stork which has a continuous black margin - also visible from below when in flight. The most common bird I saw from Maryland to Florida was the Black Vulture.
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(1) See the map of the route to Fort Fisher-Southport Ferry between Wilmington, North Carolina and Myrtle Beach, South Carolina on Route 421.

Sings So Sweet

I wake up early in the morning often these days - 3:00 AM - and I have found whether an upstairs window is open or not, I can hear the sounds of birds singing.

Right now it is 5:55 AM, and I have been browsing the morning news on the major city newspapers' Websites, and checking our youngest son's daily 100-day countdown blog. In the background from outside, I hear the coo, coo, coo of a mourning dove over the old-man ringing in my ears. There are other bird songs playing as well, but I am not all that good of a birder, because I don't know them: woo, woo, kaa, kaa, kaa.

On the front page of this morning's Washington Post, is an article all about the influences of urban sounds on bird songs - interesting.

The birds here on the East Coast are remarkable - they are remarkable also in the ways they adapt to their environments.

* Birds may be choosing to sing songs that contain higher notes, or are raising pitches to stand out above the noise.

* The regions of the birds' brains associated with song undergo partial renewal each spring, which may cement into the bird's head certain songs tailored for a noisy territory.

* Birds may learn modified songs, or may not be able to hear low notes, or they may simply drop low notes that aren't effective.

* Females may be more likely to choose males who sing in higher frequencies, and are known to select males that show a proficiency for learning.

* If birds sing more loudly in response to noise, they will use more energy, which could lead to either shorter, more efficient songs or diminished vigor.

Maybe it would be interesting to record how westerners from small college towns adapt to the hustle and bustle of the East Coast as well.

Birds of Ford Island - Pearl Harbor

With the drop of a hat, I had to schedule a work trip to Hawaii this past week. A quick browse of my birding books at home made it clear that even though Hawaii is a part of the United States, at least from the perspective of Roger Tory Peterson, David Allen Sibley, and the National Geographic Birder's Journal, Hawaii is not a part of North America. So, after catching my flight from Baltimore to Dallas to Honolulu, and meeting up with colleagues at the Hotel lobby for dinner, we made a trip to Barnes and Nobel where I picked out A Photographic Guide to the Birds of Hawai'i - The Main Islands and Offshore Waters by Jim Denny.

My meetings were on Ford Island which is a part of the U.S. Naval Base at Pearl Harbor. I have discovered that history and modern function go hand-in-hand on military bases. Each morning when we pulled into the parking lot of the meeting center, we faced a plaque commemorating the resting place of the U.S.S. California that lies just off sea wall. A little further to the right is the U.S.S. Arizona Memorial - much smaller in perspective to the harbor than I expected, and with modern destroyers and cruisers docked in the distance with the U.S.S. Missouri, newly painted, off to the left. I wonder whether the officers, and sailors, and civilians who work here have to force themselves to conscientiously think each day where they are, like I do when I come up out of the Smithsonian Metro stop onto the Capital Mall - into a place of living history.

I had little time to myself the three days in Hawaii, so the only real opportunity I had for viewing and identification was the walks to and from the cafeteria in the Air Museum on the base. What struck me most was how easy it was to notice that there are different birds there, even though there were familiar birds as at home - the House Finch (G), Rock Pigeon (H), and House Sparrow (I). But for what was exotic, a quick review of the Hawaiian bird book indicated were intentional introductions that have greatly influenced the local fauna. The Cattle Egret (D), Saffron Finch (C), Common Myna (E), Red-crested Cardinal (F), and Nutmeg Mannikin (B) are are all firsts for me, but aliens to Hawaii. Being a novice birder, I double checked over two days of quick viewing to try to figure out whether what I was seeing was the uncommon Black-bellied Plover (A) and not the common Pacific Golden Plover - I won't feel comfortable with this identification until I return and have an expert's help. There were others I was not sure of their kind - was that or was that not a Blue-winged Teal, and were those Mourning Doves or Zebra Doves that just flew by? These will remain mysteries for now.

Regardless, there is much more time for birding that needs to be scheduled in for any future trips, at least for the roadside kind. My travel partner from work (1) was pretty accommodating for the little bit of birding I did while he was with me. The only time he protested was when I was about to whip out the binoculars at breakfast one morning while sitting at an open-air restaurant patio overlooking Waikiki Beach - something about some guy might get the wrong impression that I was watching women walk by and not really looking at birds. Well, we didn't really have that much time for me to gaze up in the trees looking for new-to-me tropical discoveries. Maybe next trip I will be able to see the "real" Hawaiian birds - not migrants or aliens, but the ones of only now imagined woodlands and highlands.
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(1) Can you tell in the lower photograph of Waikiki Beach which is the flightless bird that migrated to Oahu on an American Airlines flight from Louisiana? Hint, he is the one whose long-sleeved-shirted plumage is distinctive from the native flightless birds of similar kind but with their distinctive floral print plumage.