"What a thousand acres of Silphiums looked like when they tickled the bellies of the buffalo is a question never again to be answered, and perhaps not even asked." -Aldo Leopold
I don’t know why Acadian Flycatchers are always screaming for a pizza. Have you ever watched one of these try and bite a piece off? Not a fun sight.
So those photographers who use Flickr, what is your final opinion on those changes they sprang on us? It has turned my world upside down. I can’t stand the damn thing now and I am looking into alternatives. I never thought I’d be saying that.
This image of a mamma Summer Tanager visiting her newly developing nest was taken a few weeks ago. She should now be busy raising young. I have decided not to invade her space unless I can get to this location and set up in a blind before first light. Unfortunately, this would be quite the feat at this time of year. The drive to Hawn SP, where the nest is located, is about 1.5 hours from my front door. I wish her luck and thanks to Steve who found the nest and provided a great map and directions for me.
Spring migration for the “land birds” is pretty much over. As usual, I am not happy with the amount of photos I was able to get of these guys as they pass by. But, I did enjoy every moment I got to spend trying. Here are a few that I have gotten around to processing so far. These were all caught at Monsanto’s World Headquarters, one of my favorite migration traps in the StL metropolitan area.
A large warbler, the Bay-breasted Warbler is a rather uncommon migrant. The lighting was terrible in this scenario and caused a good deal of C.A. However, this was my first usable image of this species.
Lovers of the tree-tops, I find that Northern Parula are easily heard but more difficult to spot. They can be found in large numbers across Missouri and do nest throughout the Ozarks.
The oh so cute, Palm Warbler, or “Palmies” are one of the species I seemed to spot more often than normal this spring. These guys are usually found on or near the ground on lower tree branches and bushes.
The Blackpoll Warbler’s migratory trek is one of the longest of all the songbirds. These guys nest throughout the northern boreal forests and go as far as northern Alaska. They winter in South America.
Finally, the bird pictured below is the Black and White Warbler. More abundant and easier to spot, these birds behave much like the nuthatches – climbing up tree trunks and looking under limbs for their arthropod prey.
Relying highly on the abundance of spruce budworm populations in their boreal forest nesting grounds, Blackburnian Warblers numbers will rise and fall dramatically with numbers of this insect prey.
“Blackburnian Warbler, May 2013”
Steve selflessly checked on the Gnatcatcher’s nest at St. Francois SP late this past week to give me an update to help plan for the weekend. When he arrived he watched as the pair appeared to be deconstructing the nest and moving the materials! This was surprising as they definitely were incubating eggs when I had visited about five days prior. We found one description of this kind of behavior in Harrison’s Eastern Bird Nests:
“Unusual characteristic of this bird: it tears up a completely or partly completed nest and reuses the material to build nest nearby. Author has seen this several times; believes that awareness of possible discovery during building may be cause.”
I have a few pieces of evidence to possibly explain why they would move a nest in which they were already incubating a clutch.
1) They built this nest ~20 feet above a rather popular State Park trail and the numbers of people walking underneath caused them to seek a different spot.
2) Egg predation. Someone found the nest and relieved them of their brood.
3) Cowbirds. The BHCB activity was apparent around the nest when I visited. Perhaps they snuck an egg in and the host birds discovered the ploy?
I guess we will never know. Steve tried his best to follow the “contractors” as they moved their building materials to the new construction site. Their speed and the fully-leaved trees made this an impossible task. Oh well, maybe next time.
“Housing Crisis”
I spent a little time watching and shooting the BGGN nest this past Saturday. Here are a few notes: -Nest is in action. I believe there are likely eggs in the nest. Not yet hatched. One parent will stay on the nest continuously. Every 5-10 minutes the other parent would come by and give a few quick, low call notes. The parent on the nest will reply with a similar vocalization most, but not every time, and then leave to where the other parent is calling in nearby branch or tree. The new parent then takes its place on the eggs. The nest never stayed open for more than 45 seconds. Cowbirds were definitely in the area and I believe are probably aware of the nest. Migrant songbirds were everywhere. Here is a quick list of birds I had in the parking lot or at the nest. TEWA OVBI REVI BLWA COBI GCFL PEWE SWTH NOWA LOWA SCTA.
If I make it back there this weekend, there is a good chance I could see feeding of the chicks.
“BGGN Nest Update – May-11 2013”
One of my favorite things about my job is that I work at one of the best songbird migration fall spots in the St. Louis metropolitan area. On Monsanto’s Creve Coeur campus is found a parcel of “unused” wooded acres that are set aside for wildlife and employee recreation. A couple miles of trails and associated edge habitats makes for prime spots for the birders of our campus to work on a very unique form of repetitive stress injury, which we call “warbler neck” 😉 And birders do we have! I have been fortunate enough to learn so much from a handful of world-class birders in the six years or so I have been dabbling in birds. We are now entering the last few wonderful days of the songbird migratory peak within our section of the country. What I wanted to share in this post is an experience we had a couple of weeks back that will likely never happen again.
On Thursday, April 18th a terrific storm front moved through the Ozarks in a general southwest to northeasterly course. Sarah and I took this Thursday and Friday off from work and spent it down in the Current River watershed. On Friday, my coworker and avian super-freak, Josh Uffman, found what looked to be a very odd-looking and sounding Black-throated Green Warbler. At first, he did not realize what he stumbled upon and went to look this up in the field guides. He then realized his discovery, the arguably most endangered Wood Warbler to be found on this continent, the Golden-cheeked Warbler.
Nesting in only specific woodlands containing Ashe Junipers in central Texas, GCWA numbers have declined dramatically by the clearing of these habitats. One bit of disgusting information I read while researching this was that just prior to the placement of this bird under federal endangered species act protection and the IUCN red-list, much of this bird’s critical habitat was cleared by landowners who selfishly wanted to profit from these resources. The most current numbers I could find give estimates of between 5,000 and 10,000 breeding pairs. It is most likely that this bird was moved along by this storm.
What is nice for me is that this bird stayed on our campus for a relatively long period of time. When I arrived on Monday it was still here. It was very difficult to get good looks and with nearly two hours of hunting I was awarded with less than 60 seconds of viewing time. The photo below is the best that I was able to achieve. I do think I was the last person to see it on our campus as it was not found the following day. My photo is usable for documentary purposes, but please have a look at Josh’s great pics and videos taken in days prior.
“Golden-cheeked Warbler!”
Congrats to those who made it through another one. The bird is actually yawning again. But we can pretend that is his party face?
“It’s Friday!”
Technical details: Canon EOS 7D camera, EF500mm f/4.5L USM lens, ISO 640, f/6.3, 1/160 sec
“Further on I find a bloody spot, encircled by the arc of owl’s wings. To this rabbit the thaw brought freedom from want, but also a reckless abandonment of fear. The owl has reminded him that thoughts of spring are no substitute for caution.”
-Aldo Leopold-
A Sand County Almanac
And we have the nerve to call others “lower animals” or “primitive”. Hmmpphh!
“Inquisitive Eyes”
Technical details: Canon EOS 7D camera, EF500mm f/4.5L USM lens, ISO 800, f/5.6, 1/100 sec
A Thousand Acres of Silphiums 