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Rosemary Drisdelle's BlogPosted by Rosemary Drisdelle For a little while, I thought that biofuels—fuels like ethanol made from corn, were at least part of the solution to dwindling fossil fuel reserves and a steadily rising cost of oil. Wouldn’t it be great if we could grow renewable fuel? I guess I should have known better. It looks like we’d need another planet just to grow the stuff in order to make that work. Now, crops that were previously grown for food are grown for biofuel or replaced with biofuel crops, tens of thousands of acres of wetlands are slated to go under the plow in Africa to grow sugar cane, farmers in the US are growing corn on land previously set aside for conservation, deforestation in South America continues at an alarming rate, Indonesia is being replanted with palms, and on it goes. Birds and other wildlife, already huge victims of our gluttonous energy consumption, are losing more habitat, food prices are rising, people will starve. We can’t continue using food for fuel, and we can’t continue destroying the Earth. Clearly, the rush to biofuel production has to be reined in. I’ve read about grasses that can provide both biofuel and prairie habitat, and biofuel-producing algae that can be grown in vats. Perhaps we should be focusing on the technology needed to bring these into production—but, lest we make the same mistakes again, that focus also needs to look at the probable unintended consequences. Is there any hope for biofuels? Related content: Posted by Rosemary Drisdelle The National Zoo’s Monitoring and Assessment of Biodiversity Program in Gabon studies species diversity as part of an attempt to bring resource development and extraction more in line with environmental responsibility. A group of scientists including Brian Schmidt, a research ornithologist with the Smithsonian Institution in Washington DC, was investigating species diversity in the Gamba Complex when they discovered a new species of forest robin. Seven years later, after comparing the bird with the four other known forest robin species and subjecting samples to DNA analysis, they have published a report of their find confirming a new species. The Olive-backed Forest Robin (Stiphrornis pyrrholaemus) is small but brightly coloured, with the males in particular having a bright orange throat and breast. It inhabits lowland forest where there is a lot of undergrowth. The bird forages on or near the ground and is more often heard than seen. Intriguingly, the Muséum d’Histoire Naturelle de Paris holds a specimen of this species that was collected in 1953. It’s a juvenile, misidentified at the time as Stiphrornis xanthogaster, another forest robin species that does occur in Gabon. The Report by Schmidt and Colleagues: “A new species of African Forest Robin from Gabon (Passeriformes: Muscicapidae: Stiphrornis).” Schmidt, Brian K., Jeffrey T. Foster, George R. Angehr, et al. Zootaxa 1850: 27–42 (2008) Other New Bird Species Discovered Recently: Posted by Rosemary Drisdelle Every year, we watch a particular ant colony that bulges up in the same place in a front flower bed. Mourning doves scratch at it and eat the ants, then the ants make repairs and the mound grows larger. One day in August (this year it was Aug 9), thousands of ants with wings swarm out of the colony and fly away. For a few hours, the air is thick with them—insect eating birds must have a heyday—then it’s all over. A few wingless ants remain. This year, on Aug 10, our neighborhood family of crows arrived and positioned themselves in the trees while several flew down to a sparsely vegetated rocky slope, squatted, and half spread their wings, shuffling in patches of dried leaves and low-growing mosses. Afterward, I checked where they’d been and found, as I expected, multitudes of ants. The crows were anting. I’ve never noticed crows anting in my yard before, but this year there does seem to be an unusual multitude of ants. In August, the crows are finished breeding and they’re looking a bit scruffy – molting. I can’t help but wonder if that irritates their skin and makes them visit the ants for a little relief. I don’t think anyone really knows why having ants crawling in the feathers should be soothing, but it is one possible explanation for a curious bird behavior. Posted by Rosemary Drisdelle It seems impossible that there could still be bird species on Earth that no one has ever noticed, but for the second time in less than two years, ornithologists have described a new species of babbler: Stachyris nongangensis, the Nonggang Babbler (Liocichla bugunorum, the Bugun Liocichla, was described in India in 2006). The Nonggang Babbler lives in southern China near the Vietnamese border, spending most of its time foraging for food on the ground. A small dark bird, it escaped notice until ornithologists did a bird survey in the Nonggang Natural Reserve. Zhou Fang and Jiang Aiwu first noticed the babbler four years ago and have been studying it ever since, working to prove that the species is new to science. Their description was published in April: Zhou Fang and Jiang Aiwu (2008) A New Species of Babbler (Timaliidae: Stachyris) from the Sino-Vietnamese Border Region of China. The Auk 125(2): 420–424. Predictably, a bird that’s just now being noticed is neither numerous nor widespread. Conservation—particularly habitat protection—will be an issue immediately, and ornithologists want to find out whether the species’ range spreads outside the Nonggang Natural Reserve into other parts of China and even Vietnam. So far, the bird has not been found outside the park’s borders. See pictures of the Nonggang Babbler at Oriental Bird Images Posted by Rosemary Drisdelle Nest webcams usually show empty nests at this time of year, but there are still some captivating—even addictive—cams to choose from. Northern Gannets: Bass Rock in the UK hosts a breeding colony of more than 150,000 Northern Gannets (Morus bassanus). In August, chicks are large but they haven’t fledged. Maintained by the Scottish Seabird Centre, a cam shows both close up and panoramic views. The picture refreshes every five to ten seconds. Viewers also see shags, guillemots, razorbills, puffins, and other seabirds. African Birds: A National Geographic WildCam shows the shores of a lake in Mashatu Game Reserve, Botswana, Africa. This camera scans the lakeshore for birds and animals while flocks of smaller birds pass overhead and the air is filled birdsong and the sounds of insects. The live streaming video follows animals as they move about, and even zooms in on birds perched in the trees. Carolina Wren: Four eggs hatched on July 28 in Glenham, New York. This Cornell Lab of Ornithology webcam, hosted by falconsandfriends.com, will show an empty nest by the middle of the month, so watch early. Be sure to view the hatching video in “Video Highlights.” Eurasian Spoonbills:The breeding season is over but the spoonbills are still around. The cam, by Vogelbescherming, Nederland, almost always shows seabirds of various species, but not always spoonbills. The recorded videos at this site are excellent as well. Birds of Brazil: Go birding in Brazil. Ustream.tv has a live camera aimed at a very active feeding station. Two nice features of this site are a live chat in a window right next to the video, and the option to open the video in a popup. The European Kingfisher cam in the July webcams is still an entertaining choice as well. Posted by Rosemary Drisdelle Just over a year ago, national Audubon released results of long-term surveys that indicated many common North American birds are in decline – some, such as the Northern Bobwhite by as much as 80%. Now the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) has similar news about woodland birds in the UK. Their breeding bird survey, done annually since 1994, shows a number of species have lost about half of their population while one, the Willow Tit, has declined by more than three quarters. The RSPB says it’s not a case of habitat loss, but points out that woodland characteristics in the UK have changed due to forestry management and an increase in deer populations. It seems the woodland doesn’t support as many birds as it did before. Some of the declining species are migrants who leave the UK to winter elsewhere. Dangers that they encounter while migrating and conditions in their winter ranges may account for some of the loss as well. It’s discouraging that so many bird species are declining around the world. The RSPB points out, however, that their data indicates some species are doing well: stonechats, nuthatches, buzzards, and Grasshopper Warblers are showing increased populations and ranges. Read the details at RSPB News Posted by Rosemary Drisdelle We’ve all heard of talking parrots, and mockingbirds that call using the signature song of another species, but how many of us have awakened to the sound of a blackbird pretending to be an ambulance siren? This week, a British couple who live near a UK hospital made the news when they reported a blackbird that visits their garden every morning and sounds off like an incoming emergency. The bird’s call is apparently so loud, and so accurate, that it’s hard to distinguish from the real thing. It can also mimic a wolf-whistle, a car alarm, and a cell phone. Most of the birds that can copy human speech, or exactly mimic the call of a different species, belong to the passerines, a large group of birds with highly developed vocal structures that includes the songbirds. Mockingbirds, crows, mynas, lyrebirds, bowerbirds, and blackbirds are all passerines. Parrots and toucans are not. Bowerbirds mimic other birds, various animals, and even mechanical noises; mockingbirds earn their name from their habit of repeating the calls of other birds; lyrebirds can copy birdcalls, wing beats, beak noises, frogs, and mechanical sounds; parrots have intrigued us most with their apparent understanding of human speech. Why do birds do this? Are they just having fun? Scientists believe that some mimicry in birds is to impress the opposite sex and thereby earn a mate—but they are not sure. While I can imagine that a wailing blackbird would get quite annoying after a while, I think it’s fascinating. I’d love to hear that blackbird. Posted by Rosemary Drisdelle Forty-one years ago, someone in Britain banded a Razorbill chick (Alca torda). In the summer of 2008, that same bird turned up, still alive and still breeding on Bardsey Island in Britain. The British Trust for Ornithology found the old Razorbill during a survey of the island. This bird has had an amazingly long life, considering that most of its species don’t live past fifteen years, and is the oldest Razorbill ever recorded in Britain. The Razorbill belongs to the Auk family (along with puffins, auklets, and other seabirds). The birds use their wings for both flying and swimming, and are accomplished divers. Spending virtually their entire lives at sea, Razorbills and other auks breed on rugged offshore islands, feeding on continental shelves. Finds like this one give us an idea of just how long a bird in the wild can survive—and we’d never know about them without banding. When banded birds turn up again, we learn a lot—not just how long they survive, but what habitats they frequent, how far they range, where they migrate to etc. Recoveries like this ancient Razorbill are particularly exciting—and it’s surprising to think that this one successful and fortunate bird has spent more than four decades at sea. Read the full account in the Telegraph Posted by Rosemary Drisdelle Many birds have already left the nest, but some species still have eggs or young. From June’s webcams, Osprey and Wood Storks remain in the nest, but they'll fledge soon. Here are more cams for July. Purple Martin: New York Wild aims a webcam at a Purple Martin colony (Progne subis) on Lake Ontario near Rochester, New York. This is a repeat: last month we watched a female Purple Martin lay eggs and incubate them. Now both parents bring food to the nestlings. This camera switches from live streaming video inside the nest to a live view of the colony. Eastern Bluebird: Camstreams Easy Streaming hosts live streaming video of a bluebird (Sialia sialis) nest in Charlotte, North Carolina. Four chicks hatched on June 29. The camera looks down while hungry chicks turn open mouths straight up. The picture is slightly fuzzy but you can still see a lot. Eastern Phoebe: This live camera is hosted by Warner Nature Center. The well-focused camera (refreshes every 20 seconds) looks down on a nest holding five eggs of the Eastern Phoebe (Sayornis phoebe), located in Marine on St. Croix, Minnesota. Incubation started June 20. Chimney Swift: Falcons and Friends is behind this video of a Chimney Swift nest (Chaetura pelagica) in Glenham, New York. A female has been sitting on four eggs since June 19. The camera (picture refreshes every 20 seconds) looks horizonatlly at a fragile looking construction of slender twigs glued to a wall. European Kingfisher: This camera hosted by Vogelbescherming, Nederland shows live streaming video of the favorite perch of a European Kingfisher—Ijsvogel—Alcedo atthis. If the bird’s not there, watch any of the videos listed on the right. If you can read it (Dutch?) there’s a lengthy log below. Posted by Rosemary Drisdelle House Martins migrate north from equatorial Africa each spring to breed in Britain, but in 2008 it seems many of the birds didn’t return. It may be that bad weather in southern Europe killed House Martins en route, but the British Trust for Ornithology (BTO) is worried that people may also be destroying nests. To get a better picture of the problem, the BTO is asking everyone to learn to live with their House Martins, and to participate in a survey. Using the data collected when people report that they have nesting House Martins, scientists will create a House Martin Map, which will later be incorporated into the national Bird Atlas. House Martins nest under eaves of houses, building nests out of mud and lining them with feathers. They will often use the same nest year after year, making only minor repairs, and sometimes many nests are built side by side creating a nesting colony. Pairs raise two broods of chicks in an average nesting season. It is illegal to disturb a House Martin nest during the breeding season. Nonetheless, some homeowners object to the bird droppings and pieces of eggshell that accumulate under the nests and knock them down, heedless of growing chicks inside. The destruction of an unoccupied nest hurts the birds as well, as it will take 10 to 18 days to rebuild. If you have House Martins nesting under your eaves, leave them alone! Visit the BTO website to learn how to enjoy your tenants, and participate in the survey. Related Content: Posted by Rosemary Drisdelle In the lead up to Israel’s 60th birthday, people were busy collecting votes to choose a national bird. According to news reports, ordinary people, schoolchildren, the military, even Israelis living abroad had their say. A panel of poets, politicians and academics accounted for 25% of the result, while the remaining 75% of votes came from the people of Israel. 155,000 people voted, and 35% of them chose the Hoopoe, Upupa epops. The Hoopoe (Duchifat in Hebrew) is a striking cinnamon colored bird with black and white striped wings and tail, and a crest of bright feathers on top of its head. It lives in Israel year round, and appears in the folklore of the region, both features that made it a good candidate. It is already the namesake of a commando unit in the Israeli military. The effort to choose a national bird was a project of the Society for the Protection of Nature in Israel and, in part, an attempt to bring conservation issues into the public eye. The Hoopoe competed against nine other shortlisted species: bulbul, a falcon species, Griffon Vulture, Spur-winged Lapwing, honey-sucker, warbler, White-breasted Kingfisher, Barn Owl, and goldfinch. Now that Israel has a national bird, there are plans to designate official birds of the country’s cities as well. Read more about the Hoopoe. Posted by Rosemary Drisdelle For the wild bird enthusiast and collector of bird identification books, there’s a new field guide, authored by Ted Floyd, editor of Birding Magazine. More than five hundred pages long, the Smithsonian Field Guide to the Birds of North America has attractive and useful features:
Twenty-first century North America is home to a growing number of people interested in birds, and technology provides them with birding resources like never before. It’s easy to see that, with its basic information about birds and birding and its clever use of the highly portable MP3 player, Ted Floyds book is well aimed at this group. Smithsonian Field Guide to the Birds of North America is available in bookstores now. Other innovative products for birders: Posted by Rosemary Drisdelle Bird webcams are getting better and better. All of the webcams below should provide good viewing in June. Also check “Webcams to Watch in May 2008” – at the beginning of June, the Peregrine Falcons, Bald Eagles, and Barn Owls were still worth watching. Osprey: Two webcams look in on osprey nests in the United States. The Connecticut Audubon Osprey Camera is aimed at a nest with four young chicks. An adult bird is usually at the nest as well. Click on “Live View” to refresh the picture. The Kentucky Environmental Education Projects (KEEP) has a webcam watching an Osprey nest with three chicks. These chicks are a little older than the ones in the Connecticut nest. Reload or refresh to update the picture (every 12 seconds). The site also has video clips and photo galleries that are worth looking at. Atlantic Puffins: The Burrow Web Cam on Craigleith Island (Scottish Seabird Centre) watches the entrance to an Atlantic Puffin Burrow. On June 2, this webcam was not updating but the site promises that the problem will soon be fixed. Wood Storks: This web cam is operated by Storchennest.de in Vetschau, Germany. The stork pair started with six eggs. Only four eggs hatched, then two chicks died of unknown causes on May 25. Two chicks remain in the nest and seem to be doing well. This cam provides a great picture. Purple Martins: New York Wild watches a Purple Martin colony on Lake Ontario near Rochester, N.Y. Two cams are located inside nest gourds while one watches the activity outside. There are no eggs yet, but the birds are adding nesting material. Follow the link for streaming video. Posted by Rosemary Drisdelle I’ve written about wind farms and birds in the past because of the potential that windmills have to kill birds. In general both environmentalists and people interested in bird conservation support wind energy because it doesn’t pollute and is renewable; however, when wind turbines are built in places where large numbers of birds fly through, they can be a problem. The most famous example is Altamont Pass in California, an enormous wind farm that kills many raptors every year. Audubon Texas thinks that a wind development proposed for Kenedy County in coastal Texas has the potential to be as bad or worse, because it is directly in the path of literally millions of migratory birds as they travel north and return south each year. Audubon points out that there has been insufficient study of sites like this one to accurately judge whether it will be a significant threat to birds. It’s discouraging that developers fail to take birds into account when choosing a location for windmills. While research and good environmental studies can help us avoid repeating Altamont Pass elsewhere, wind development that threatens bird species already in decline can ruin wind energy’s clean and green image. Lets’ hope it doesn’t happen. Read the Audubon resolution and additional information about the proposed development in Kenedy County, Texas. Posted by Rosemary Drisdelle Perhaps you’ve wondered where the shore birds you see along the coast spend the rest of their time, and what routes they take to get there. If you live along the eastern coast of North America you can learn about the migration routes of a number of familiar shorebirds by visiting the website of the Goldenrod Foundation. Follow the link that says “Click Here to See Shorebird Migration Routes”, and you’ll be treated to a list of fifteen different eastern shorebirds, all of which either nest at Plymouth Beach, Massachusetts, or stop there on migration. Try the Red Knot: the globe fills the screen and a white silhouette of a bird traces the Red Knot’s migration route north from Argentina to the Arctic and back by a different route. The species stops at Plymouth Beach on its journey south. The Piping Plover, which nests at Plymouth Beach, spends the winter in various locations in Florida, along the Gulf Coast, and on Caribbean islands – delightfully illustrated by the animated migration route created by the Goldenrod Foundation. These animated maps don’t give an accurate account of the migrations of entire bird populations—just the ones that stop at Plymouth Beach. Other populations of the same species may nest and winter in other locations. Still, the maps are interesting and fun as long as you keep this in mind. Other fascinating birding activities on the internet: Posted by Rosemary Drisdelle The Short-eared Owl is widespread globally, and ranges throughout North America except in the very far north. In spite of this, Asio flammeus is a species of Special Concern in Canada, and one that we don’t know enough about. To learn more, scientists have placed a satellite transmitter on a female Short-eared owl in order to track her movements. Anyone can watch by visiting the map at Bird Studies Canada. The owl was tagged in Southern Ontario, where she spent the winter. In early spring, she flew to Michigan, but soon headed north into Quebec. Based on what we know of the species, she may migrate more than 1600 kilometres (1000 miles) to reach her nesting site. Short-eared Owls live in open habitat such as prairies, marshes, grasslands, tundra, and sand dunes. They begin nesting from March through late June--like Burrowing Owls, Short-eared Owls nest on the ground. On May 13, the owl was in Quebec, near the eastern shore of James Bay. It remains to be seen whether she will continue moving north in the days to come. You can see her entire flight path by updating the map (click on “Previous Month”, or “Previous Two Months,” and then “Update Map.”) and watch her progress by checking back regularly. Posted by Rosemary Drisdelle Many birds nest in May in the Northern Hemisphere, so it’s a good time for webcams. Here are five that provided great viewing on May 7, 2008: Peregrine Falcons (Hamilton Community Peregrine Project): A pair of Peregrine Falcons, dubbed Madame X and Surge, are nesting on the Sheraton Hamilton Hotel in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada. Both birds are banded and some of their history is known (the information on the page is worth reading). Monitors have been watching them since early March and the webcam, which refreshes every ten seconds, provides a clear view of the scrape. The first egg hatched on May 6. Bald Eagles (Xcel Energy): This streaming video webcam looks straight down into a Bald Eagle nest in Platteville Colorado, US. There are three nestlings (two is the norm) and it’s easy to see them moving about as the adults come and go. Great Blue Heron (Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife, Kids in the Nest, and Olympia Systems): My personal favorite from April’s webcams, this streaming video cam is superb. The three chicks are active and growing fast. Barn Owls (Wirral’s Barn Owl Webcam): This site provides four views of a Barn Owl nest in Wirral Country Park, UK. The pictures refresh every five minutes. (Hint: the four cam views open in separate windows so you can have them all open at once to see the present scene from all perspectives.) For past views, click the “Diary of a Barn Owl” link. A Birdfeeder in Oklahoma (Pat’s Backyard Bird Cam): Watch feeder birds in Oklahoma City. There are two cameras which refresh every 15 – 20 seconds and at certain times of day there’s lots of activity. Click on the “Bird Visitors” link for pictures of birds you’re likely to see. Posted by Rosemary Drisdelle Many waterbirds migrate north from Africa and Southern Asia each spring to breed. In the fall, they make the return trip. During each migration, they rely on wetlands along the route to provide them with resting, feeding, and roosting sites. Sadly, these wetlands are disappearing as humans drain them, pollute them, or build on them. The fact that migratory birds must pass through a number of countries makes conservation of this dwindling habitat difficult—it requires international cooperation. The Wings Over Wetlands Project (WOW) is an attempt to address this difficulty. WOW is an international partnership of conservation organizations and governments designed to help countries get the information they need, and then work cooperatively to conserve important wetlands (and with them, the world’s waterbirds). The area covered by WOW includes Africa, Europe, much of Asia, Greenland, and the Canadian Arctic Archipelago. The WOW project has just launched its website, a site designed to provide information about the project, critical wetlands, and the birds involved. In the future, the site will link to tools such as the ‘Critical Sites Network Tool,’ which will link wetlands with the bird species that use them to help conservation groups determine the importance of specific wetlands. Related Content: Posted by Rosemary Drisdelle In a recent article in the New York Times, (Did Your Shopping List Kill a Songbird? Opinion, Mar 30, 2008) Bridget Stutchbury discusses the impact of extensive pesticide use in Central and South America on migratory birds. It seems that birds returning to the south for the winter are dying in vast numbers from pesticide poisoning. Many of the pesticides that are being used in large quantities in the south have been banned or restricted in the north due to their toxicity. People in North America and Europe are increasingly aware of threats to bird species, whether it be chemicals, destruction of wetlands or other habitat, wind farm development, fishing practices, even feral cats. Concern and conservation have become more intense since National Audubon revealed that many common North American birds are in precipitous decline. It’s ironic, then, that even as we become more aware at home, we fuel the decline of birds in the south with our hunger for imported produce. Those pesticides we’re not using are being used to produce our food anyway—they’re just being used somewhere else. To help the birds and our own health, Stutchbury suggests that we should avoid buying the following produce from Central and South America if it has not been organically grown: coffee, bananas, melons, strawberries, green beans, bell peppers, and tomatoes. Bridget Stutchbury is the author of Silence of the Songbirds (Harper Collins, 2007). Posted by Rosemary Drisdelle Every day we hear about bird species in decline and new threats to birds around the world. In 2007 BirdLife International launched BirdLife Species Champions, a project to save the world’s critically endangered birds—all 189 of them. Now, BirdLife brings us the Rare Birds Yearbook, a book about the 189 threatened species and some of the efforts that are being made to save them from extinction. The Rare Birds Yearbook is mostly about the birds themselves: species names, ranges, populations, threats, past conservation attempts and actions for the future. There are photographs and illustrations of the birds to complement the data. However, the yearbook also makes interesting reading because it contains articles about species with interesting backgrounds, some of the conservation projects already underway, and the people involved. Birds face numerous threats: habitat destruction by industry and development; recreational incursions into wilderness; introduced predators such as cats, rats, and snakes; fishing practices; egg collecting; hunting; extreme weather; and global warming to name a few. This list makes it clear that humans bear much of the responsibility for the dwindling birds of the world. Some humans are working hard to help our beleaguered birds, and publications like the Rare Birds Yearbook not only provide education but also directly help the effort: for every purchase, £4 goes to support BirdLife Species Champions. Find out more about the book from BirdLife International. Birds on List of 189 Critically Endangered Species: Ivory-billed Woodpecker, Campephilus principalis Posted by Rosemary Drisdelle More and more people are setting up webcams so bird watchers can watch birds in the nest and at busy birdfeeders. Here are five webcams that were all working when I checked them on April 8, 2008, and worth looking at (Remember to account for time differences when you want to watch!). Lake Washington Eagle Cam (WildWatchCams): A Bald Eagle is sitting on this enormous nest of twigs and branches. The picture refreshes every ten seconds so it’s interesting to watch. The only difficulty is that the bird is usually sitting partly hidden behind the trunk of a tree. Blackwater Refuge Live Osprey Cam: I don’t think osprey are actually nesting on this platform yet but they are coming and going. The nest is in Cambridge, Maryland. Burrowing Owl Cam (WildWatchCams): The Burrowing Owls seem to spend most of their time outside near the burrow entrance, though they are not very active. The picture updates every ten seconds. Great Blue Heron Cam (Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife, Kids in the Nest, and Olympia Systems): The heron is sitting. This is a streaming cam - you can see the bird moving around and watch its feathers being ruffled by the breeze. Wildlife Focus Web Cam in the Forest (The World Land Trust): Set in Buenaventura Reserve, Ecuador, this is recorded streaming video. On April 8 the video showed many beautiful hummingbirds drinking from a water dish. Posted by Rosemary Drisdelle Canada’s 1.3 billion acres of boreal forest stretches all the way across the country and includes forests, wetlands, and northern tundra. It’s home to many species of plants and animals that rely on it for everything, and is the home and/or breeding range of literally hundreds of species of birds. Warblers and many other songbirds, shorebirds, ducks, geese, swans and countless other species nest and raise young there every year. People use Canada’s boreal forest as well—and most don’t use it sustainably. Millions of acres are destroyed each year for lumber harvest, mining, hydroelectric projects, and gas and oil exploration. Only a tiny 8% of this vital ecosystem is protected, while almost a third is earmarked for development. Eight percent is not nearly enough if we want the species that rely on the boreal to survive. SaveOurBorealBirds.org, a group of at least 17 environmental and bird conservation groups from both North and South America, is asking for everyone’s help to save the boreal forest. You can read more about the boreal forest ecosystem and the many birds that depend on it at their website, and sign the petition (directed at Canadian government) to protect the ecosystem before it’s too late. Related content: Posted by Rosemary Drisdelle For the past few days, I’ve observed a pair of nuthatches showing considerable interest in one of my nesting boxes. I’m delighted: I hung the box in the fall of 2006, and to my knowledge no bird has given it a passing glance, let alone looked inside, until now. I’m also worried: we have red squirrels and they have certainly checked out the box, travelling through the tree at regular intervals. I’ve read, however, that nuthatches have ways of dealing with squirrels , so I’ll wait to see what happens. The interest shown by the nuthatches does seem to confirm some nesting box wisdom. First, a nesting box may need to weather a bit and become part of the landscape before birds will use it. Second, attention to design and location pays off. Third, a nesting box may well attract a bird species it wasn’t originally meant for (I was aiming for chickadees). And finally, by the time spring is officially here, nesting boxes should be ready outside, even if the temperature is still below zero and there’s snow in the forecast. Interested in encouraging birds to nest on your property? Here are some articles that might be of interest: Posted by Rosemary Drisdelle Have you ever seen a bird living in the wild that obviously doesn’t belong? Seeing Mynahs in the trees in Florida or peacocks strolling around in California is a reminder that birds raised in captivity can escape and survive in new places, at least for a while. In the worst case scenario, escaped cage birds do well in the wild in new places, establishing a breeding population and becoming invasive threats to native species. In colonial times, people sometimes deliberately released cage birds in new places: this is how European Starlings and House Sparrows came to thrive in North America in such great numbers—displacing native birds from territory, food supplies, and nesting sites. Other birds, such as mynahs and peafowl may have escaped from captivity by accident or been deliberately released by owners who no longer wanted them. Then there are the popular pet birds like parrots and canaries that sometimes escape and usually perish. Today we know it’s rarely a good idea environmentally to deliberately introduce a species where it doesn’t belong. In the case of a pet bird, it’s abusive to the animal as well, since we can never be certain that the bird will be able to find food, endure the climate, and evade unfamiliar predators. Bird owners should always be extra vigilant to ensure that birds don’t ever escape from cages and enclosures. Two rules to follow: never remove a bird from its native habitat, and never release a bird into the wild where it doesn’t belong. Simple. Posted by Rosemary Drisdelle A new field guide to the birds of Chile was published in 2003, including 473 species known to live in the country or visit there (Birds of Chile: Princeton Field Guides. Alvaro Jaramillo. Princeton University Press, 2003). One reason that Chile is home to so many bird species is its wide variety of habitats: sea coasts, offshore islands, mountains, desert, forest etc. There is not just a wide range in elevation in Chilean environments; the long thin shape of the country means a wide range in latitude as well. It means hundreds of different bird species suited to many different ecosystems—cotingas in the north, pelicans along the coast, and albatrosses offshore. I’ll be visiting some of these ecosystems and I hope to see a lot of birds I never seen before. You can see some of the possibilities in another birder’s photoset. Check out the collection of silhouettes of a Giant Hummingbird. Hummingbirds are one of the things you have to visit South America to really see: a few species migrate into North America each summer, and although these are much appreciated, the vast majority of beautiful hummingbird species remain in the south throughout the year. Another fascinating South American species is the Burrowing Parrot, seen in another photoset by the same birder. These birds, once extremely numerous in Patagonia are becoming increasingly rare and may be threatened with extinction if population decreases continue. Here’s to seeing lots of Chilean birds. Enjoy the Birds page on Suite101 while I’m away. Posted by Rosemary Drisdelle Malta is an important location for migrating birds, visited by species from dozens of European countries. This is important because, despite its membership in the European Union, Malta breaks EU laws every year by allowing hunters to take migratory birds in the spring. Spring is a particularly damaging time to hunt birds because they are on their way to their breeding territory. A bird that is hunted in spring has no opportunity to reproduce that year; a bird that is taken in the fall may well leave offspring who will reproduce in later years. Each year, there is an outcry against spring hunting in Malta—but the hunting continues. Now the fight is heating up. The European Commission has announced that it will take Malta to the European Court of Justice to force an end to the spring hunt. Meanwhile, though the vast majority of Maltese are thought to fully support an end to the hunt, a small minority are willing to go to surprising lengths to illustrate their opposition: in the past vandals have destroyed trees at nature reserves, and now three cars belonging to BirdLife Malta volunteers have been torched and destroyed. The mindset of these criminals is beyond me. I couldn’t shoot a bird, let alone shoot one illegally, or set fire someone’s car because they say I can’t shoot one. It looks like pure selfishness is way ahead of common sense here. It’s scary to think these individuals have firearms as well as fire. What do you think of the situation in Malta? Start a discussion. Posted by Rosemary Drisdelle Technology is wonderful: it makes it possible for me to take a vacation while readers continue to read articles on the Birds page—and new things to read will continue to appear. From now until mid-March, I’ll be trying to catch glimpses—and maybe photos—of some South American birds. I know that lots of North American birds fly south to spend winters in South America, but the continent also has many birds of its own. Other travelers have posted collections of South American bird photos for us all to enjoy and I’ll be happy to do even half as well with my camera. Argentina, of course, has penguins, but I probably won’t get far enough south to see any—another trip perhaps. Other possibilities include hummingbirds, toucans, skuas, unfamiliar raptors, petrels, parrots, ibises, rheas and many others. Any of these would be wonderful to see living in the wild. Whenever I travel and see unfamiliar birds, I’m reminded that my local birds only seem ordinary to me because I’m so used to them—while people visiting my part of the world must find them interesting and exotic. Blue Jays, Downey Woodpeckers, Yellow-shafted Flickers, and even Chickadees are all beautiful birds. Wherever you are, enjoy the birds while I’m away. Where have you travelled that you particularly enjoyed the birds? Start a discussion. Posted by Rosemary Drisdelle Last May a new video game appeared: “Snapshot Adventures: Secret of Bird Island.” A game of mystery and photographic skill, it allows players to move through a graphic world tracking down a missing bird photographer while practicing their own bird photography. A refreshing departure from the violent themes of many video games, it still offers lots of challenges to the video gamer. "Snapshot Adventures: Secret of Bird Island" was developed using the knowledge and expertise of ornithologists at the Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology. Now it’s in the running for the Audience Award given by the Independent Game Festival. Those who have already played the game and loved it can vote for it on the Independent Game Festival website. If you haven’t played it yet, you can try it for free at Large Animal Games, and then vote for it if you agree that it’s one of the best video games come out in a while—which is likely if you’re a bird lover. But be careful, once you try it, you may get hooked on creating and photographing your own birds… and get lost on Bird Island forever with all the other birders. Have you played "Snapshot Adventures: Secret of Bird Island?" What did you think? Start a discussion. Posted by Rosemary Drisdelle For pictures and videos of wild birds, the web site to visit is Bird Cinema, and for pet birds, it might just be AvianVideos.com. This new website does have some wild bird content (check out the “Weird Bird of Paradise” in the Eco-Tourism Category), but is mainly devoted to pet birds. It already has lots of content featuring parrots flying, talking, playing, bathing and being cuddled. AvianVideos.com is well organized, with links to collections of videos on popular species of pet birds: eclectus parrots, loris and lorikeets, canaries and finches, toucans and many more (I didn’t see a category for mynahs or crows). Once the site has more videos posted in the various categories, it will be an excellent source of information for anyone thinking of purchasing a pet bird and wondering which species is the right one for them. Meanwhile, there are still lots to watch and they’re addictive. You don’t have to be a member to watch the videos or make comments, but if you have your own to add, sign up for an account and begin sharing. You can even embed favorites in your own blog if you want to. What do you think of AvianVideos.com? Start a discussion. Posted by Rosemary Drisdelle In the past few years, I’ve seen a total of one Common Redpoll at my birdfeeders, and one Pine Siskin. This year, a whole flock of Common Redpolls made an appearance in January and they remain in the neighborhood, visiting both birdfeeders regularly, winging through the skies in a shifting mass that is constantly reorganizing itself, and sitting in the evergreens like Christmas decorations that never got put away. On one occasion I watched a Sharp-shinned Hawk plunge into their midst, but he caught nothing. At about the same time, a flock of Pine Siskins arrived. At first, they were accompanied by a small number of American Goldfinches and even seemed to mix with the redpolls a bit, but when last seen, the siskins were foraging alone. Add to this a flock of Pine Grosbeaks enjoying the rosehips at the corner day after day, and a report of White-winged Crossbills from another local bird watcher, and we have evidence of a winter finch irruption: winter finches have moved into eastern Canada from central regions where seed crops last fall were reportedly poor. Is it a superflight? The results of the Christmas Bird Count may tell us. It’s sad to think we probably won’t have so much fun with the winter finches next year, but I’m enjoying them while it lasts—and wishing I could lure those White-winged Crossbills to my own feeders! Are you seeing unusual numbers of winter finches in your area (or perhaps an unusual lack of them)? Start a discussion. Posted by Rosemary Drisdelle During the winter months, I notice that birds are most abundant at my feeders when the snow is deep or the weather especially cold. This is because it’s harder for birds to find food at these times – at other times, the birds are off finding natural food sources. Backyard feeders are accessible sources of good food for birds that are struggling with winter conditions. I sometimes hear people saying that you shouldn’t feed birds because it makes them too reliant on handouts, and incapable of fending for themselves. Once you start feeding, some say, you can’t stop because the birds will starve. We also hear that feeding discourages birds from migrating. Experts tell us that none of these things are entirely true. Even when they visit feeders, birds get the majority of their food from natural sources; if the feeder unavoidably goes empty, they’ll turn to other feeders and to natural sources, just like they would in the wild; a dwindling food supply isn’t generally the cue that triggers bird migration. So go ahead and feed the birds: it will help them survive the cold days and nights of winter. They’ll also benefit from a roosting box, a brush pile, or other shelter. Read about feeder maintenance and cleaning. Posted by Rosemary Drisdelle I used to wonder why the amount of potting soil in a house plant pot seems to decrease as times goes by. If you leave a plant in the same pot for years, you’ll notice that it eventually appears to have no soil any more – how can that be? The confusion comes from the fact that we tend to think of soil—or dirt—as being a mixture of ground and powdered rocks, the results of millennia of erosion. Sand, gravel, and clay are all words for various textures of broken up rock, and they don’t tend to disappear. Soil, however, is something different. Soil, and particularly potting soil, is mostly the remains of plants that have partially, but not completely, decomposed. A list of ingredients for potting soil might contain peat moss, shredded hardwood bark mulch, composted plant material, perlite (a volcanic glass), and sand. Only the last two ingredients come from rocks and they account for very little of the total mass of potting soil. The rest is organic and it breaks down over time. Of course, potting soil for indoor house plants is usually sterile because people don’t want insects, earthworms, and other soil dwellers living in their plant pots. This will significantly slow down decomposition of organic material in the soil—and also make it considerably less interesting. Read about living things in natural soil: Posted by Rosemary Drisdelle In the article What is an Ecosystem, I mention the idea of equilibrium: in theory, ecosystems remain the same for long periods of time because the amount of energy being added by the sun compensates for the energy lost in the lives and deaths of living things. Everything in the ecosystem depends on everything else and all needs are met. There must be considerable change allowed, however—quite a bit of elasticity—because there are significant natural fluctuations in climate that don’t bring down ecosystems. An unusually cool summer would be a good example (less energy being added). Some plants won’t do as well at cooler temperatures, therefore some other species don’t have as much food and they don’t do as well either. Some species that don’t normally do well in cooler years thrive briefly because the competition is less. But as long as the cool weather doesn’t continue year after year, the normal balance returns. This is greatly oversimplified of course, but it does suggest that something quite significant has to happen to destroy an ecosystem: the loss of a keystone species perhaps, extreme destruction of habitat, or a long-lasting change in weather patterns. It’s discouraging to think that humans are causing all three of these things simultaneously in ecosystems all over the world. By the time we learn not to do it, what will be left? Posted by Rosemary Drisdelle Inermicapsifer madagascariensis. It’s the most beautiful scientific name I’ve ever come across. I’ve no idea what the genus name means, but clearly the species name indicates a relationship to Madagascar. Inermicapsifer madagascariensis (can you say it?) is a parasitic tapeworm, but one we needn’t worry about too much. Then there’s Diphyllobothrium latum, a more common tapeworm. For this one I understand the genus name: di means two, phyllo means leaf-like (like phyllo pastry), and bothria are grooves, so the name means “two grooves on a leaf-like structure”—the worm’s scolex, or head. Obviously I would find scientific names a lot more interesting if I were fluent in Latin and Greek. The idea behind scientific, or Latin, names is that everyone everywhere can refer to species by exactly the same name, no matter what language they speak. Of course the system isn’t perfect. Diphyllobothrium latum has been called Taenia lata, Bothriocephalus latus, Dibothriocephalus latus, Bothriocephalus taenioides, and Dibothriocephalus minor. It’s no exception: many species have left a similar trail of names behind them. Even today, a scientific name can change if scientists determine that a species has been placed in the wrong group. It’s unavoidable. Nevertheless, the system is useful once you understand how it works—the scientific name, if you know it, is often the fastest way to get information about a species from the scientific literature. And if you use them often enough, Latin names don’t sound so odd. You may even find them beautiful—like Inermicapsifer madagascariensis. Other topics in biology: Posted by Rosemary Drisdelle Biodomes are enclosed environments where scientists have created a specific environment that does not usually exist at that particular place. They populate it with plants and animals that are comfortable there, and provide the required temperature, humidity, light levels etc. on an ongoing basis. Ideally, a biodome works as a complete ecosystem, sustaining itself. The Montreal Biodome is an example of a climate controlled enclosed ecosystem that successfully recreates four specific environments. The visitor gets to actually visit the different environments and see many plants and animals that live there (except in the case of the polar world, where one just looks in, through glass). What makes it so convincing is the sheer size of the place: there’s actually room for tropical birds to fly, for sloths to climb high into the towering trees, for whole schools of marine fish to come close to the glass and then disappear in the distant depths. The freedom that the animals have to move around in natural surroundings—surroundings that people are moving through as well—and the size of the biodome, are also what set it apart from zoos and wildlife parks, and make it more educational. It’s well worth the price of admission: I’ll happily go again on my next visit to Montreal. And one day I’d love to visit the Eden Project, and even bigger series of biodomes in southwest England. Read more in Biology at Suite101 |
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