Painted Bunting finally leaves Va. yard
North Dakota had a painted bunting show up north of Dickinson last year. Several state bird nuts saw this first state record which was making appearances at a farmstead for a few days. Alas, the day I drove out to see it, it had gone. Of course the 40 m.p.h. winds probably helped. I missed that one by a day.
Well, one spent the entire winter in someone's yard in Virginia (here's the story via newsleader.com). Seems the homeowner quite counting the number of visitors who showed up to view this southern specialty when the list topped 350. Wish that was my yard, at least for a day.
Here's a photo of the North Dakota bird courtesy ND Birding Society website:
Posted by: kcorliss on 5/14/2008 at 11:28 AM | Comments (0) | Permalink
Migrant birds target of Climate Change scaremongers
I tell ya, every day it's something else. Now the fear peddlers are targeting migrant birds. Eurekalert.org has put this out, apparently from a soon-to-be published piece in PLoS ONE.
In the above link you will find a discussion of energy usage by migrant birds. Supposedly this climate change stuff is "predicted" to cause an increase in turbulence and winds. How vague is that?
Anyway, according to the researchers, it has been shown that Swainson's thrushes' heart rates (and therefore energy usage) increases with windier conditions, be they tailwinds or headwinds.
Now, I'm no expert but this smacks as completely bogus to me. I fly airplanes. A body (bird, airplane, canoe, whatever) moving through a fluid medium (such as water or air) doesn't care whether the wind is blowing or not. Sure you may get there slower or faster depending on flow direction, but the actual work being done at that moment is exactly the same.
Take for example a canoeist in a meandering river that is flowing at three knots. If the canoeist is paddling at a rate of five knots and going downstream, his speed relative to someone on shore is eight knots. But he is still moving through the water at five and doing the same amount of work. Even if he turns and travels upstream the work load (i.e. energy usage) remains constant but his speed is now down to two knots. It works the same with airplanes. And golly, I highly suspect it works the same with Swainson's thrushes or any other bird for that matter.
Posted by: kcorliss on 5/14/2008 at 11:07 AM | Comments (0) | Permalink
DL Festival making huge strides
The annual Detroit Lakes (Minn.) Birding Festival is becoming quite a big deal. Last year David Sibley was the keynote speaker.
I know I should have mentioned it earlier but it starts tomorrow and runs through the 18th. Honestly I've never attended this event but virtually everyone I know has. It's well run with competent field trip leaders and insightful evening speakers. I don't think it's too late to join in on some of the activities if someone is at all interested in birds.
These bird festivals can go a long way toward educating any birder, be they beginners or expert. The few days are intense. Plan on filling your brain with much new information.
Here's the link with all of the information. From reading their site I see they are heading out to a couple new locations, both with excellent birding potential: Glendalough State Park and Red Lake WMA/Beltrami Forest.
Posted by: kcorliss on 5/14/2008 at 10:47 AM | Comments (0) | Permalink
26.2 just four days out
So the Fargo Marathon is a mere four days away and the weather looks to be improving. I sat for four hours today watching my son's double header baseball game in cloudy, windy, 50-degree conditions. It was cold and it was miserable. Oh yeah, just to add to the misery the first game went extra innings. But, as I say, by Saturday we may have fairly decent weather but it sounds like it could be windy. Gee, wind in North Dakota, imagine that.
Anyway, I thought I'd challenge myself during this run and to a bird census along the way. I'm not sure I've ever heard anyone else doing this. Oh there are plenty of other mental excursions to take while trying to remove the notion of pain from the front of your conscience. Personal sound systems are common (although I hear they are banned from the Fargo Marathon) although I've never run with them. Then there is the "smell-the-roses" technique where runners just watch and enjoy the landscape going by. There is always some pretty girls to follow. Conversations with fellow sufferers is another tried and true method. But I'm going to try the bird census thing. We'll see how this turns out.
Posted by: kcorliss on 5/13/2008 at 10:42 PM | Comments (0) | Permalink
looks like we may be wrong again
Swedish researchers have purportedly shown that birds have a significant difference from humans in perceiving with their eyes. Ultraviolet is apparently visible to them while we are blind to it. As a result, many of the studies done in the past regarding color and sexual selection and whatnot may just be wrong. Don't you love it when we find out we didn't know what in the heck we were talking about?
Here's the piece from the Times of India. It just goes to show you just how much hubris and haughtiness exists even in the hallowed halls of science. Gee birds' vision is different than ours...well duh.
Posted by: kcorliss on 5/13/2008 at 10:24 PM | Comments (0) | Permalink
Future lies with such cooperation
I've only seen one cerulean warbler in my life and that was a stray someone found at the Tamarac National Wildlife Refuge in Minnesota. It's one of the many new world warbler species which populate the Americas. But this one is in trouble. Everything I've read about the cerulean says the population is crashing. Who's to say what is causing the decline. Certainly fragmented habitat is a concern as is what is happening on their tropical wintering grounds.
It is heartening to read this from the Vinton Country (Ohio) Courier. A landowner there has opted to let the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service plant trees on his land (once a strip mine) for the betterment of future cerulean warbler habitat. He likes the idea because it enhances his hunting land. But it illustrates the importance of getting public buy-in on habitat issues.
The various levels of government just don't have the land or the resources to tackle all the problems. It's important for the future of all wildlife for large landowners to at least think about preservation options. Certainly we can't tell owners what to do with their property but we can educate.
The CRP program was another such private/government arrangement which benefitted prairie species as well as hunting opportunites over the past many years. But that success story is already fading as the sky high crop prices are tempting many payees to abandon CRP in favor of higher returns on crops.
It's all about habitat folks. The rest really doesn't matter.
Posted by: kcorliss on 5/12/2008 at 10:38 PM | Comments (0) | Permalink
New Spring Bird
The Townsend's solitaire is a species my wife and I used to see quite a bit when we lived in Washington. Here in North Dakota it's a fairly regular winter visitor to the juniper stands in the more westerly parts of the state and rare here in Cass County. I found this bird on Sunday in West Fargo marking my first spring record for Townsend's solitaire.
It was a nice bird to get since I had missed the crappy weather the day before which had brought a bunch of warblers to the Fargo parks. Apparently that bunch left that evening because they weren't there Sunday. Nonetheless I'll take a solitaire as my consolation prize.
Posted by: kcorliss on 5/12/2008 at 7:18 PM | Comments (0) | Permalink
Bird killers: don't be shy
A couple young lads were going around town killing birds out of season. Punishment: parading naked through the streets. This story is out of India but it makes a person think.
Wildlife crimes, for the most part, are not prosecuted with much vigor in the US. Plus the penalties are usually of the wrist-slapping variety.
I wonder how a sentence such as public embarassment would work here in North Dakota. It may make a person think twice. Of course, this would never happen here--too much like uncivilized Plymouth Colony-type punishments they'd say. I can see the defense attorney saying, "We are much more enlightened today for that. Better to take away hunting privileges for a year than embarass someone."
Posted by: kcorliss on 5/12/2008 at 9:44 AM | Comments (0) | Permalink
Can't turn it off
Those folks afflicted with the disease can't help themselves. It's a can't-turn-it-off ailment that can rankle those around them. Right in the middle of a conversation their eyes wander off and fix on something. Something other than the person talking.
I'm talking about nature watching, or bird watching specifically. I've got it too. And it happens all the time. In this story out of the Dallas Morning News, author Mary Ellen Botter describes the fantastic birding to be had at Disney World. Now, who goes to Disney World to look at birds? You might be surprised.
The piece does a decent job of talking about the birds but doesn't really address the spouses, children, or disinterested others who are fed up with that certain person in their party with the habit of wandering off into the trees.
I've tried to keep it in check. But last year, for instance, I was at a Yankees game in New York. I couldn't help but watch the swallows and gulls zipping around the stadium. At least between pitches.
I'm not sure there is a cure. But doggone it you just never know when an osprey will fly over the county fair.
Posted by: kcorliss on 5/12/2008 at 9:16 AM | Comments (0) | Permalink
Downright rude
Okay so we live here and we deal with the weather in the best way we can. But there are limits to my patience. This morning I woke up and looked out my hotel room window at the Dickinson, No. Dak., cityscape. That's right, snow. Enough already.
(Here's the view. Merry Christmas)
Posted by: kcorliss on 5/10/2008 at 11:02 AM | Comments (0) | Permalink
