I and the Bird 51: I and the Bird Sweepstakes

Yes, that's right: head on over to The Birdchaser for a roundup of the best of recent bird and birder blogging from around the world, and you can enter the contest for a chance to win a great prize!

The winner will receive a copy of The Audubon Society Guide to Attracting Birds, signed by the author, Steve Kress.

All you have to do is what anyone would want to do anyway--read the collected posts and answer the skill-testing questions. Check it out!

I and the Bird #52 will be hosted by Paul at The Wandering Tattler. To participate send your submissions to Paul (pjollig AT gmail DOT com) or Mike at 10,000 Birds by June 26.

The Brewster's Back

It's been a couple of days since I got out back--last time, not a warbler to be heard (although I've heard a black-and-white a number of times from across the street over the last ten days or so). Last weekend hummingbirds, house wrens, and chimney swifts arrived in the hamlet--now tree swallows and wrens are squabbling over the two nesting boxes in the yard. Chipping sparrows are getting very serious in their various battles and courting dances. Then this morning, warblers. Out in the far field, my old friend the Brewster's Warbler was singing from the same perches that have accomodated this bird over the last few years. Joining him, one of those American place-name warblers, Nashville, I think. Didn't get the best look, and don't know the song well enough to be sure. In the woods beyond, an ovenbird and a wood thrush sang.

The Eastern Towhee has been back for a while now--but there seemed to be a number of them singing back there this morning. And at least one of them was letting me get much better looks than I normally do of this bird. The towhee has been a difficult bird for me for some reason. It took me years to learn its song. It has a very distinctive call and song, very beautiful. And for several years at first hearing it sounded like something marvellous I'd never heard before. Last year I felt like maybe it'd sunk in. And, voila, this year I knew the call the first time I heard it. Today I was treated to the song as well.

The Brewster's has never been a problem. It's song is distinctive and memorable, for me--at least the song sung by my birds. This bird, a hybrid of the Golden-winged and Blue-winged Warblers, was one of the most interesting things I discovered during my days as an atlasser. The expansion of the range of the Blue-winged Warbler has been a problem for the Golden-winged, or at least has added to its troubles. The birds are very closely related and hybridize happily. The consequence is likely to be the eventually swamping out of the Golden-winged Warbler. (Click here for the Golden-winged Warbler Atlas Project at Cornell) I had a Golden-winged singing in the far field for most of the summer of 2004. Since that summer it's been all Brewster's. The next year, 2005, I saw a Brewster's in the company of a female Blue-winged Warbler, both carrying food for nearby, noisy fledglings. My surmise is that the 2004 bird mated late, with a blue-winged, starting the dynasty that still breeds back there. The bird I saw this morning was singing the same mixed song I know so well, and had the classic Brewster's markings, except that he had yellow under his chin as well as on the top of his head. Others have a different idea of the classic Brewster's, this page has photographs of a couple of interesting examples, and a blue-winged for comparison.

The Golden-winged warbler has recently been designated a "species of special concern" in Ontario.

Bioblitzing--Days 1 and 2

Saturday, April 21

Saturday was the first day of the week-long Blogger Bioblitz event. Hot day--fierce sun, and I got a late start, so I thought I'd just do a reconnaisance of a location in the cedar bush, where the stream runs through, that I thought might be interesting. I'd hoped to list flora, but was frustrated in that the only recognizable flora were ones I already knew were there, i.e., exactly where. Nothing else was far enough along to identify (or in most cases to find). There is a common fern back there that's just coming up now--but I don't know its name, and there wasn't enough of it to work on. That was one of a series of very warm days, followed by some rain, and more to come (maybe) over the next few days (along with cooler temperatures, though not real cold)--so I'll go back there again next Saturday when more might be up and recognizable. As it was I listed a few of the plants that were up and about, a frog, and birds:

Weather: hot and sunny
Temperature was 20C when I left the house around 9:00 am, and up to 23C an hour later.

Flora
-white cedar (Thuja occidentalis

-white birch (Betula papyrifera) This birch was in the middle of the cedars--the only one there, which led me to speculate that it is older than they are. bot are relatively fast-growing trees, and I don't think the birch would be able to get going in the shade of the cedars. There are a number of dead birches and poplars in the wetter parts of the area.

-marsh marigold (Caltha palustris) Well leafed out, no sign yet of the blossoms.

Frogs
- spring peeper (Pseudacris crucifer) One calling (not really their time of day).

Birds
I just counted birds I heard or saw that belonged to the habitat--the area of bush and swamp is small, and I could also hear birds singing in the field beyond.
-Ruffed Grouse (Bonasa umbellus)
-American Crow (Corvus brachyrhynchos)
-Black-capped Chickadee (Poecile atricapillus)
-American Robin (Turdus migratorius)
-Northern Cardinal (Cardinalis cardinalis)
-Red-winged Blackbird (Agelaius phoeniceus)
-American Goldfinch (Carduelis tristis) Okay, the goldfinches don't really belong here--but at this time of the year they are hanging around in large, noisy flocks, insisting on being recorded.

Mammals
-red squirrel (Tamiasciurus hudsonicus)

Walking back through the fields I saw my first Tree Swallows of the year. And later in the day I saw my first Barn Swallows. Finally second (or maybe third) wave migration is well underway.


Monday, April 23

Monday I got out early, around 6:30 am, to avoid full sun and to look closely at the edge of the far field. This time I ignored the flora--I am hoping now to have a flora day at the end of the week. I don't know if I'll count the sumach, prickly ash, red cedar, etc., but I'll get up some kind of list.

So, I set out, again, at a dawdle, back through the fields. I saw Grizzly Man over the weekend, so I had bears on the brain--but the only bear sign I saw was from last summer (turned-over rocks). No vibe of large animals, lots of fox and coyote tracks, as ever, but nothing conspicuosly fresh.

Mammals
What was fresh was a set of racoon tracks (Procyon lotor).
Who was out there with me? An eastern cottontail (Sylvilagus floridanus)--way at the northwest corner of the far field. (I'm not counting the cottontails I have to push aside to get out of the yard.)

Birds
Because of the time of day, and the temperature, around 15C (i.e., not 2C), there was lots of bird activity. I should do a list in order, but I think I'll stick to narrative.

A flock of 100 Canada Geese, heading north, flew overhead, followed moments later by another of about 50. Robins were singing in every corner of the field. A single cardinal was as well--moving all around a couple of acres. I saw two field sparrows, and listened to another two, my first clear hearings of the year. Chickadees followed me along the edge. The noisy flock of goldfinches made lots of noise. A flicker called. A ruffed grouse drummed (and I flushed a another out of the edge of the cedar bush as I went by). Song sparrows were everywhere.

Someone must be nesting now--I know that chickadees may be, and the song sparrows and blue jays show signs that they are too. But I figure cowbirds know. I saw a courting group (first three then six or seven males following a female, strutting and posing) moving around the treetops at the field's edge. but best of all, a pair of Belted Kingfishers. Sometimes these birds nest well away from the water where they feed, at the end of long tunnels they excavate into banks of earth. I don't know that they've nested back there--but I've seen them scouting there before. It was a pleasure to see and hear them there again.

I'd hoped that there might be warblers, and there is a chance for one or two by the end of the week (last year my first was a black and white), but it really is just a little too early. Just yesterday I saw my first chipping and white-throated sparrows.