| INTERESTING ODDS & ENDS
Archive #12 |
| Song Matters as Much as Color to House Finches (from Birders’ World Magazine, August 2006) Through studies, researchers have discovered that even though the reddest color of House Finches does help in mate selection, song also matters. It was discovered that “Males that sang long songs initiated their first clutch significantly earlier, and males that sang songs at a faster rate had larger clutches…males that nest early produce more and healthier offspring than late nesters.”. |
| Ways to Become a Better Birder (from Birders’s World Magazine, October 2006) 1. Don’t just go birding. Learn the birds! Work at it! Concentrate! 2. Use good equipment. Buy the best you can afford. It is a lifetime investment in something you enjoy and aids significantly in your view of the bird world. 3. Go birding a lot! As in anything, practice makes perfect. Plus why not spend as much time as you can doing something you enjoy? 4. Bird with better birders. We can always learn something from someone. Find people who are better than you, who are willing to teach, and tag along as much as possible. Don’t be intimidated, just soak in whatever you can and learn! 5. But go birding by yourself, too. The downside of always going with better birders can be the tendency toward laziness by letting others do all the identifying. Go by yourself too and build your own birding skills. 6. Learn from your mistakes. Don’t be discouraged. If you make a mistake, learn from it and try not to repeat it. Everyone makes mistakes identifying birds, even the experts! Note what made you misidentify the bird and you will learn. 7. Start young…if you can. Or start someone you know and love early. It will be a lifetime pleasure! 8. Read everything! Read everything you can about identification, behavior, etc. The more you know the better. 9. Have fun! Wonder, laughter, fresh air, exercise…all good stress reducers! Enjoy every minute! |
| Birds That Imitate (from Bird Watchers’ Digest Magazine, summer 2005) Five of our most common birds are wonderful mimics: Northern Mockingbird, Gray Catbird, European Starling, Brown Thrasher and the Blue Jay. But why do they mimic other birds? No-one really knows, but after careful study, four possible reasons are given by Jack Hailman, project director of Archbold Biological Station: danger alert, false danger alert to keep competitors away from food resources, increasing vocal repertoire, or maybe just from the pleasure of performing. In any case, these mimics imitate a large variety of sounds and noises, as well as other birds. Mockingbirds seem to hold the number one spot in this list of mimics. There was once a mockingbird in Boston that imitated “39 bird species, the call notes of 50 others, as well as crickets and tree frogs”. One was even known to imitate the drumming of a red-headed woodpecker! They have also been seen/heard imitating barking dogs, car alarms, cell phones, burglar alarms and trucks. All these wonderful mimics can produce a large variety of bird songs and can often confuse the “by the ear” birder…so don’t take those sounds for granted when trying to ID a bird by sound! |
| A Site About Long Island Birds & Birdwatching |
| Hawks Don’t Stake Out Backyard Feeders (from Birders’ World Magazine, August 2006) According to studies, researchers have determined that even though hawks return to feeders regularly they don’t spend a disproportionate amount of time hunting prey at backyard feeders. “Instead, hawks appear to be ‘managing’ their prey…that is, by hunting at unpredictable times and places, hawks prevent songbirds from expecting their arrival.” There are also other factors that determine hawks hunting behavior. “Owls influence the hunting behavior of Sharp-shinned Hawks. The hawks remain in their night roost until about a half-hour after sunrise while Great Horned and Barred Owls are still active. Sharpies attack prey more frequently in the evening hours, and they return to their roost before sunset, when owls come back out.” |
| Birds and Cannibalism (From Birdwatcher’s Digest Magazine, September/October 2006) Yes, whether we like it or not, different forms of cannibalism are quite common in the bird world. This behavior may go by many names, and is actually done for many different reasons, usually for the survival of either the individual, or the species. Cannibalism: “a wide variety of bird species engage in cannibalism of their own eggs and young in the wild. They include shrikes, owls, eagles, hawks, falcons, cranes, storks, ducks, terns, and gulls. In many cases it is related to food availability." Another possibility may be stress. "Constantly disturbing nesting pairs can certainly lead to the disappearance of eggs and chicks from the nests. They are most certainly eaten by one or both of the parents because the remains are never found” Kronism: “the eating of one’s own young, either weak or dead”. “Documented in such birds as white storks and red-backed shrikes, this behavior is considered by some to be a form of population regulation.” This form of cannibalism is also “employed by tawny owls and barn owls…during times of low mouse populations…beginning with the youngest and/or weakest”. This behavior can also be found quite commonly in large gull colonies where “the average number of chicks raised per pair can be fewer than one, due to rampant cannibalism in which parents prey on their neighbors’ chicks”. Infanticide: where “unmated males obtain a mate by killing the latter’s dependent off-spring” and then mating and creating a new nest. Fracticide: “know as siblicide or “cainism”, refers to the killing of one sibling by another and is often seen in boobies, skuas, egrets and several eagle species including the bald eagle”. This is also seen with Osprey. The behavior “usually results from aggressive behavior brought on by food shortages” but can also be an “adaptive behavior that improves the chances of survival for the stronger chick”. Many species (common in short-eared owls and barn owls) lay many eggs over a two week period; a sort of “hedging their bets” type of behavior for the survival of the nest. “When food is scarce, the much larger chicks begin picking on the runts to the point of killing and eating them.”. |
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| Interesting ID Tips & Information (from Birdwatcher’s Digest Magazine, September/October 2006) Ducks: Did you know that it now appears to researchers that all female ducks are the same species? Well sure enough “Now there is solid genetic proof”. So…concentrate on the males! Sparrows: ID on these birds is HARD! But did you know, that with grassland sparrows, “each of these sparrows has a median stripe on the crown of its head…the color of this line is distinct for each species”. So, just look at the color of this stripe and your ID is almost done. Here is the sparrow stripe color chart: Backman’s = alabaster, Clay-colored = almond, Botteri’s = eggshell, Cassin’s = ivory, Brewer’s = linen, Savannah = Oyster, Grasshopper = parchment, Baird’s = porcelain. Of course, telling the difference between eggshell and linen in the field might still be a lttle difficult! Shorebirds: Behavior, behavior, behavior Learn the behavior of the shorebirds and your ID becomes much simpler. |