Robin Building a Nest

The sun was shining Thursday, and it nicely warmed the day. It felt like spring had arrived.

I watched a female robin building her nest. She was collecting mud, grass, lichen, and other plant material. It was fun watching her build it. Sometimes she would land above the nest, drop the material into it, and then hop down to arrange it in the nest. As I watched her, she seemed free-spirited and joyful. She took a break every so often to forage and check in with her mate. He was always nearby watching and ready to chase off any intruders.

Pileated Woodpecker Pair

Standing at the top of the zigzag trail, I could hear hammering resounding through the forest. I walked down the path to find a pair of Pileated Woodpeckers on a dead tree. They were excavating small holes in the wood using their chisel-like bills as they searched for food.

They will make holes in trees to get to the tunnels of carpenter ants or wood-boring beetles and termites. The holes are often in a rectangle shape and can be quite deep—a good sign that a Pileated Woodpecker is in the area. You will see these characteristic holes on the older Douglas Fir trees near the juncture of the zigzag and hillside trails.

When a Pileated Woodpecker discovers an insect path inside the tree, it has an incredible tool to procure its food. Its tongue is part of a fascinating system of small bones and muscles that wrap around the back and top of the skull to its forehead. In What It’s Like to Be a Bird, David Sibley writes, “The long tongue has a barbed and sticky tip, and tiny muscles that allow the bird to bend the tip of the tongue in any direction, so it can follow twisting tunnels, trap prey against walls, and pry insects and larvae out of their hiding places deep inside a tree.” That is truly amazing!

In addition to the sound of pounding on trees, you can also hear the vocalizations of the Pileated Woodpecker reverberating across the landscape. Click here to listen to their calls on Cornell’s website All About Birds.

Once its sound has clued you into its whereabouts, you will be in for a real marvel. Assuming that the Ivory-billed Woodpecker is extinct, the Pileated is the largest woodpecker in North America. Both the male and female have flaming, red crests. The red on the male includes the forecrown, and he has a red mustache mark. Good luck in finding this spectacular bird!

Nature is an inexhaustible source of wonder. Hope to see you out there.

Junco Taking a Bath

The Birder’s Handbook: A Field Guide to the Natural History of North American Birds is a great resource. It has information on the biology of bird species “known to nest regularly on the continent, north of the Mexican border (with the exception of some exotic species that have escaped from captivity) and all the now-extinct birds known to have nested here since the arrival of Europeans.” The book is also full of essays covering different biological topics. Here is an excerpt from the essay “Bathing and Dusting:”

“…Feathers are marvelous and intricate devices, but keeping them functional requires constant care.
A bird is considered to be bathing whenever it uses any of several stereotyped movements to wet its feathers. One pattern, wading, is commonly observed in birds with strong feet and broad, short, flexible wings. In a typical sequence a bird stands in the water, fluffs the feathers to expose the bare skin between their bases, and rapidly flicks the wings in and out of the water. The breast is submerged and rolled vigorously back and forth, and then, as the front end emerges, the head is thrown back, forming a cup with the partially elevated wings and tail, and dousing the feathers of the back. Those feathers are elevated so that the water reaches the skin, and then lowered, forcing the water between them. The sequence may be repeated, with the bird submerging farther in each cycle, until it is a mass of soaked, disarranged feathers.
…Songbirds shake themselves to throw off water by vibrating wings and tail and ruffling feathers. All birds normally follow bathing with preening.”

The water in the creek is lightly flowing at the moment due to the lack of rain over the past couple of weeks. There are plenty of stretches where the water is shallow. The depth is perfect for songbirds to wade out into the creek and take a bath. I love watching them splash around in the water.

Remember to click on the photos to enlarge and scroll through them.

Bird Silhouettes

To identify birds successfully, many aspects are helpful to be in your awareness. In the front of Peterson’s Field Guide to Birds of Western North America 4th Edition, there is a section of excellent questions to consider with illustrations. For example, “What is its shape?” Peterson has two illustrations side by side and asks, “Is it plump like a starling (left) or slender like a cuckoo (right)?”

To cap off the end of the book, Peterson included three panels of illustrations of the silhouettes of birds—shore, flight, and roadside. This is an important reference when determining what bird you’re watching because the lighting isn’t always ideal. Can you guess the ones in the photos?

When it came to identifying birds in the field, Roger Tory Peterson was an expert and created an invaluable guide to help us learn and enjoy our time birding. Thank you for all of your hard work and dedication!

Saving Birds

One of the biggest hazards to the health and safety of birds is windows. The estimated number of birds killed every year by striking a window is 365 million to 1 billion.

Birds are unable to see the glass in the window as a solid object. In addition, the glass acts as a mirror. The reflection makes it appear that the surrounding sky and landscape continue.

The White Oak Pavilion at the arboretum was constructed with many windows to be able to connect with the surrounding landscape. To help deter birds from colliding with the windows, the arboretum decided to install vertical nylon cords to give birds the visual cue that it isn’t an open landscape. The cords are spaced out close enough to keep birds from flying through them. I have already seen chickadees land on the cord as they curiously poke around looking for food.

Lane County Audubon Society publishes a monthly newsletter called The Quail. In the November 2021 issue, Jim Maloney wrote a great article about the project at Mt. Pisgah to prevent bird collisions on the White Oak Pavilion. Click here to read it.

I am posting this now because migrating birds will soon be here. For some, Mt. Pisgah Arboretum is their destination. For others, it is a brief stopover to rest and fuel up before continuing on their journey. Birds can collide into windows year-round, but it happens more frequently during nesting season. Birds’ hormones become elevated as they start to establish and defend territories, find a mate, etc. So start thinking about installing a deterrent to window collisions, like the nylon cords. I’d like to give a shout-out to Karen in Minnesota. After visiting the arboretum, she decided to install something similar on the windows of her home. Way to go! The American Bird Conservancy has a list of resources to help to decide the best solution for you. Click here to check it out.

There are some informative and interesting articles about birds colliding with windows and research to prevent it. I have included links below to some of them.

Article on the All About Birds website by The Cornell Lab: “Glass Action: Advances In The Science Of Making Windows Safer For Birds, “ by Pat Leonard.

Article on the American Bird Conservancy website: “Birds Flying Into Windows? Truths About Birds & Glass Collisions From ABC Experts, “ by Christine Sheppard, Ph.D., and Bryan Lenz, Ph.D.

Article on the Audubon website: “Making Buildings Safe for Birds,” by Julie Leibach.

Western Bluebird

I frequently see a small flock of western bluebirds at the arboretum. When the mistletoe berries are ripe, I see them in the oak trees around the parking lot. I also find them in the meadow above the creek trail, in the vicinity of the barn, or in the south meadow.

On this cool, sunny afternoon in the south meadow, they were perched on the lower limbs of bigleaf maple trees as they scanned the ground for insects. When they located their prey, they quickly dropped down to the ground to catch it. They would often return to the maple limb. Or they would fly low across the ground and then rise to perch on an old flower stalk.

I usually hear them before I see them. They have a soft call note that can be given in flight or from a perch. Peterson describes it as a short pew or mew. Their song is strung together into gentle, stuttering notes that Audubon’s website describes as “a short, subdued cheer, cheer-lee, churr.”

Male western bluebirds have a colorful blue on their head, wings, and tail. Complementing the blue is a rust-orange breast and upper back. The female’s coloration is more muted. Her blue shows up as a subtle tint in the wings and tail. Her breast is a pale, orange wash. The throat is blue in males and grayish in females. Their bellies are whitish.

Nature is an inexhaustible source of wonder. Hope to see you out there.

Sources
Peterson, Roger Tory. Field Guide to Birds of Western North America. 4th ed. New York, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2010.

Websites:
All About Birds by Cornell
National Audubon Society

Bushtits Eating Poison Oak Berries

About a week ago, I posted about poison oak berries being an important food source for birds because the hardy berries will linger on the plant into the winter months. Up to that point, I reported that I had only seen chickadees eating the berries.

On Saturday, I was watching a flock of bushtits performing their acrobatic routine through the landscape. The next thing I know, they had descended on a patch of poison oak and started eating the berries. I was delighted to have observed another bird eating them.

It was fun to watch them cling to the plant in all sorts of ways as they ate the berries.

Red-tailed Hawk

"Nothing makes the earth seem so spacious as to have friends at a distance. They make the latitudes and longitudes.”

Letter
Thoreau to Lidian Emerson
May 22, 1843

Happy New Year

May you find time to be in nature to absorb its serenity and carry it with you back into your daily life.

Poison Oak Berries

As I was walking around today, I saw that some of the poison oak berries are still lingering around.

I realized that I had started writing this post about a month ago, and somehow it got buried under a pile of other ideas.

During the fall when I took this photo, I frequently saw chickadees foraging poison oak berries. Supposedly their are a number of different birds that eat the berries, but I only have observed chickadees consuming them. I will see juncos on the ground around thickets of poison oak shrubs, but I am unable to see if they are eating the berries that have fallen on the ground.

I read in a few places that the berries are full of important nutrients for birds, but there weren’t any specific vitamins, minerals, etc. listed. I’m sure that they at least provide a source of energy, because the action-packed chickadee will know what is best for fueling its motor to keep it zipping around the landscape.

The chickadees appetite for poison oak berries has an unfortunate consequence, especially for people like me who are quite allergic to the plant. The seeds can be spread throughout the landscape as they pass through the chickadee’s digestive system.

Spotted Towhee

A familiar sound at the arboretum is the rustle of leaves of spotted towhees foraging. They hop backward with both feet to sweep away the leaf litter in search of food. Their diet consists of insects, spiders, seeds, acorns, and berries.

Towhees stay in the security of dense shrubs or right along the edge where they can quickly retreat to safety. Additionally, their spotted pattern and earth-tone coloration make them well camouflaged.

They have an interesting call note that you can often hear as they communicate with one another. Peterson describes the sound as a “catlike gu-eeee?.” Personally, their call reminds me of the mysterious, prehistoric past when dinosaurs roamed the earth. I amusingly imagine a baby pterodactyl calling for its mom.

Their songs are more friendly and sweet-sounding. Peterson describes it as a “chup chup chup zeeeeeeee” or a “drawn-out, buzzy chweeeeee.” Click here to go to the Audubon website to listen to their songs and calls.

Birds also communicate nonverbally. When watching spotted towhees you will often see them flicking their tail feathers open. In a flash, white patches on their outer tail feathers are revealed. On Cornell’s website All About Birds, this behavior indicates that the bird is being disturbed or alarming to signal potential danger. This could also be a way for them to silently check in with their companion nearby without having to call to them and possibly reveal their location.

Nature is an inexhaustible source of wonder. Hope to see you out there.