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BirdWords: Wood Ducks

By on January 23, 2016 in BirdWords
Wood Duck Female

Wood Duck Female photo courtesy of David Bogener

For those who observe them, it’s small wonder that six of the new gifts offered in The Twelve Days of Christmas are birds! Not mentioned, however, are some of our most stunning winter birds, the ducks.

Wood ducks are the kings of color— green, blue, chestnut, and goldenrod, their beaks and eyes in two shades of vermilion, all set off with bold blacks and whites and decorative plumes and pony tails. The hen ducks are less outlandish, dressed mostly in their camouflage grays, but still sporting a splash of dark aquamarine and a delicate white eye-ring that thins into a teardrop behind the eye.

As their name suggests, wood ducks favor wooded byways. They spend the winter in small flocks, often with just a few friends, resting and feeding in quiet water. They eat mostly plant material—seeds, acorns, berries, and weeds—gathered either in the water or on land. Along about January they pair up. Courting involves mutual preening, and shrill whistles and stretched wing-and-tail dance moves from the male.

Then in early spring the hen wood duck, like only a handful of other duck species, chooses a cavity in a tree to make her nest. She is far too big for woodpecker holes, so she will often lay her 10-15 eggs in the rotted out scar of a fallen branch, usually 30-65 feet up. She will prefer to reuse successful nest sites from prior years. Other passing hens may dump more eggs into her nest, and she will incubate and raise them all.

Once hatched, day-old ducklings face immediate challenges. If their nest-hole is deep in a tree trunk, they might need to climb vertically many feet, up to fifteen, to reach their nest entrance. But they have clawed toes and instinct to help them out. Once reaching the entrance they blithely drop to the ground outside. It’s a long fall but doesn’t seem to faze them. They pop right up and begin to follow their mother to the nearest water, a hike that may be over a mile on their little duckling legs.

In truth, things have gotten easier for wood ducklings. With extensive tree-clearing in the late 1800’s wood duck numbers plummeted. But the ducks readily accepted human-made nesting boxes, and now they are thriving. Most nesting boxes are close to the ground, so ducklings might drop eight feet instead of their historical fifty.

Wood ducks live year-round in wet woodlands along the West Coast and throughout the Eastern US, and will winter in Mexico and nest all along the US/Canada border. Here in the North State look for them in quiet woodland waterways such as those of Battle Creek Wildlife Refuge, Anderson River Park, and Turtle Bay.

Our Education chair Dan Greaney writes for the Wintu Audubon Society and wrote this post.

The 116th Christmas Bird Count Is Open For Registration

By on December 8, 2015 in Christmas Bird Counts
Christmas Bird Count

Rough-legged Hawk

The Audubon Christmas Bird Count (CBC) is run by the National Audubon Society in partnership with Bird Studies Canada, the North American Breeding Bird Survey, and the Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology. Birders of all skill levels are urged to participate in the 116th Christmas Bird Count, which begins December 14th, only a week away!

If you love birds, especially if you are a beginning bird watcher and want to learn about the birds where you live, you will want to participate in at least one Christmas Bird Count. You see, there is always at least one experienced birder in each field party, and each field party needs a recorder, someone to record the birds as they are counted.

While participating in my first Christmas Bird Count, not only did I learn which birds lived in my neighborhood in the winter, I learned where to find them on an American Ornithologists Union arranged bird check list, the same arrangement used by most bird guide books. If you are the group recorder, by the end of the day I guarantee you will have learned how to use a field guide to birds.

If you are an experienced birder you may be asked to lead a field party that covers a specific area within the 15 mile diameter of your local count circle. Not only is this an excellent way to support bird conservation but you can also influence younger or less experienced birders by helping them identify birds and build their confidence in bird identification.

Participation on the Christmas Bird Count is FREE! You can find a local Christmas Bird Count here. Let’s get out there and really discover how are local birds are doing! Join in a Christmas Bird Count today!

The Hoarders: Birds That Store Food

By on November 7, 2015 in BirdWords
Acorn Woodpecker Granary

Acorn Woodpecker Granary

Last month in the Birdwords column we heard about the yellow-billed magpie and its relatives in the crow (or corvid) family. Birds in that group store food away for later, also known as caching. That trait also shows up in many other species that are not related to the corvids – or to each other either.

You may see several of our common backyard birds visiting your feeders too frequently to be eating all that bounty on the spot. Both the perky little gray birds with the jaunty crest – the oak titmouse; and the sleek white, gray and black tree-clinger – the white-breasted nuthatch – can be observed doing this. In both species, a bird will carefully select a seed – often discarding ones that don’t meet its standards – and dart off to lodge the seed firmly in a crevice in the bark of a nearby tree. Studies have shown that they have remarkable memories as to where their stashes are located. In the black-capped chickadee, a close cousin of our oak titmouse, it has been found that the structures in the brain involved in memory are more highly developed than in non-caching species – although I don’t think the question has been answered as to which came first: the behavior or the brain modification.

Among the woodpeckers, there are several species that hoard food – most notably, the acorn woodpecker. If you look around, you are bound to see trees with many small holes excavated by acorn woodpeckers. Each hole was made to accommodate a single acorn. These are called granary trees. To the chagrin of ranchers, these birds don’t limit themselves to trees but will also puncture fence posts and barn walls. I’ve even seen power poles used as granaries.

Acorn woodpeckers are togetherness birds – they form a colony of a number of individuals to fill and use their granaries. They even nest communally – a behavior not seen in other woodpeckers, in which a pair will nest alone. The granaries are vigorously defended. Acorn woodpeckers go on red alert if a western scrub jay comes near. The jay is definitely not above conducting a raid if a granary is left unguarded, so the potential thief must be chased away.
The acorn woodpeckers’ acorns are strictly for their own benefit. However, various species of jays inadvertently aid the oak trees as well. They hide acorns by burying them in the ground. A certain percentage of the seeds don’t get retrieved and eaten before they have germinated and sprouted into baby trees. Young oak trees can’t grow in the shade of a parent tree, so by” planting” them elsewhere, the jays help regenerate and spread the oak forest.

A botanist noticed this connection and did some mapping. If he superimposed the areas of the world where various species of jays live over a map of the occurrence of all the oak forests of the world a remarkable pattern emerged. There were some places that had jays but no oaks – but there were no oaks where there were no jays. So, our familiar pesky western scrub jay is actually a forester!

You may have noticed this year’s acorn crop has been a good one. Keep your eyes open as the cooler days of autumn spur our avian friends to lay in their supplies for winter!

Audubon Northern California Council Meeting Members Share Information and Experience

By on October 18, 2015 in Events

Northern California Audubon Council 2015

2015 Audubon Northern California Council

The event began with a leisurely bird walk around Lema Ranch, where 14 of the 25 attendees found 41 species in a little over an hour, including two Snowy Egrets previously not on the Lema Ranch Bird List! They returned to the beautiful meeting room at the McConnell Foundation headquarters to find a continental breakfast waiting for them as they tallied their list.

The meeting was kicked off with an enlightening report on the “Status and Nesting Ecology of Purple Martins at Shasta Lake” from our resident fisheries and wildlife biologist and long time Wintu Audubon member, Len Linstrand. Several questions followed regarding the largest of the Swallow species and the possible effects of the raising of Shasta Dam.

Daniela Ogden, Associate Director of Marketing and Communications for Audubon California, gave us an enlightening summation of all the social media opportunities we all may be missing and why they are so important. Her presentation was a call to action for all of us to increase our online presence, thereby increasing the possibility of gaining more chapter members.

Desiree Loggins, Chapter Network Manager, followed with important updates from Audubon California. We are so fortunate to have such an active state organization with great leaders like these.

There are eight chapters that comprise the Northern California Council and seven of those chapters had representation at this meeting. Fortunately we also had a guest speaker from Yolo Audubon Society to give us insight into a recent proposal to create an “Inner Coast Range Conservancy.” Chad Roberts, Yolo’s Conservation Chair, gave an intriguing presentation supporting legislation to create a conservancy to protect this globally significant area which includes world renowned geological, biological and cultural resources; a national monument; and many large, pristine areas that are open for public use. The reaction from the members to his proposal seemed to be unanimously positive.

Our President, Chad Scott, and Plumas Audubon’s Outreach and Education Coordinator, Teresa Arrate, reported on “Chapter Incentives and Programs on Birds and Climate Change.” Important to this endeavor is being active with Audubon Works. There are many resources we can use to further our conservation efforts.

The catered lunch was followed by highly energetic reports from the attending chapters with lively conversation on some very important topics. I think that all participants had some excellent input on ways to increase membership, create a more collaborative organization and steer clear of some possible pitfalls while we try to make the most out of our abilities to conserve our wildlife and wild lands for future generations to enjoy.

***

In the photo from left to right: Chad Scott, President Wintu Audubon; Teresa Arrate, Outreach and Education Coordinator, Plumas Audubon; Dan Greaney, Education Chair, Wintu Audubon; Linda Aldrich, Program Chair, Wintu Audubon; Ryan Keiffer, Peregrine Audubon Member at Large; Esther Cox, Past President, Wintu Audubon; Connie Word, Treasurer, Wintu Audubon; Janet Wall, Conservation Chair, Wintu Audubon; Jeanette Carroll, Recording Secretary, Wintu Audubon; Dave Jensen, President Mendocino Coast Audubon; George Horn, Membership Chair, Wintu Audubon; Desiree Loggins, Chapter Network Manager, California Audubon; Chet Ogen, Board of Directors, Redwood Region Audubon; Jennifer Patten, Program Chair, Altacal Audubon; LeAnn McConnell, Treasurer, Altacal Audubon; Chad Roberts, Conservation Chair, Yolo Audubon; Bill Oliver, Newsletter Editor, Wintu Audubon; Catherine Camp, Conservation Chair, Wintu Audubon; Beth Brockman, Finance Committee, Wintu Audubon; Ken Sobon, Vice President, Altacal Audubon; Daniela Ogden, Associate Director of Marketing and Communications, Audubon California; Larry Jordan, Webmaster, Wintu Audubon; and Rebeca Franco, Education Chair, Mount Shasta Audubon

Yellow-billed Magpies

By on October 17, 2015 in BirdWords
Yellow-billed Magpie

Yellow-billed Magpie photo by David Bogener

Endemic. It means they live nowhere else in the world–and we’re lucky enough to have a beautiful California endemic right here!

Yellow-billed magpies live in a swath from Redding down to Santa Barbara. They are seldom seen away from the scattered large oaks of that stretch, and never seen outside the state, where they leave the turf to their black-billed relatives.

The only thing not beautiful about these birds is their voice, a chatter variably squeaky and raspy. But visually, from yellow bill to long, graceful tail, they are striking. Clean white shoulders and belly offset their silky black feathering, which in good light shines with a deep cerulean blue. Their wingbeat, for a bird as tough as magpies, has a gossamer flow to it. If a group of crows is called a murder, we should speak of a waltz of magpies! And they look at you as if they know what they’re doing—as well they might.

Magpies, jays, and crows are part of a family of birds known as corvids. Like people, corvids usually live in social groups—not synchronized flocks, but neighborhoods of individuals. Also like people, they can physically manipulate their environment—people with opposable thumbs, corvids with long, hefty, all-purpose bills. These physical and social characteristics seem to promote problem-solving in creatures as varied as parrots, wolves, dolphins, and apes.

Corvid studies have shown these birds to far surpass Harvard students in remembering where they have hidden acorns. But their thinking gets more complex, too. Crows—much more studied than magpies–are socially and mechanically adept. Those who have pilfered other crows’ acorn stash will bury the food but then re-hide it when their chums aren’t looking! As mechanical engineers, they have replicated Aesop’s old fable—not only getting a drink by dropping pebbles in a vase to raise the water level, but dropping pebbles to raise a floating piece of meat, and declining to drop pebbles to retrieve the meat in a vase half-filled with sand instead of water.

Alas, corvid intelligence cannot solve all problems. West Nile virus has hit these birds particularly hard, and magpies show almost no development of resistance. I very rarely see them on the Shasta College campus or at Lake Redding any more. Magpie families can still be seen at Kutras Pond and Anderson River Park. There they continue to prosper in the mix of tall oaks, open ground, and nearby water. They forage in the fields for bugs, seeds, lizards, or dropped sandwiches; they crack and eat acorns, and reportedly they will even pick insects off a deer’s back.
The oaks offer magpies elevated roosts and nesting sites, where they build their little towns of stick-and-mud nests with domed roofs. They line the interior with softer materials such as hair or grass, and there they raise their half-dozen nestlings each year.

But as for so many birds, a looming threat to those nestlings is climate change. Yellow-billed magpies are expected to lose over half their range by 2050. That’s a problem that neither corvid intelligence nor any other has yet resolved.