Gotta Keep Up

The title of this blog may have you thinking, I'm referring to blog entries or keeping the feeders full or even my species count for my competition.  I wish it was in reference to the fun side of birding, the happy days of searching new species or of simply enjoying the ones I share my yard with and then share with my readers.  Today, I walked out into the courtyard at work and found a horde of birds that were casualties of circumstance.  These birds had simply picked the wrong place to forage and never saw the glass that they flew into. 

 

American Robins from the beginning of Nov.

I can't even count the number of dead or injured birds we have found around work that were victims of window strikes.   If I were to estimate over the last 4 years...  I'd guess around 300.  What amazes me is not the number but the fact that those are only the ones I've seen.  When I think of all the other building in the world and all the other windows, the estimates conservationist make seem beyond real and more like an understatement. 

Fox Sparrow, not all the birds die, at least right away.

Here the abundance of window strikes is without a doubt Dark-eyed Juncos.  These small gray-brown sparrows breed across Canada and into the northern US, including some higher altitude areas farther south.  During the winter they migrate south as far as parts of Mexico to forage for food and survive before heading north again.  There are quite a number of forms of Dark-eyed Junco as would be expected from the large distribution of the species.  To go into any more details about their behavior would require discussing separate forms.  Instead, I just also mention that they are NOT the only birds that have been killed.

Dark-eyed Junco (Junco hyemalis)- 10 in total today from one hall

Window Strike Species (off the top of my head): Red-tailed Hawk, Sharp-shinned Hawk, Cooper's Hawk, Mourning Dove, Hermit Thrush, Swainson's Thrush, Ruby-crowned Kinglet, Golden-crowned Kinglet, Ruby-throated Hummingbird, Dark-eyed Junco, White-throated Sparrow, Song Sparrow, Fox Sparrow, Northern Flicker, American Robin, Yellow-rumped Warbler, Black-throated Green Warbler, Common Yellowthroat, Chestnut-sided Warbler, Northern Waterthrush, Indigo Bunting, Brown Creeper, etc, etc.

Squirt Bottle
filled with soapy water

So back to the title.  I take some of the blame for today's casualties.  We have tried a number of different methods for keeping them from flying into the windows but our options are limited because it is a workplace.  In vacant areas we've put some newspaper up on the windows but that's not an option for the higher traffic sections.  In those areas we try to do non-invasive window soaping.  The basic goal is get soap scum on the windows to breakup the reflection and let the birds know something is there.  BUT I haven't done it in awhile and with all the rain, most of the residue has washed away.  I "Gotta Keep Up" with making sure we're making an effort to reduce the number of window strikes. 

Me illustrating the final product, it doesn't stop the strikes
but it does reduce them.

Scouting Trip

Almost two weeks ago on a beautiful Friday I headed up to the Northwest part of the state to do a little scouting for a bird field trip I'm helping lead next month for the Society for the Preservation of Natural History Collection 2012 meeting.  I met CAS conservation biologist Twan Leenders at Mohawk Mountain State Forest, our first potential stop.  There is a small Black Spruce Bog located in the forest with a small boardwalk.  When I got out of the car the first thing I noticed was a chorus of Chestnut-sided Warblers up and down the forest road. 

This area has a great variety of plants, it's a mix of upland forest, some cleared early successional habitat, and the spruce bog.  There were many High Bush Blueberry plants and lots of them in flower.  One Ruby-throated Hummingbird was enjoying their inflorescence.  This female hummingbird was taking a rest before flying to another flower and inserting her bill into the flowers to drink some nectar.  As we walked along there was a good variety of birds, many of which will stay around and nest.  Some birds seen or heard, Black-and-White Warbler, Magnolia Warbler, Canada Warbler (a lifer for me), Blackburnian Warbler, Veery, Ovenbird, Yellow-bellied Sapsucker, Common Raven, Red-shouldered Hawk, Rufous-sided Towhee, and Red-eyed Vireo.

This Rufous-sided Towhee was hanging out in the edge habitat of a cleared area.  Vegetation in was all low and shrubby, perfect for these sparrow relatives.  I love their 'tow-hee' song and there was more than one.  This male sat out on the edge of a branch to show off for a few minutes. 

Not an extraordinary bird but still one of my favorites!  The ever adorable Black-capped Chickadee made an appearance in the spruce bog.  There were two birds moving around in the underbrush both seeming to be as curious of me as I was of them.  While watching the two, one began loudly begging to the other although to my amature eyes, they both seemed adults.  Possibly courting behavior?

Our last stop was not really a part of our scouting... it was really to try for another life bird!  And I was successful!  Thanks to Twan's knowledge of the area and great ears, we were able to chase down this Cerulean Warbler on River Road.  Cornell's allaboutbirds website says this of the Cerulean Warbler "Cerulean Warbler is one of the species of highest concern in the eastern United States because of a small total population size and significant declines throughout its range. Under consideration for listing under the Endangered Species Act. Listed on the Audubon Watchlist".   

This spot produced many good birds and was teeming with life in general.  American Redstart, Barn Swallow, Tree Swallow, Veery, Blackburnian Warbler, Warbling Vireo, and Indigo Bunting, among others.  A fantastic day in the field, with a great companion, and many birds to add to my year list for my competition.  I need to get outside more often!

Window Strikes Again

Almost every morning that I drive into campus, I make a swing under what I have started to call the 'corridor of doom'.  It's not 1 but 2 floors of elevated glass hallway that connect two buildings here at work.  I guess I should clarify, two unoccupied buildings here at work.  I've asked if they would be willing to lower the shades all the time, at least until people move in.  Of course, the answer is that it is an impossibility because it's automatically programmed to close and open based on temperature in the blah blah blah.  I must admit to me it sounds like, the hallway is too pretty to keep shaded and I'm not going to put the trouble into figuring out how to do it. 

Casualties of the Corridor of Doom: Ruby-throated Hummingbird and Black-throated Green Warbler

One fall we had a HUGE fallout of Juncos and unfortunately many did not survive.  Luckily, that has been by far the worst accrual of death we have had due to window strikes.  I can't blame all the death on those corridors however; our building also has three ground-floor passageways with glass on both sides.  One side of one passageway causes most of the window strikes in our building and we've been lucky that we have gotten away with hanging newspaper on the windows and no one has taken it down.  Lucky except... there's a glass door with a glass header over it and the birds still fly into that. 

Last week I went out for a quick walk-through the courtyard and didn't see anything by the windows and was happily enjoying the White-throated Sparrows that have just shown up on campus, the American Robins feasting on random berries, and a Common Yellowthroat hopping around in the underbrush. 

Then as I was heading in the doors, here was this little bird sitting on the cold cement slab panting.  Ruby-throated Humingbirds are still migrating through Connecticut with mostly females and first year birds left.  Most of the hawkwatch sites count the Ruby-throats they see and by this time the numbers are starting to drop off with most of the birds already reaching the southern U.S. on their way to Mexico and South America to overwinter. 

Ruby-throated Hummingbird- female/ immature type

So why did I pick this bird up and not just leave it where it was to recover?  Hummingbirds burn a lot of energy and they have a very small body which doesn't retain heat very well.  I picked it up to donate some of my body heat while the bird was recovering.  After a few minutes of sitting on my open palm, it recovered enough to fly up to a tree branch in the sun about 15 feet above me.  I watched it for about five minutes but it was still sitting in the tree when I left, I figured it could probably do without the stress of having me still so close. 

Ruby-throated Hummingbird- recovering from window strike