Redhead Shenanigans

This is a pair of redheads (a type of duck) seen during last weekend's Horicon Marsh Bird Festival.  Horicon Marsh is over 33,000 acres in size and at first glance it may appear to be managed for Canada geese and muskrats, but redheads are one of the main targets for optimizing habitat.

If you are not familiar with any other duck but mallards, you should really get to know the redhead.  Rather than the usual green head of male mallards, they have a gorgeous rusty red head.  And they don't quack...they kind of sound like crows that have swallowed helium--what's not to love?

Check out the above photo, that is some serious redhead flirting going on--that kind of "my head is higher than your head" posture.  Don't worry if you are reading this at work, that's not the hardcore flirting.  For that they completely throw their heads back.

Here's an example of a couple of male redheads competing for the attention of a female.  I love this look of who can raise their head the highest in the above photo.  For some reason, it reminds me of Kanye West.

But then things can get heated between 2 males.  Note how the female is observing the fight.

The redhead with 2 backs! (How many times am I going to make that joke this week?).  Two males duking it out.

Oh no, redhead body slam!   Again, note how the female is watching with a discernible eye.

Oh no, redhead chase!

Uh oh, is that a redhead goose?  Is that allowed?

Oh man, that is a total redhead goosing.

All part of the mating shenanigans you can see at Horicon Marsh!

Why I Shouldn't Go Birding Without Coffee

Last week, before I headed to Horicon Marsh, I stopped at Mr. Neil's house to check our bees and some warbler watching.  The plan was to check the bees Thursday afternoon, spend the night, bird in the morning and then hit the road to Horicon.  Being British, there's not a lot of coffee around the house.  I thought this would be a good motivator--if bird watching is awesome, I will linger and be late.  If I don't have coffee, the withdrawal will force me on the road.  The birding was awesome and one of the things I did was check out a red-tailed hawk nest that's across a ravine from the house.  The leaves were quite out and if I positioned my scope in just the right way, I could look directly into the nest:

That's the nest visible through my spotting scope.  It looks like the female has a fairly light head.  The male has been very vocal chasing anyone who dares cruise through his patch of sky.  Thanks to his vocal and merry chases, I've discovered that a red-shouldered hawk sometimes glides through (new hawk for Neil's yard).  To give you an idea of how well hidden the nest is, here is where my scope is aimed:

Here is an arrow for guidance:

Neil's house is on top of a ravine, down below is a creek and the red-tailed hawk nest is in a tall pine on the other side. Since the nest is a challenge to actually get in the scope, I left it set up there while I gathered my things and repacked them in the car.  I showed groundskeeper and the housekeeper the nest and continued gathering my stuff.

When I was about about an hour of away from Horicon, I received a call from Neil, "I was just looking through your scope that you have set up on the nest, it's lovely.  But don't you need this for the festival."

I pulled over and realized my error and shouted a loud, "BLERG!"  Figuring that shipping it overnight it would be impossible, I decided to drive back.  Neil's assistant Lorraine gave the groundskeeper her car and he drove and met me halfway--which was quite nice as he had plans to go the opening of Thor that day.  But thanks to all, I got the scope and made it to the festival and learned that coffee is a good thing for me to have when birding in the morning.

Sometimes I think it takes a village to manage a Birdchick.

Warblers Eating Honey

I'm in a quandary with my beehives and my love of birds.

On my way out to the Horicon Marsh Bird Festival, I stopped at Mr. Neil's for a quick check of our new beehives and some birding.  The warblers have arrived and the cool weather has forced those who arrive early in migration to search for alternate sources of food.  Yellow-rumped warblers like these would prefer insects.  Far too cool and far too few available, so the enterprising early migrants explored the bird feeders.

Despite the fact that Baltimore orioles are in the area and singing, none came to the feeders.  Yellow-rumps gladly took advantage of the grape jelly.

The warblers even jockeyed for position at the suet feeder among the four species of woodpecker that normally feed here.

Pine warblers are also hitting the feeders.  Whereas the yellow-rumps go for the suet and jelly, the pine goes for sunflower hearts.  It will also go for the suet, but seems content to eat the seeds.

While I was working around the garage, I noticed Neil's groundskeeper Hans had put out some old bee frames.  We do this so the bees from active hives will fly in and clean out the old honey.  These frames were from the hives that died over the winter.  The bees found it.  While I was working around the garage, I noticed warbles hanging out in the area.  At first, I thought the warblers were after the live bees and even said allowed, "I know you're desperate for insects, but you're far too small for eating bees."

Then, right about dusk when the honeybees were all tucked in their hives for the day, I noticed the warblers on the frames, pecking at them.  The light was dim but thanks to the auto timer on my Nikon D40 I was able to digiscope a Nashville warbler and a yellow-rumped warbler on the frames.

Based on the holes in the frame it looked like the warblers were going for dead bees.  Some of the frames had capped larvae that never hatched, so I figured the warblers were after the protein of old squishy non-hatched larvae.  We had more frames of dead larvae and honey in the garage so I set more out.  I figured the warblers could clean out the larvae and the bees could clean out the honey and help get a head start on their hives for the season.

The next morning when I went out for some birding, I checked the frames, they were covered in warblers.  Above are two yellow-rumped warblers and one Nashville warbler.  These were a small cross-section of about two dozen warblers waiting in line to feed off of my old beehive frames.  There were at least four species in the flock, the above two and pine warblers and orange-crowned.  I didn't get photos of the other two species, but got plenty of shots of the feeding frenzy.

Here are four warblers on one frame.  As I took pictures and watched them feed, it became clear that old bee larvae was not the only sustenance they were after.  They were very certainly eating honey.  I had a moment of panic...should birds be eating honey?  Honeybees are a fairly new species to North America, they came over with the early settlers.  Warblers did not evolve with honeybees.  Could they safely process honey and still migrate?

As I watched them I noticed that they tugged and chipped at wax foundation too.  Is that safe?  I've seen honeybees that have built comb out in the open on a bare branch, I remember seeing some abandon ones in Arizona and Texas...perhaps warblers have had exposure to this.

The air was so cold and their food scarce, I didn't want to take this source of food away if they were still trying to load up for their journey north.  I couldn't find anything about it on the Internet other than not using honey as a means to make nectar.  I wanted to plant myself in front of the frames all day long see how many species of warbler would come in but I had to go.

I also noted that as the sun got higher in the sky and our honeybees became more active, the bees didn't tolerate the warblers in close proximity and chased them off.  A few warblers still came in for the bounty but not four on a frame like at dawn.

I'm not sure if this is a good thing but if the warblers figured honey out, no doubt other birds will and I don't know if they should.  We already had one casualty of a tufted titmouse getting covered in honey while it explored some of our dead beehives.  I'm going to have to seek out an avian nutritionist to find out if this is a safe thing to offer birds.  If it is, this may be a new way to enjoy birds and bees and a new product to offer at bird stores.

Suspicious Cowbird

"I'm not doing nothin'!"

Random Rose-breasted Grosbeak

It's always a good day when I see these guys come back to the feeder.

Random Nuthatches

Well this was a pleasant surprise.  After months of being AWOL, a red-breasted nuthatch returned to the feeders today...much to the chagrin of the white-breasted nuthatch.

No Podcast Today

Between the strange breaking news and my head cold, there's no podcast Monday morning.  Take in the world news today and then take in some migration.

Cooper's Hawk Attacks Owl Nest

Well, Friday morning turned out to be far more exciting than I anticipated!  I had to work at the park service in the afternoon and evening and I was meeting a friend for a late breakfast.  I thought that since it was warm, I'd peek at the great horned owl nest in my neighborhood and see if the owlets were more visible...

One owlet was easily visible with the naked eye on approach.  Great horned owls do not build their own nests, they take over old squirrel, hawk or heron nests.  They don't even make any renovations before they use it, they just squat.  As the chicks grow, the nests soon shrink.  Between the dwindling nest and the larger chicks, the female no longer fits very well and perches near the chicks.

It appears that the nest contains two owlets!  When I arrived to the general nesting area, I could hear the crows heartily mobbing.  I saw the male fly over with a flock of about 20 crows in tow.  The chicks showed a bit of interest in the commotion but mostly laid low.

The female was very interested in the crow activity as she watched the crows surround the other owl.  What was interesting was that I thought the crows were chasing one owl, I later ran into a fellow birder who was close the crows and he said the crows were after two great horned owls and a third flew in.  I wonder now that as I was watching her keen interest in the crow activity, if she was responding to an intruding great horned owl into her territory rather than the corvids gathering around her mate?

She soon left the nest to try to get a better look at the mobbing crows but still would turn around to keep an eye on her chicks.  It was so strange to me to see a secretive owl perched out in the open in the middle of the morning.  Not long after I took this photo, she bolted off into the middle of the flock of crows.  The owls all went in separate directions and the crows split their murder into 2 smaller groups, diving and cawing at the owls.

With the female away, the young owlets closed their eyes and assumed an upright position.  I wondered if this was all part of a camoflauge instinct?  With the adults going after the crows, it stirred up the surrounding birds.  Robins began giving their alarm calls and then an adult Cooper's hawk flew in.  The hawk missed its intended prey...then suddenly noticed one of the owls and started diving at it and screaming its call.  If you're not familiar with a Cooper's hawk mobbing an owl, let me remind you of the video of the Cooper's hawk mobbing a plastic owl (they never work to scare birds away).

The Cooper's hawk then made a wider pass and went straight for the owl nest, hell bent on mobbing the chicks.  First it bounced off the nest and then started to make a second dive, by that time, the female great horned owl was back on the nest and ready to kick some serious accipiter ass if it tried it again.  I have never seen a great horned move so fast in my entire life.  I've always referred to them as the Sunday drivers of the raptor world...I got schooled--they can move very fast when they need to.  The above photo is on the Cooper's hawk's second attempt at a dive on the nest.  The blur above the nest is the female owl defending her chicks.

The angry Cooper's hawk perched nearby and shrieked out angry, "kek kek kek kek kek keks" at the great horned owl.  I suspect this bird has a nest nearby.

The great horned owl stood at her nest above her chicks and hooted back her retorts after every kek the Cooper's hawk gave her. The owl even barked a few times in warning at the hawk.  It was the weirdest argument I'd ever heard.  As the two continued, a few crows gathered nearby to continue their remarks on the two predators they detested.  Then, out of nowhere, a broad-winged hawk screamed nearby.  Three raptors all at once! An owl, a buteo and an accipiter.

The chicks nestled against the female as if to say, "Yeah, my mom is awesome."

I wondered, how long was this battle going to last?  The suspense was killing me...then I got my answer.  I heard a helicopter coming fast and approaching low.

This was not digiscoped, this helicopter was THAT low.  It was Metropolitan Mosquito Control dropping their corn pellets full of Bti and Methoprene to kill of mosquito larvae.  The helicopter skirted the tops of the trees, the owl, crows and hawk scattered.  The adult female owl apparently thought, "Cooper's hawk, yeah, I can kill that," but when the helicopter appeared her attitude shifted to, "yikes, too big for me kids, you're on your own, see ya!"

After the raptors scattered, pellets rained down and bounced off my body.  I could hear nearby woodpeckers give low warning noises to each other.  Robins were on high alert.

A couple of nearby mallards seemed to dig the pellets and tried to eat them as soon as they hit the water--they were the only birds who seemed to be unaffected by the strange aerial machine.  The city assures me that the pellets are harmless both to me and the wildlife that might consume it.  I was tempted to start running around like Cary Grant in a Hitchcock movie, but it's not so much fun with a spotting scope in tow.

The helicopter made a few more passes and a few moments later, one of the owls flew back with a few pesky crows hot on its tail.

She perched right above my head and the crows still followed.  She looked over to see her chicks were still in the nest and I think scan for the Cooper's hawk.  Most of the crows lost interest, but a few hung around to caw out their angst.  I couldn't stay, I had to get to my breakfast meeting, but things seemed to be settling down and I'm sure she went back to the tree.  After a Cooper's hawk and a helicopter, crows were merely an annoyance.

One of the chicks was scratching itself, but it almost looks like it's trying to give a high five.  Note the large gray feathers in the nest.  Looks like the owls have been eating some pigeon.  And based on an owl pellet that Non Birding Bill near the nest, some other surprising species...but that's for future blog entry...

Cooper's Hawk Nest

Ah, bird festival season is almost upon me.  Next week is the Horicon Marsh Bird Festival...although, every time I mention it to Non Birding Bill, he thinks I'm either going to a horror convention or meeting up with some odd transformers.  But I am so looking forward to birding this part of Wisconsin--it's been too long.  I see friends reporting awesome warblers and sparrows just south of us so I'm eager to see these same species next week. Meanwhile, I'm taking what I can get spring-wise here. Last week, someone on twitter pointed out a hawk nest, possibly a Cooper's hawk not to far from my neck of the woods.  I thought I'd head over and check it out.

This is a very relaxed urban hawk.  This Cooper's hawk has chosen to nest right over a south Minneapolis street.  I always think of these hawks as fairly high strung and desiring quiet, hidden areas.  Not only was this nest placed right over the road, but the hawk itself was perched in an open area.

The male didn't seem to mind my scope on him for a few moments as a digiscoped a few photos.  Usually, Cooper's hawks don't like that.

Even though the nest has been built over the street, once the buds show that once the leaves are out the nest will be well hidden. Cooper's hawks do seem to have a knack for selecting a nest spot that will be covered by leaves.

I noted all the surrounding birds singing on territory in the neighborhood, despite the male perched in the open.  Robins, house finches and cardinals all sang their song.  A downy woodpecker drummed his territory announcement on a nearby branch.  I've often heard people express concern that Cooper's hawks nesting nearby scare away other birds.  Certainly wasn't the case here.

When I worked at the bird store years ago, we had a Cooper's hawk nest nearby and even though the hawks periodically plucked off birds at the feeder (and a day old Canada goose) we had good activity all summer.  I think sometimes people see what they think they should see.

I hope I have time to check this nest through the summer and I hope it does well.

Birds and Beers Rain Plan--Merlins Rest

Well, the weather certainly isn't cooperating for woodcocks this year! I'm not willing to cancel Birds and Beers outright, so let's go ahead and meet at Merlin Rest tonight at 6:30pm instead of a very soggy and muddy Lebanon Hills.

Sorry if this puts a damper on anyone getting a lifer woodcock.