First of Season

“First of Season” or “FOS” is a notation in a birdwatcher’s records that highlights when migratory birds return from their winter vacations. Baltimore Orioles breed all across the eastern and central United States, from the Dakotas to Maine, and as far south as Louisiana. When they leave us in the fall, they go to southern Mexico, the southern tip of Florida, all the Caribbean islands, and as far south as the northern sections of Venezuela and Colombia. Then they come back in the spring…and the first one I see or hear gets the distinction of FOS.


My FOS Baltimore Oriole this year was April 10.


This year, he arrived at his cluster of Sycamore trees to find them overpopulated with his cousins, the Red-winged Blackbirds. I wonder if he found that to be strange. He will mate and nest in one of those trees (the one in my neighbor’s front yard, most likely). His wife will construct a dainty sock and hang it from a branch that cannot bear the weight of a gray squirrel, at the tippy top of the tree. They will eat insects, nectar, and fruit. They will occasionally drink from my hummingbird feeder, but they have yet to shop at a fruit feeder I put out just for them. Usually, they stay so high in the trees that I have to hurt my neck to try to see them.


Even though orioles and blackbirds are in the same family (as in Kingdom, Phylum, Class, Order, Family, Genus, Species), they have their own niches. Red-winged Blackbirds don’t migrate. They like to hang out in the tall grasses in fields or at water edges. During breeding time, a male will have a dozen or more wives. They often put their nests on or close to the ground. They eat insects and seeds. The ones in my yard frequent my sunflower feeder. In the fall and winter, they flock together by the millions, but Red-winged Blackbirds still roost in small groups in the spring and summer.


My house is not that far from the marshy Quail Creek and two old river bayous. In the past, I have had the occasional flock of Red-winged Blackbirds to visit and empty out my feeder. This year is different. This year they aren’t just stopping by once in a while, they’re making camp.


Why are they sticking around? Kohl’s, JC Penney, Dick’s Sporting Goods TGI Fridays’, Lowe’s, Cost Plus World Market, Linens and Things, Pier 1, Starbucks, Romano’s Macaroni Grill, PETCO, Krispy Kreme, DSW Shoes, P.F. Chang’s, Buffalo Wild Wings, Logan’s Roadhouse, Circuit City, Raising Cane’s…I may be forgetting a few. Shreveport is growing! And it just grew into the fields between Youree Drive and East Kings Highway, where the red-winged blackbirds had lived.


http://www.stirlingprop.com/uploads/122906_BigYearforLocalRetail_ShreveTimes.pdf


http://kscl.blogspot.com/2007_08_01_archive.html


I hope my Baltimore Oriole doesn’t mind sharing his seven sycamore trees with a few hundred distant relatives.

Field Journal for March 14, 2008

Yesterday, I traded a pair of navy slacks for a new perspective on nature. Thankfully, there were no other humans around to happen upon me while I was crawling across the forest floor composing photographs of early blooming wildflowers, emerging Spring leaves, butterflies and a toad. The experience reminded me of an image I saw of Kjell Sandved chest-deep in a bog, camera in hand, capturing a butterfly for his alphabet. I think we would have both looked pretty silly to the casual passer-by.

Though the fruits of my labor shouldn't even be in the same sentence with the word 'Smithsonian,' they're pretty good (if I do say so myself), and they complement my field journal nicely...

Juvenal's Duskywings, Erynnius juvenalis, on Violets,
Viola sp. (I will find out which species and edit here.)

The violets are booming! And getting a lot of attention from some duskywings.

Cardamines, Cardamine bulbosa

The cardamines have peaked and are beginning to fade. (I had no luck getting a Falcate Orangetip to pose for my camera, but they were out in force, visiting both the cardamines and the violets.)

Blueberry bushes. I do not know if they are Vaccinium elliotii or young Vaccinium arboretum. I know both species have been recorded in Walter B. Jacobs Memorial Nature Park. I will probably need to sit down with a dichotomous key to be sure.

The blueberries have just begun to bloom.

Spicebush, Lindera benzoin

Spicebush flowers are opening up.

Pawpaw, Asimina trioba

The Pawpaws are waking up.

**

I think it's safe to say Spring has sprung in Shreveport!

**

By the way, if the name Kjell Sandved doesn't resonate with you, check out who he is and what he's done here: http://www.butterflyalphabet.com/story.html

Snowy Day

Here is proof that sometimes it does snow in Louisiana.

These images were taken at Walter B. Jacobs Memorial Nature Park in Shreveport, Louisiana on March 7, 2008.

Any evidence that it had ever snowed disappeared about an hour later.

Ringing in the New Year

The woods are never completely silent. On cold winter days, you won’t hear buzzes or clicks of insects, or the flute-like song of a wood thrush… but you can hear dried leaves rustling in the wind, water flowing downstream, woodpecker taps and calls, and warbler songs. That’s right. Warbler songs.

You see, bird vocalizations can be categorized as ‘songs’ or ‘calls.’ Songs are almost exclusively performed by the males to establish and maintain territories for breeding. The songs function to simultaneously ward off competitors and attract mates. Calls are simple notes or phrases uttered by males and females to communicate the availability of food, presence of predators, or relative distance from the receiver. Since true bird songs are reserved for breeding season activities, even year-round residents have nothing to sing about in the winter months. Or so you would think.

Pine Warblers set up their territories, mate and breed earlier than most other birds in the forest. In Louisiana, they start singing in the winter, and are nesting by the middle of March. So, on a sunny New Year’s Day at Walter B. Jacobs Memorial Nature Park, the forest rings with the tremulous trills of male Pine Warblers singing in the canopy.

Listen to the Pine Warbler:

http://www.birds.cornell.edu/AllAboutBirds/audio/Pine_Warbler.html

Find good information about the Pine Warbler:
http://www.fs.fed.us/conf/birds/Pine_Warbler_MIS_New_Plan.pdf

conserveonline.org/docs/2001/05/piwa.doc

http://www.birds.cornell.edu/AllAboutBirds/BirdGuide/Pine_Warbler_dtl.html

Peepers in December

The breeding song of the Spring Peeper heralds the spring… in Vermont! Here in Louisiana, peepers fill the December night with song. Just as the deciduous trees close up shop for the year and the wintering birds arrive, cold autumn rains revive the vernal ponds and the peepers begin their chorus.

Almost always heard and not seen, these diminutive frogs are only about the size of a nickel. They spend their days sleeping under logs and in leaf litter on the forest floor. They awake in darkness, and spend their nights eating ants, beetles, flies, spiders… whatever’s available… whatever fits in their mouths. Their cryptic coloration affords them some protection. Still, many fall victim to salamanders, snakes, owls, and larger frogs.

Those that live long enough (3 years) will congregate in the temporary ponds. The males establish small territories and call. The louder, faster callers succeed in attracting females for momentary trysts. Fertilized females then deposit their eggs – one at a time – under vegetation and debris on the bottom of the ponds. Each female lays 900 or so eggs before retiring to higher ground. In four months, her offspring – whom she will never know – join her on the forest floor.

Where will the peepers live when the forest is gone? Where will they breed when their habitat is commandeered for a housing development, and their ponds are filled with soil? Those that inhabit protected areas like the 160 acres of Walter B. Jacobs Memorial Nature Park may not have to find out.

The Night Flier

High in an old pine tree, in an old woodpecker hole, a southern flying squirrel lies huddled with his family. He wakes to a reveille of silence - the pause between the canticles of the day birds and the acoustic strums of crickets and frogs.

Eager to break his fast, he crouches on the edge of his doorway and dives. Freefalling, he flattens his tail and steers his body onto the vertical surface of a tree. He grabs hold and hurries to the opposite side, looking back to be sure his path was not tracked. Throughout the night he flies and lands, always circling around the tree to elude owls, foxes, minks, raccoons, snakes, and others who would eat him.

An accomplished acrobat, he prances along a horizontal branch high above the forest floor. He knows his territory. He knows every available cavity and refuge. When the alarms sound that a predator is near, he can quickly take cover. Now, the chirps and squeaks from his fellow flying squirrels assure him that all is well in their own sections. He, too, twitters and chips, reporting the semblance of safety in his vicinity.

In the next twelve hours he will feast on a banquet of lichens, fungi, seeds, and berries. He will raid rodent nests and devour the infants alive. On shorter, warmer nights, he might steal and eat bird eggs and even baby birds. Now, the growing darkness and falling temperatures prompt him to hoard and hide acorns and pecans. Some he will bury under leaves on the floor. Some he will deposit in communal caches in the cavities of trees.

Before his next jump he expels the baggage from his bowels. The jetsam contains spores and seeds which will grow into new organisms. The fungi he disperses are vital to the forest, fixing nitrogen in the soil so that it can be absorbed by tree roots. The seedlings he plants are equally important. They feed browsing animals and renew the forest.

The pre-dawn intermission in Nature's symphony cues him to return home and rest. He has survived this night and will live to fly again.

Today's Visitors

Let me see if I can illustrate this scene for you…

1:05 p.m. Two men drive into the nature park, pass the parking lot and park directly in front of the building. This behavior indicates that 1) they have some varmint they want to identify and/or relinquish custody of, or 2) they are unwilling or incapable of walking very far. In both cases, the visitors will exhibit common behaviors once inside:

∙They begin with the mildest curiosity about the exhibits inside the building.

∙They become slightly more interested as they discover the other rooms.

∙They will express fear and/or disdain for some (if not all) of the animals on exhibit.

∙They will absolutely not want to walk or hike and have no use for a trail map and probably don't want a brochure.

∙They will spend no more than 15 minutes in the building, including the time they spend in the restroom.

The men are around 60 years old, and one has an obvious limp. He makes a bee-line for the restroom. The second man remarks about the attractive dioramas. "Those were created by Don Edwards," I say and pause for moment to see if the name means anything to him. [Don Edwards is a locally renowned wildlife artist who painted the 1994 Louisiana Duck Stamp, a mural that covers the entire wall of a building in Downtown Shreveport, and lots pieces often displayed at the Shreveport Regional Airport.] He knows of the artist and can't say enough good stuff about him.

"Did you know that he puts a little Red-headed Woodpecker in every painting he does? It's fun to try and spot them." The man seems to take little interest in this tidbit. He looks up at the taxidermic owl.

"What kind of owl is that?"

"He's a Barred Owl…"

"Oh, a Barn Owl?"

"Barred. He's called that because of the stripes on his chest that look like bars…"

"B-A-R-D?"

"B-A-R-R-E-D."

"Is this the kind of owl I hear at night?"

"Where do you live?"

"North Highlands."

"You could be hearing him. There are three owls that you could expect to hear around your neighborhood…the Barred, the Great Horned, and the Screech. This one, the Barred Owl, says 'Who cooks for you; who cooks for you all?"

"That's him!"

"There's another owl who hoots," I say, leading him to the taxidermic predator-prey display in the next room, "This owl, the biggest we have, the Great Horned Owl."

"How does he sound?"

"His voice is lower, and he usually has only 5 syllables: 'Who's awake? Me too."

He thinks he's heard this call, too.

"This is the owl that you hear on television when it's supposed to be nighttime on the show."

The man with the limp enters the room. "Hey! I know what that owl is around my house…it's a Barred Owl." He turns to me, "Tell him what the Barred Owl says again."

"'Who cooks for you; who cooks for you all?' They call to announce their territories and attract a mate. Sometimes the mates will 'talk' back and forth with each other; they don't always do the whole call, and sometimes they add notes on the end."

"Do this one. The Great Horned Owl."

"'Who's awake? Me too.' The phrase helps me remember that their voices are lower and they usually have 5 syllables, 'Who, who who…who who.'"

"What's that other owl you said we might have?"

"The Screech Owl. He doesn't hoot. He sounds like a tiny horse whinnying from the trees," and I do my best to imitate the sound.

"Yeah. I've heard that before, too."

The interaction seems to have run its course and I want to remove myself so they can explore on their own. I remind them to let me know if they have any other questions. Before I can take a step, they ask me about the alligators… and then the turtles. I move out of the room with them and once again, before I can walk away, they have more questions…

"You said there was other rooms?"

"Yes." I lead them to a third room. "In this room we have leaves of trees that are in the park, a slide show of the butterflies known to be in the park, and a few of the snakes."

We discuss the snakes (how they eat, who feeds them, who cleans their cages, their microhabitats, etc.). We move back into the main room to see the other snakes.

The man with the limp looks out the picture window and sees a squirrel at the feeder. "We got to go!" He says hurriedly, "We got to pick up this car over on North Lakeshore."

As I walk with them toward the door, I thank them for coming and invite them to come back, but we don't get far…

"Hey! Have you seen this? Don Edwards did this."

"Yeah?"

"And he paints some kind of bird in all of his paintings…"

"A heron?"

"No. It's something in the tree. What is it again?"

"A Red-headed Woodpecker."

"Where's it at?"

I give them instructions on where to see the bird. "He's up high on the trunk of the third tree from the corner here, about two inches above the leaf of that bamboo." They can't see it. After a second, I think to get my binoculars. "Maybe we can see them with binoculars."

Can you visualize this? Inside a building inside a nature park, the three of us cluster together, and share binoculars to get a view of a 1 centimeter-tall painting of a Red-headed Woodpecker on a wall. It was almost like we were really birding!

On the way out the door, the first man asked me about the 'owl thing' he heard about here at the park. He had thought his granddaughter might want to come, but she was scared. I got him a pamphlet listing all the events we have planned for the year. I explained what the Owl Prowl was and when we would be doing it again.

"Thank you." "Thank ya'll for coming. Have a nice day." "You, too."

They leave at 2 o'clock.

http://www.geocities.com/soho/museum/2092/