This week in birds - #21

We spent a wonderful day at Anahuac National Wildlife Refuge yesterday. It's one of my favorite day trips and I always look forward to the birds that I know I'm going to find there. My target birds for yesterday's trip were Roseate Spoonbill, Purple Gallinule, and Least Bittern. Almost immediately, I got very lucky with the bittern. I saw this bird fly into the spot where it is standing in the vegetation and trained my binoculars on it. Sure enough - Least Bittern! Not only did I see this bird but a few seconds later its fuzzy chick showed up wanting to be fed. I got a few pictures of the chick, too, as well as a lot of other birds. I'll post some more as soon as I've had a chance to go through the 200 or so and pick out the best.

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And in news of birds, birding, and the environment this week:  

A new scientific paper just published describes the discovery of a large quantity of bones and eggshells of birds from the Late Cretaceous period that were apparently drowned and then preserved by mud and silt. The deposits indicate that even in that early time seabirds were coming together in colonies to breed and nest.

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Male robins seem to discriminate among their offspring when it comes to feeding. Researchers found that the robins fed chicks that came from more brightly colored eggs more often. The speculation is that the color of the egg indicates health and likelihood of survival so the males are hedging their bets. But if a chick is fed more often, common sense tells me that like its likelihood of survival would be greater!

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The organization American Rivers has released its list of America's most endangered rivers and topping the list is the Potomac. The threat to the river - and many others - is Congress which keeps trying to roll back the regulations of  the Clean Water Act.  For this particular Congress, any regulation at all is considered bad. Who needs clean water anyway? 

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The Cliff Swallows no longer breed and nest at San Juan Capistrano Mission in California. A few years ago, the mission undertook a restoration project which drove the swallows away and they have refused to return. The mission has tried everything it could think of  to lure them back. Now they are playing recordings of swallow calls to try to bring the birds in.  Will this prove any more successful than their other efforts or are the birds gone for good?

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Hen Harriers, a European species related to our own Northern Harrier, are in danger of being wiped out as a breeding bird in England because of persecution. As far as is known, only one pair shows signs of breeding this year. The harrier has had its nests destroyed, been poisoned and shot almost to extinction for one simple reason: It is a natural predator of the Red Grouse, and humans, surely one of Nature's more selfish creatures, don't want any competition in their quest to kill the grouse. 

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Bug Girl, this week, had an interesting post about "The Coming Beepocalypse."  

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As the climate warms up, especially at the poles, Arctic seabirds like Dovekies, or Little Auks, have adjusted their fishing habits to the warmer waters.

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An Earbirding.com post talks about Canyon Wren females as well as the males singing and says that among most North American wrens only the males sing. That may be true but, having spent my life listening to the vociferous Carolina Wren (male and female) perform their "call and response" duets, I have to wonder.

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It's a pretty well-established scientific principle that crossbreeding can confer many advantages on the results of the breeding. The crossbred offspring often combines the best of both parents' genes and is better able to survive. A new study shows that crossbreeding happens among Heliconian butterflies and for much the same reason.

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Those clever crows are confounding scientists again with their abilities. It seems that they are able to recognize different human voices as well as different voices among other species. Just one more strategy for being able to distinguish friend from foe it seems.

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Around the backyard: While we were at Anahuac yesterday, I heard a Yellow-billed Cuckoo, the beloved "rain crow" of my youth, calling. I was glad to hear him but also somewhat sad to hear him because it reminded me that I have not heard one in my own yard this year and that I didn't hear or see one here at all last year. Imagine my delight then, when, while working on a pruning project in my garden today, a Yellow-billed Cuckoo called from one of the trees in my front yard! I heard the bird several more times as he moved around the yard. It made my day.

I was certain that my family of Eastern Bluebirds would have fledged by today. Wrong again.

The babies are still tucked up in the box and the parents are still flying themselves ragged to keep them fed. Here, the female exits after delivering a fat caterpillar.