Still Cold

Fat is the order of the day with the birds and the cold weather. This hairy woodpecker was getting the suet while the gettin' was good.

Soup has been a popular menu item with the dip in temperature. I was so excited, I found a stewing hen at the grocery store (those are getting harder to find)--now that makes a flavorful broth! It's in the pot right now. It's night and day between the difference of using one of those "young fryers" compared to an old stewing hen. If you've never tried making soup with an old hen, give it shot, you'll be amazed.

My banding class was canceled yesterday since it was far too cold to be safe for trapping birds. So, rather than bringing you photos of banded birds, I'll pass along some announcements from the blog inbox. For those who have been coming to Birds and Beers (the next on is February 28) you may be familiar with Wild Ones and Sue who talks about landscaping your yard for birds. Well, Wild Ones is having their 7th Annual Spring Exposition Through the Eyes of Nature: The Birds’ View of Landscaping Saturday, February 23, 8:30 am – 4:30 pm at the Radisson Hotel Roseville. So, if you're in Minnesota and want to landscape more for birds, check it out.

And my buddy Steve Moore emailed that he is starting his own bird podcast called Birdwatch Radio. He was at Bird Watch America while I was there and interviewed a bunch of my friends.

I got an exciting email from the Potholes and Prairie Bird Festival in North Dakota full of fun stuff. One being that my buddy Kate Fitzmeier from Eagle Optics will be there--she is a party looking for a place to happen (I'm also going to see her at the Detroit Lakes Festival too--WHOOT). She and Bill Thompson III will be doing a Bird Watching For Beginners in North Dakota that will cover things like the difference between bird families and species, two terms often used when bird watchers try to identify a bird, bird identification short cuts and tips, how bird, behavior can help with bird identification, how to recognize birds by their songs, making your own “life list” by keeping notes and records of the birds you see how to join bird clubs, take field trips, and attend bird festivals nationwide. Should be a good time.

Red Head Recovery (the bird, not the Tina Louise kind)

I got an email asking to promote a project with the Audubon Chapter of Minneapolis to address the precipitous decline of red-headed woodpeckers. The big project for 2008 is to identify and map all existing clusters of red-headed woodpeckers in Minnesota--a 'cluster' defined as two or more nesting pairs in relatively close proximity (say 1/4 mile) of each other. A cluster probably indicates good savannah habitat, which is key the recovery efforts. If you have a cluster or if you would like to learn more, visit their website.

I went to check the website called www.RedHeadRecovery.org, which suddenly put the image of Amy Hooper of WildBird on the Fly needing recovery--she's a red head. I got even more of a chuckle imagining red-headed women running around when I read some of the website:

"Red-Heads often occur in loose colonies or clusters."

"Educate yourself and your neighbors to the Red-Head's habitat needs. You may be richly rewarded."

Yeah, there's a crude joke to be made in there, but I just can't put it all together at the moment.

Another Way To Recycle Phone Books

It's cold. Painfully cold. The type of cold that makes you utter a colorful four letter word with every step you take outdoors.

I went to The Raptor Center for my shift today and got an update on Peregrine 568. She's alive, feisty, and still in recovery. She has some bumblefoot issues but still, for a bird with all sorts of metal pins, she's doing as well as can be expected.

We have an education turkey vulture named Nero at The Raptor Center. Almost all of our ed birds are housed outdoors since they would be here in winter and are capable of surviving sub zero temperatures. The few exceptions would be Nero and the new broad-winged hawk we have in training. Nero's housing has been adjusted, complete with plexiglass and a heater, but the staff was making some upgrades to it and he was tethered in the prep room. He's imprinted on humans which means he would look to defend his territory from humans and worse...try to mate with one in spring.

Now, turkey vultures are the type of bird, that need a little enrichment when in captivity. In the wild, they fly around and look for carcasses to rip apart. Because of that instinct to seek out things to rip and tear, they can be a challenge in captivity. Above is a photo of Nero attempting to rip apart the astro turf around his perch. The turf is important, so birds can slough off dead skin on their toes and help prevent bumblefoot.

The staff would rather he rip apart his turf instead of his jesses. He is capable of picking and ripping apart the bracelets around his feet and could potentially get loose. He's sometimes given other objects to purposely rip and shred for enrichment-too keep him engaged with his natural behaviors--and keep him from ripping up his jesses.

Today, he had a phone book. Now that is what I call creative recycling! I wonder how much longer we'll keep getting phone books?

As much fun as it is to watch a turkey vulture take out the yellow pages, when my shift was over, I had to head home. On my way out, the front desk got a phone call that someone had a hawk or a falcon sitting outside the Rec Center of the St. Paul Campus of the University of Minnesota. The bird had hit a window and the weren't sure if it needed to be picked up. Since it was on my home, I offered to drive by and check it out. I found a place to park and just walking one block in the wind, and in all my long underwear, it was still painfully cold and my eyes were watering. I met up with the man who had called in the bird, and he pointed me to a dark corner. He said that the bird appeared to be recovering and was now standing up, as opposed to laying flat on the ground. I looked in the corner and said, "Holy Crap! It's a merlin!"

It was an adult female merlin and when we got within ten feet of her, she took flight and zoomed down the side walk, zigged and zagged through some small trees and darted off in an ally. Well, I guess it's safe to say that she didn't need any time at The Raptor Center. It was so sweet to watch her dark form darting through the campus, right over student's heads--such a cool bird. As I walked back to the car, I found a couple of spots of sparrow and junco leftovers. I think the merlin has been doing well. The wind was very strong and numbed by fingers and stung my face, I wondered if maybe that helped propel her into the building in the first place. I was glad I didn't have to take her in.

And now I leave you with some videos of the turkey vulture ripping his phone book and adjusting his turf:

Kitty Hive RIP

Alas, the fear I had this past fall has been realized, the Kitty Hive has failed. The above photo is the last one I have of the hive alive. On January 1, I could hear some activity in the hive, but I have put my ear up to Kitty twice in the last two weeks and both times the hive has been silent. I had hoped it was just that they were tucked deep inside, but today we got confirmation. Mr. Neil checked the hives this afternoon and with the warm weather, the Olga hive was dumping out dead bees and pooping. The snow around her hive was completely melted. Kitty was silent with no visible activity and the snow was not melted around the hive. He opened the roof, looked in and found all bees inside to be dead (on the upside, that's not Colony Collapse Disorder).

I think it all started with my mistake of preventing the swarm, that led to a late requeening and having too few bees to keep the hive warm for the winter. Sigh.

We expected complete failure our first year, and were pleased as punch that we got as far as we did this fall, including harvesting a wee bit of honey from Olga. But, I still feel bad and will miss our girls. After all, they were the ones who I installed after my initial panic and unlike Olga, none of us have ever been stung by a Kitty bee.

I also got some of my best photos from the Kitty Hive. I loved the above shot of all the Kitty workers coming to lap up a river of honey that surged down a frame when I accidentally opened some cells. Kitty, you taught me lots. I'm sorry we couldn't keep you through the winter.

The Next Birds and Beers Is Scheduled

There's been a request to have the next Birds and Beers on February 28 at 6pm at Merlin's Rest and so it shall be. I've also added a Google Calendar Feature to my Appearances Page so that way I can add in where and when I'm going to be instead of the usual process of assuming Non Birding Bill is reading my mind and updating it for me. So, that is where to check for upcoming Birds and Beers.

Birds and Beers is a gathering of ANYONE interested in birds from the hardcore lister to the mildly interested. You can meet people from all walks of life, ask bird questions and just generally have a good time.

Afternoon Buteo Call

Yes, I did just make that joke.

It was hard to contain any Twin Cities resident indoors today. After sub zero temps, the weather really warmed up to the twenties and thirties over the weekend and today it got to the low to mid forties--whoot. And we need to gather our rosebuds while we may, because tonight it's rain that turns to ice as the temperature is supposed to plummet to a low of 3--which as coincidence would have it will be our high for tomorrow, with the temps going somewhere in the neighborhood of -14. That's about a 60 degree change in the next twenty-four hours--how do we not a get winter tornado with that?

So, it was take the spring like day while you can. I took a quick jaunt over to the Minnesota Valley NWR. When I arrived, I could hear an angry red squirrel squeaking and general angry bird chips. I wondered if the sharp-shinned hawk was around and dashed behind the Visitor's Center.

Well, it wasn't a sharpie, but a young red-tailed hawk (not the yellow eye and the lack of red in the tail). It was half heartedly preening its feathers and bobbing its head watching was moving below. It was close, but not in the best light.

Some of the birds seemed to sense that they weren't high on the prey item list for this species of hawk and returned to the bird feeder. But, young hawks are unpredictable because they'll try anything once, so birds that did brave the feeders, keep a watchful eye towards the hawk.

I think the red-tail got tired of the squeaky red squirrel and it flew down the hill towards the river--which was great because I could get a photo with a better background. The only problem was that it was facing away from me. So, I did my best whistled impersonation of a red-tailed hawk scream and it looked at me. Great day with a great hawk. And with that, I left it to hunt in peace.

I Just Bring It Out

I took this photo of Cinnamon during the interview last night. This is the stare down--she does this hoping that if she stares at me long enough, she will have willed me into giving her a treat.

Well, last night's online show (The Rabbit Show) took a weird turn. I guess when you have an online show hosted on Talk Shoe, you can have a forum going where people can ask questions and it's very interactive. And as happens in forums, someone joined and started asking...well let's just say they were questions that Cinnamon would not approve of. The poor host seemed surprised and flustered. My inclination would have been to just giggle quietly and ingore it, but the host was trying to delete them, which I think just made the anonymous posters pose even worse questions. Then, there was an odd sound and I couldn't hear the host. I figured I was on hold or the show was stopped because of the questions. Non Birding Bill was in the other room listening live and shouted, "Hey keeping talking--he's not on, but I can hear you, fill the dead air."

So, I kind of "umed" and "ahed" and "you knowed" my way into getting rabbits from humane societies, it was very strange. And fortunately, there were people asking questions that didn't involve impossible rabbit mating processes (thank you to all those kind folks) and I was able to speak to those.

The host made it back on--he had a power surge from his house and got knocked off the show. An eventful interview to say the least. You can download a podcast version here. I guess I was the first author he had on his show--I hope the experience didn't sour him on future guests on his show. Thanks, Dan, for having me on and for promoting the book.

After it was finished, NBB shook his head and said, "You just bring that out in people, don't ya my little trouble maker."

The Rabbit Show on Talk Shoe

Cinnamon and I are going to do an online talk show tonight at 9pm EASTERN TIME (as much as a rabbit can be on a talk show) on TalkShoe called The Rabbit Show. You can listen here and you can call in. If you miss it, you can get a podcast version too.

The Cabin

Okay, I'm more confused about the track I found than ever. Someone suggested elk, but didn't think their were elk anywhere near where I was. Well, thanks to the great readers here, I've learned that there are in fact reintroduced elk less then 140 miles from the cabin and it wouldn't be out of the question for one to have meandered. Moose seems more likely for the area though. Whatever it was, it was big.

I woke up the first morning at the cabin and it -13 degrees Fahrenheit. Br. Now, that may look like a big field out beyond the bird feeders, but that is a very frozen lake. So, with it being that cold, it made it easy for me to avoid going outside and taking photos as a distraction.

It also made it a great excuse to eat lots of bacon. I loved the truth in advertising that came with the bacon. It's true, bacon does make everything better--even sub zero temperatures.

The few times I did venture out, it was nuthatch central out there and they did not care about people. I could walk right up to this one. She was too close to even digiscope. When I waked by she would continue eating. If I stopped to look at her, she looked back almost as if she were asking, "Yes, can I help you? Must you stare while I eat?" She would wait until I moved opened the door and went inside and then she would resume eating.

I would allow myself some outdoor time once a day, and I did do a tiny bit of digiscoping. It was tough because the birds were so close. Also, the temperature was so low that it just killed my batteries--even storing them with hand warmers (that only seems to work when it's above zero). Also, it made my camera run very slow. I got a kick out of this series of three photos, starting with the female red-breasted nuthatch above. I took her photo, and there was an long pause while the camera processed, and then when the screen came back on...

Oh, hey, check it out, she suddenly turned into a male red-breasted nuthatch! He must have chased her off while I was watching the camera. I took of photo of him and again, my camera took a long time to process the image and when the screen finally came up again...

It turned into a whole different species of nuthatch! The white-breasted nuthatches were out numbered four to one by the red-breasteds.

There were some ice fishing houses out on the lake and from time to time a snow mobile would whip around on the surface.

From time to time, a snow plow would come through and keep a road cleared, which I thought was strange. There were several ice houses out there, but nothing too warrant a whole road.

Here was a couple setting up there day of fun. You can see the auger on the left to poke the hole in the ice, their truck, a snow mobile and the little blue tent, is what the fisher person will sit in to keep the wind off while they fish. I love to go out on ice, but a big vehicle like a truck makes me nervous. I know when the weather is right and the ice is thick enough, you'll be fine, but it still makes me nervous.

I found out on Saturday as I was packing up to leave why there was a road being plowed. About a hundred cars came out onto the ice for a fishing contest. The tree is obscuring half the cars. This many cars make me REALLY nervous. I can see one out on the ice, but this many, so close together, just freaks me out.

See the green skinny structure up towards the right hand corner, in front of the blue truck--it's an on site port a potty! You could tell the mood was festive on the ice and everyone was ready to have a good time.

And before I left, I got this photo of a final photo of a red-breasted nuthatch. It wasn't the best, but I loved how they seemed to prefer to hang upside down on a feeding port, to feed out of the port below it--instead of sitting upright on the perch and feeding out of the port that is attached to it. I guess they're little Frank Sinatras--they do it their way.