Birds & Beers, Woodcock Edition Is 04-22-09

So, Friday night I headed out with a few friends to scout for woodcocks for the next Birds and Beers--we had success and found at least three woodcocks.  Above is a very blurry photo of one of them.  Birds and Beers is an informal gathering of birders of all abilities to meet with others, have a beverage, and talk some birds. You can promote an upcoming bird event or website, share research, look for a birding buddy, or just learn what this birding thing is all about.  It's relaxed and fun!  Normally, we do this at a pub, but we're so excited to get out in some warm weather, that the next gathering is going to be combined with some fun birding: watching woodcocks!

The next Birds and Beers will be Wednesday, April 22 at Lebanon Hills Regional Park.  The woodcocks start their display about 15 - 20 minutes after sunset, which means they will start around 8:30pm. Since the display area is next to the visitor center at the park, we'll meet there starting about 6:30pm and have an old fashioned tailgate party--you can come early to mingle or come closer to magic hour.  Bring your own food and beverages and we'll laugh until it's Woodcock Time.  The park closes at 10pm, so this gives us plenty of time to get some great birding done.

Looking at the park rules, I can't find anything that says "no alcohol period" but I did find rules that say no alcoholic beverages at the beach or trails, so use good judgment, this is a family park and it's no fun running through brush in the dark looking for a small brown bird if you are toasted.

If it is pouring down rain on April 22, this event will be  postponed to the following Wednesday, April 29.

If you are unfamiliar with how to watch woodcocks, here is a video that Non Birding Bill and I made a few years ago for Eagle Optics. This is fun birding, I've taken a few non birders and they've all had a great time:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GeBevezTpx0[/youtube]

The friends who went out with me on the scouting mission included a couple of kids.  One even made me the cutest thank you card:

I love the little woodcock head in the binocular view.  She has them saying "Mah" as opposed to "peent" which just cracks me up.  My absolute favorite part is the little portrait of me down in the right hand corner:

It's me demonstrating how to cup your hands behind your ears and opening your mouth--this increases your hearing by 40% (partially because you aren't talking while doing this).

Spread the word for the next Birds and Beers, should be a blast!

Cardinal Cam

I gotta say, that I love the internet age and the ability to do some online birding!  At first we would get some still images updated from falcon cams, eventually that moved on to next box cams like owls and the occasional chickadee cam, now it's all sorts of species, not just raptors and the video is live, with sound! Cornell's Nestcam site has a new streaming video of cardinals starting their nest in New York.  Check out one of the highlights:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K7sjVqBYFZU&feature=player_embedded[/youtube]

If you have some favorite species cam sites, don't hesitate to share them in the comments.

What Is Golden Eagle 42 Up To?

Well, we're getting some unexpected results of the golden eagle that was injured and released with a satellite transmitter.  The bird is part of a population of golden eagles that spends the winter along the Mississippi River along the Minnesota/Wisconsin border.  The speculation is that the birds breed in Canada, but we don't know for sure.

The golden eagle is supposed to be on its northward migration--but went south!  Here's the report from Mark Martell:

"Data came in for the past 5 days and our golden eagle decided to take a trip to Iowa. We have a data gap for April 3 & 4 but by April 5 the eagle had started moving away from Nelson, WI where he had been the previous week and was in Minnesota. He spent the evening of April 6 just south of Houston, MN and the evening of April 7 found him near Lansing, IA. He wandered around Allamakee Co., IA on the 8th and spent the evening just west of the Mississippi River near the Yellow River IBA. On April 9 he started heading north and by 1pm, the last signal we have in this batch, he was back in Houston Co., MN

I hope this is just some pre-migratory wandering but of course there is no way to know if this is normal until we get a few more birds tagged."

I'm wondering too if this is normal, or since this eagle was in captivity recovering from a leg injury (from one of those awful leg hold traps, which I wish would be banned) is this bird is taking its time to get its bearings?  Cannot wait to see where this bird ends up from the breeding season.

Pigeons Getting Busy In My Neighborhood

I noticed some pigeons nesting on a nearby apartment in my neighborhood.  This is not out of the ordinary, you would expect to see pigeons nesting in early spring in Minnesota, but it's what they are nesting on that makes me chuckle.

See the board with all the little nails on it?  That was put up to keep the pigoens from hanging out on the ledge.  Pidgeon says, "In your face, building manager!"

This pigeon is part of a pair that nests in this general area and also lost their chicks this time last spring to some crows.  Hopefully, they will have better luck this year.  This bird has a distinctive pattern and I can always tell when it's at my feeding station--its also rather bossy to the other birds.

This is a video from an eagle center in Denmark called EagleWorld. The birds is a Stellar's sea eagle and I'm not sure what they're training it for, but I can't help but giggle at the bird's giant schnoz and feathery pants--especially when it's running down hill. [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iNs8yEWR4_E[/youtube]

Saturday Birding Program

For those interested, I'll be doing a Spring Birding Program at Kroening Interpretive Center at North Mississippi Regional Park from 1 - 3pm this Saturday, April 11.  We'll start with a talk about attracting birds, then go out and watch them.  I'll have my digiscoping equipment if you have any questions on that too. I believe that there is a park fee, so do call ahead 763-694-7693.  The weather should be fantastic and we should get some great spring migrants.

Best Little Breakfast Stop In Guatemala

If you ever have the fortune to find yourself near the Pacific Coast of Guatemala, one of the must stops should be Rincon Suizo in Tecpan, Guatemala.  Half the reason is the food, the other half is the birding potential!

I have to say that I had one of the best breakfasts of my whole entire life here.  Much of the food was pre-ordered for us on the road and this place was no exception.  The original meal  included beans, plantains, tortillas, eggs and hot sauce.  But when I entered the restaurant, all I could smell was bacon and I was a woman obsessed, I asked if it was possible to add bacon to my meal (I offered to pay extra) but they gave it to me--it was the best bacon I ever tasted, it was grilled.

The tortillas are out of this world too and I am forever spoiled.  Every place we went for a meal, whether it was breakfast, lunch or dinner, you heard the familiar patting of women preparting the thick, fresh delights, not like the thin, papery ones at my local grocery store.

We took a trail behind the restaurant which led to a clearing surrounded by a woods, full of wind and a little bit of cloud. Our quarry was a bird called a pink-headed warbler which just might be the snazziest warbler out there (which is saying something because in general most warblers are fairly snazzy to begin with).  The wind whipping through the trees, the slight howling was slightly ominous but only added to the adventure of the search, especially as we ascended the slopes and my heavy breathing and heartbeat just added to the sound.

There were quite a few familiar birds like this flock of rose-breasted grosbeaks.  At least three are in the above photo, two females and a male.  I wondered if any of this flock would make it up to Minnesota.  I normally write blog posts pretty much as they happen, but I'm enjoying doing these Guatemala posts so early in the Minnesota spring, even though I was there in February.  While I see on Facebook and Twitter that my birding friends in the southern US are getting warblers and sparrows, I'm still waiting, finding joy in highs of 40 degrees.  Looking back to Guatemala is a pleasure.

This was a hermit thrush that caused a bit of debate in our birding group.  When we first saw it at a distance, some in the group thought it was a gray-cheeked thrush.  It ended up being a hermit thrush, still a delightful bird, always happy to see a familiar face.

One of the cutest birds we saw was a tufted flycatcher, which is reminiscent of a tufted titmouse.  I have to say that will never be a hardcore lister because I just do not care about my flycatchers as much as I should (I am not one to put up a strong fight for a willow or alder flycatcher if it's in the fall and if you know what I mean by that reference, you know too much about birds).  But this dude is cute, easily distinguishable by its crest, and hangs out in the open making it easy to identify.

As I look at these photos, it's interesting to note that while we were here, I didn't get photos of colorful birds. Non Birding Bill would say that is natural since I don't pay attention to colorful birds, I'm only interested in brown birds.  But we saw some really cool colorful birds, one being a red-faced warbler (do follow the link, it's a great bird) and we did finally see the pink-headed warbler.  I just did not get a good photo.  Mike from 10,000 Birds got a pretty good shot of it though--isn't that just a dynamite bird?

It's also funny that I have so many brown bird photos because what struck me most about the native people was how important color is to their culture and to their day to day lives.  While we were birding in the woods, this group of women came out of the woods. I was a good distance away and digiscoped them. They were off to work probably in nearby fields and here they are in beautiful colorful dresses.

In many of the places we went birding, we would come across family groups of women going about their day to day lives. One of my favorite moments was coming out of the woods in pursuit of a bird and finding a group of Mayan women washing their clothes in a stream.  The vibrant clothes were spread to dry on the banks as they finished the wash and their small children played nearby.  A young girl, no more than four or five was holding her mother's machete.  I wanted to get a photo, but her mother shook her head, "No." I had to respect her wishes and completely understood.  I don't like my photo taken on laundry day either.

But color just played a huge roll in the day to day life of people in Guatemala.  I wondered what it must like for someone to come from a country like this were even a guy who sells buckets uses color in his merchandising comes to someplace like Minnesota and sees the winter where it's white and then early spring when it's several weeks of gray and brown--how monochromatic and hard to deal with!  That's got to be huge culture shock.

Birding Among Bullets In Malta

Holy Crap, I was sent a trailer for Birds, Bins, and Bullets a documentary about Eurpoeans fighting back against the illegal hunting of migrating birds in Malta.  Here is the trailer: [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GaC1u4D8bUA[/youtube]

You can watch an excerpt of this distrubing documentary here.  It's incredible to see these European birders, going right into the heart of the poaching area to try and stop this.  You may be wondering why you should care about some small island off the coast of Italy should be of any concern to you--it's an important flyover for many migratory species of European birds.  I'm not against hunting, but many of these birds are protected and the poachers are just shooting them, not taking the meat--that I don't like.

This is not unlike the fight that Audubon first faced to stop the Christmas Bird Hunt or the days of shooting hawks for sport in the fall along places like Hawk Ridge, MN or Hawk Mountain, PA.

Since Malta joined the EU, they've been gradually shifting the hunting laws to fall more in line with the rest of the union, however the illegal hunting still goes on (if you watched the trailer, you saw the protest against the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds being protested by the people who still wanted to poach the protected birds).  This year, the Maltese Government, feeling the pressure, has announced that there will be no 2009 spring hunting season, but will that stop a poacher who still feels it is their right?

So, watching this, one might think, "Perhaps boycotting Malta is the best thing?" Well, that's not going to stop the shooting.  Bird Life Malta is going to some great effort, like hosting a Spring Watch April 11 - 26.

Basically, on the camp, you are on illegal hunting surveillance and migration monitoring--this is not your ordinary listing trip.  They also offer a Raptor Camp in the fall with similar objectives.  Reading about the previous camps on the website, it sounds like it's a combination of reward, frustration and danger.  Last year, some participants have their windshield shot out and tires slashed, but on the other hand, much of the illegal hunting was curtailed and some poacher arrested.

It's an interesting situation and really makes one wonder if birders can make a difference.  They certainly are struggling to in Europe.

Bee Update

I kind of put my nose to the grind stone the last week and finished off a draft of the book and now I am dying to get out and watch some birds!  I'm hoping to do a bit of that on Wednesday.  In the mean time, we are getting things ready for the fast approaching bee season.  Our final living hive, the Kelli hive, has unfortunately succombed.  From the looks of things, she had moisture build up and that's what killed the hive. In the meantime, Lorraine has been extracting the honey from the dead hive and forced that nice folk singer, Jason Webley to aid in the extraction. Thanks to all who offered advice regarding Russian bees, we now have three packages on order, which brings our coming hive total to 7.  Yikes!  This year's Hive names are: Wendy, Juliet, Hannah, Yvaine, Magda, Svetlana, & Bea Arthur.

Golden Eagle 42 Did An About Face

I got an update from Mark Martell at Audubon Minnesota about Golden Eagle 42. It looks like the bird started to head north, changed it's mind and went south again. "Our bird’s northward movement during the first 3 days after his release which saw him move north into Chippewa Co., WI  ended there when he did an abrupt turn-around and headed back south to Buffalo County on the morning of March 29.

Our most recent data is through April 2 and he remained in the general area of northern Buffalo County. He moved around the area quite a bit during the day and chose different evening roost sites every night although he spent 3 nights in the general area east/northeast of Nelson, WI. The area he is traversing, and the evening roost sites he chose are consistent with the observations Scott Mehus and I made of other golden eagles during Jan and Feb. and fit with Scott’s overall impressions gained in the past years. We believe most of the adult golden’s have started moving north so we would expect this bird to do the same in the near future."