John Newland--Doh!

Just landed in Atlanta and I got this news item from Blue Lizard Blog. The worm has turned somewhat on the Texas cat shooting case. Remember how the bridge worker argued that the cats were his pets and that was the reason Jim Stevenson should not have shot them. Well, that reasoning has just turned around and bit the bridge worker in the butt according to this story from the Galveston County Daily News:

Bridge worker gets citation for too many cats

By Scott E. Williams
The Daily News

Published January 8, 2008

GALVESTON — For about five years, John Newland has fed a clan of cats near the San Luis Pass Bridge where he worked.

Newland said he never had problems, until November 2006 when island bird-lover Jim Stevenson shot one of the cats. A year later, charges against Stevenson were dropped after a deadlocked jury.

Now, Newland himself is headed to court as a defendant in a criminal case.

Last week, city animal control officer Leroy Cooper issued Newland a misdemeanor citation, accusing him of keeping too many animals.

The charge carries a possible fine of up to $500.

Newland is set for court next Monday before Preceinct 1 Justice of the Peace Jim Schweitzer.

Newland said the feedings have been going on for years.

“These cats have been here longer than we have,” he said. “They keep us company, and no one had ever told us it was against the law to feed an animal that was hungry.”

However, Galveston police Lt. Mike Riedel said the feedings were against the law, because 15 to 20 cats had been eating the food Newland put out for them. A Galveston ordinance bars a person from keeping more than four cats or dogs, and Riedel said that feeding the animals made Newland responsible for them.

“The cats are breeding like crazy, and there are health and safety concerns, because he’s not getting them fixed, he’s not even taking them to the vet. He’s just feeding them,” Riedel said. “I know he thinks he’s taking care of the cats, but he’s just making the problem worse.”

Attorney Tad Nelson represented Stevenson at his animal-cruelty trial, which ended in a jury deadlock in November.

Nelson praised law enforcement for pursuing a case against Newland.

“It’s a tough position to take, but I’m proud of the city for doing this because it’s the right thing to do,” Nelson said. “As lovable as Mr. Newland is, he is naive to think he’s benefitting those cats.”

Stevenson, president of the Galveston Ornithological Society, faced a charge of cruelty to animals for shooting the cat near the San Luis Pass bridge.

The crux of the case was whether the cat was feral or domesticated, as the animal-cruelty law under which he was prosecuted applied in cases in which an animal’s owner did not consent to the animal being harmed.

Newland said he suspected Stevenson of complaining to police about him feeding the cats. But Riedel said Stevenson had nothing to do with Newland being ticketed.

Riedel also said he would prefer to charge the people at the root of the cat problem.

“The people who dump those cats off, the original owners who abandon them out there, that’s who I’d like to get,” he said.

Give Kat Doc Advice

This question came in through the comments from Kat Doc:

Great bittern photos! What a problem to have, to be "too close" to a bittern.

Birdchick, I am going to Orlando later this month. After my veterinary conference (5 days locked inside of hotel convention rooms) I have 3 days free. Any suggestions on places to go birding near Orlando?

~Kathi

Any Florida readers have a suggestion for her? I told her that she should look at the Space Coast Bird Festival site (so wish I was going to the festival, maybe next year). When I was there this week, I did Viera Wetlands (another entry about that forthcoming and Merritt Island). How about it, all you Florida insiders: tell katdoc where to go...birding that is.

Hot Gratuitous American Bittern Action

Well, I thought getting some great head shots of the wood stork was going to be the high point of my trip, but hands down, it was the American bittern action, I captured at Viera Wetlands yesterday. Now, the American bittern is a bird I can see in my home state of Minnesota, but not easily and certainly not in good photography light. One thing I am fascinated with birds is how birds respond to human activity in different states. In Florida, the birds are totally mellow: osprey right on the street lamps like red-tailed hawks. Herons and egrets will let you get within 10 feet of them. We have some of these same species in Minnesota, but they are way more cagey--it's just an interesting regional difference.

Bitterns are birds that skulk around in reeds, using their stripey plumage to hide in the reeds--it's hard to find them, you generally hear them more than you see them and when you do see them, it's usually when they are slinking back into the reeds and out of your sight. When I got the above photo of a bittern disappearing into some vegetation with the sun behind it, I considered myself very lucky.

Then we got to this spot and a fellow birder mentioned to our group that there was an American bittern in here that is a real ham. I'm a ham, I would even say chickadees and nuthatches are hams. But bitterns as hams? They are more of the Howard Hughes type. But, the light was perfect, I had a flash card to fill and couldn't resist a chance to digiscope a bittern. We couldn't see it and buddy Clay Taylor said that we were probably going to have to walk around and just work it. Clay and I assumed our positions with our scopes and our cameras and waited. Less than sixty seconds later, we saw the bittern.

It skulked out of the grasses and I got this photo. I thought this was pretty darned exciting and very bloggable--and a good representation of how you usually see a bittern through a scope or binoculars. Part of the bird and obscured by vegetation. I congratulated myself in my head for a digiscope well done. But, it didn't end there.

The bird continued to search the water at the base of the vegetation for fish and seemed completely oblivious to the pack of humans on the nearby road freaking out at how close we were to an American bittern.

Look at that! An almost completely unobscured bittern face? I felt like the luckiest girl in the world!

The bittern eventually came out fairy close to the road. If you look at the above photo, you see the end of the barrel of my spotting scope and at the top center of the photo is the bittern. I was dying at this point. It was sunny, the temperature was in the upper seventies, a slight breeze was blowing and I was watching a really cool and generally hard to see bird.

The birder we met on the road was right, this bird was a ham. Here it is point its head up to camouflage as a helicopter few over (or maybe it was simply watching the helicopter).

And then it poked its head out and continued its "relentless warfare on fish." Some of the members of our group were not birders and did find the bittern cool, but I'm sure they were wondering why Clay and I just planted ourselves for the better part of an hour photographing the bittern.

The bird was so close, I had a tough time getting anything but head shots, so I moved myself further back and was able to start getting the whole body in the frame. What amazed me was look at the size of the head in relation to the body--tiny and skinny head governing a large body in back.

At a couple of point, it puffed up slightly. I wondered what that was about. I once was fortunately enough to watch a bittern give it's call and it's really interesting. They inhale air first and their bodies blow up like a big brown beach ball and the bird deflates as it gives that pumper call. Here, it puffed up once? Is it giving some kind of call that is inaudible to me? What was it about? Still, so much to learn.

Here's a final photo, check out the wet feathers on the chin--I saw this bird get at least five fish, who knows how much it was getting as it would periodically disappear into the grasses. Though the above is the last photo, below is a video of the bittern. There is a spot on the lens and yes, I am aware of the spot. I've been uploading some photos to You Tube in the last twenty-four hours to blog about this week. Some people subscribe to the videos on there and see them right away. And a few have felt the need to let me know that I have a spot on my lens. It's a big spot and fairly obvious and it amuses me to know end that the commentors feel the need to let me know, on the off chance I didn't see it. So, as you're watching this, yes, I know that there is a spot on the lens.

Oh! And I forgot to mention, you will hear fish crows calling in the back ground--sounds like a crow that swallowed a kazoo going "ha ha". Also, watch how the bittern wiggles back and forth--that's how it's focusing on what it's about to stab it at. Alas, the flash card I was using when I took the video filled up and the camera stopped filming. Immediately after the video stops, the bittern nailed a fish.

Florida Brush Fire

There's a news story about a controlled burn in Florida that got out of control and is now a brush fire that contributed to a 50 car pile up. I think we saw it yesterday when we were birding at Viera Wetlands (the nice name for South Central Regional Wastewater Treatment Facility). I think we saw the start of it yesterday:

We saw smoke puffing up as we were birding and we wondered if it was a controlled burn or wildfire. I even called NBB and had him check Google News to see if there was anything we should worry about. There wasn't anything up in the news and we noticed that the wind was blowing in the direction of the smoke, blowing it away from us. When I was taking off from the Orlando Airport yesterday evening, I could see the smoke and see it starting in a different spot and wondered what was up.

This station has some photos of the smoke mixed with fog this morning, crazy stuff.

Merritt Island NWR

Just rolled into chez Stiteler--how will I ever get all my Florida blogging in before I leave for Atlanta on Thursday? Above is one of the many palm warblers that were flitting around the hotel and just about everywhere else we went in Florida.

Yesterday afternoon we headed over to Merritt Island NWR in Titusville, FL. We pulled over so folks could test out some digiscoping stuff. I was trying to get a photo of some of a shorebird called a ruddy turnstone. Alas, it was too close to get the scope on it! It was just as easy to take a photo the regular way. That's my shadow and the turnstone in the upper right hand corner.

Eventually, I got some distance between the turnstone and me. C'mon, even if you don't care for shorebirds, you have to admit, that's kind of a cool looking shorebird. Look at those bright orange legs!

As we were going down the road, we pulled over for some wood storks. If you look at the tops of the trees, you can see a couple of wood storks. Would you like to see them even closer?

Is it a beauty? What? That's not close enough of that dry, wrinkly skin? You want more?

Almost makes you think that this is what a white ibis would look like at 80 years old. These guys mostly eat fish, but will go for weird things like baby alligators and cow dung. Kind of makes sense with a face like that. You want more of the face?

Breathe in the wood stork, breathe out. Breathe in the wood stork, breathe out. Look at that insane nostril too. Cool bird.

We didn't spend huge amounts of time at Merritt, a storm was rolling in. I was hoping for some roseate spoonbill action in the sun, but didn't see any.

Until the rain came and it got darker, then it was spoonbill city.

Here's a spoonbill mixed in with a bunch of tricolored herons. As I was loading this onto the blog, Non Birding Bill walked behind me and asked, "Is that a roseate spoonbill I see?" I asked how he knew what a spoonbill was and he answered, "Because it's the one bird that actually looks like its name. It's rosy and it's bill looks like a spoon. That must have been the one day Audubon wasn't drunk when he was naming birds."

It's good to be home. Brace yourself for some pretty hot bittern action coming in the next 24 hours.

Birders Help Nail Pelican Poacher

Here's the story from the Tyler Paper:

Audubon Society members bird watching around Lake Palestine Saturday afternoon were shocked when the white pelican they were observing was shot from the sky.

The birdwatchers were parked on County Road 1134 viewing water foul fly back and forth from a private lake to Lake Palestine when they heard a gunshot.

"A pelican they were watching folded and fell to the ground," said Chris Green, game warden for Texas Parks and Wildlife Department. "They're beautiful to see swimming together. They have a large bucket-type mouth and it's neat to see them fishing. That's why they are protected."

The birdwatchers called Operation Game Thief, a toll-free number where the public can report hunting, fishing and other environmental violations.

Green said he was dispatched to the area and located the shooter and his friends along with the bird that was hidden in a makeshift dumpsite on the property.

When interviewed, the 17-year-old Robert E. Lee student told Green he shot the bird because it was eating too many fish out of his private lake.

"I seized his shotgun and wrote him a ticket for killing a protected bird," Green said.

In he state of Texas there are three classifications for protection. The first is endangered, which includes species such as the whooping crane and brown pelican. The second is threatened, and includes the bald eagle, and the third class is protected which includes owls, hawks, pelicans and songbirds.

"They are numerous, but we still protect them from random shooting, and violators face a pretty steep fine," he said. "(The teen) will be looking at around a $500 fine."

In addition to the fine for killing a protected bird, he was ticketed for not having a hunting license or hunter education.

Green said even though the bird was shot on private property it is still against the law to harm or kill protected wildlife. He added that if it wasn't for the Audubon ladies looking through their binoculars, he probably would not have known about the shooting.

"The women were very disappointed. They came to East Texas to see the beauty of our wildlife and all we can show them are killers," Green said.

Serisously? People still name their kids "Robert E. Lee"?

Great Bird When I'm Away

The meeting that I am attending is a mix of both birders and hunters. Yesterday, as we were reconvening after lunch, I did a quick check of email to discover that an ivory gull was reported in Duluth, MN. I announced that I had to fly home immediately, the guy running the workshop who is also a birder said, "Not unless I can come too!" Most of the birders in the room wanted to go.

This morning when I woke up, Sparky Stensaas had put up a photo of the gull on his site.

Oh well, I have ibises to keep me warm.

Dixie Crossroads Seafood Restaurant

I just thought this was a cool photo of a boat-tailed grackle--almost looks like he has mutton chops.

Tonight we had dinner at the Dixie Crossroads Seafood Restaurant, which is a must if you are birding around Titusville, FL or are going to the Space Coast Birding Festival (they were actually having a meeting prepping volunteers for it while we were there) I highly recommend the broiled rock shrimp. Outside there is a small pond full of fish--many huge, some minnows.

In the dark, along the rocks, you could see a green heron fishing for the minnows. For twenty five cents, you could purchase fish food and many of us tried to aim it in the green heron's direction to get the fish over its way, but it seemed to have its own system and ignored our helpful tosses of fish pellets.