Pale Male and Zena, Osprey Cam Action, Doorstep Dove is FOUND, and Canada Goose Alert!

 Photo courtesy of http//www.palemale.com/
One of Pale Male and Zena's fledglings, watches for "prey", which includes rocks and twigs at this age, from behind a leaf.  Good thing, she's still getting the real thing from her parents.  Look at that bulging crop! 


Having raptor cam withdrawal in those spare moments in between updates,  now that most Red-tail eyasses have turned into fledglings?

Here is one I just discovered today.  AND as I've never watched Ospreys in the field, the learning curve is fascinating plus I have questions, questions, questions...

http://explore.org/#!/live-cams/player/live-osprey-cam
That's vigilant mom on the left and there are three eyasses napping in the bowl of the nest.

Dad shows up with a still flopping fish.

Mom gets fish and stops the flopping.  Dad keeps an eye peeled.

Mom pulls the fish up onto her handy dandy staging area/orange netting and starts working on the fish.  The eyasses begin to show some signs of life.

 Mom begins to feed and as the eyasses become more active it is apparent that ospreys have asynchronistic hatching.  The is a rather large size variation compared to Red-tails who's young most often hatch in a day of each other.  In this case they come in large, medium, and small.  Interestingly though Large and Medium were first up to be fed, before long Small managed to tumble Large back somehow in a scramble and got an even share.  Spunk counts.  Dad keeps watch.

Then dad is off as feeding continues.  Note Large is to the right of the perpendicular stick.  Medium is center above Small.  And Small, with the lighter feathers and open beak is about to get the next bite.


Here is one of my questions.  See the square item?  Follow  the perpendicular stick from the bottom of the photo up.  That looks like a rock but it appears to be placed on top of other nesting material.  I don't know that Ospreys carry rocks to their nest and in any case it would appear to be too heavy for them even if they did.  Perhaps a remnant of Styrofoam?

Next up Robin of Illinois also had a pair of mallards visit her feeder. Here's a recap--

About 5 years ago I had a mallard pair come to my yard and gardens, two years in a row. They would come in late April and come daily, and then disappear in mid-May. The second year, in early May, we had a tornado 1/4 mile from my house, and I've not seen the pair since. I hope they fled the area in advance of the storm. The second year a juvenile was often seen accompanying them. The first year, another male tried to steal Mrs Mallard away, and the males duked/dueled it out on the wide park-like area behind my house. I watched with bated breath and great fascination. By the way, the home team won.

I wasn't the only one who was fascinated and delighted with them. Neighbors would watch out their windows, slow their cars as they passed my yard if the ducks were in it, and sometimes sneak around in the bushes furtively to watch them as well.

Doorstep Mourning Dove finally appears again!

I admit it. I was worried.  Yes I know it's nesting season and hens have to stick to the nest pretty closely but I hadn't seen Doorstep for weeks and weeks.  Then the other day, after I'd seen a clutch of three newly fledged Mourning Doves being herded into the Big Nest by Friend and then I saw Friend, Doorstep's mate sitting on the bird bath watching the sunset without her--  I really got worried.  Yes she'd likely be laying a new clutch but ordinarily she helps Friend for a day or two with the youngsters before beginning to sit again.

Then I looked out on the feeding floor and saw a petite Mourning Dove with a slight ruffle to her posterior feathers pecking away.  Poor thing she's practically sleeping on her feet.

She heard the camera and looked up completely aware.  I bobbed my head.  She bobbed back...  It IS her!!!!  Alive and well.

 And then she went back to eating with her eyes at half mast.  Raising a threesome can really take it out of a girl. 

ALERT!!
Once again this year Canada Geese will be rounded up in New York City's Parks and killed.  The USDA chooses this time of year because Canadian Geese are at their most vulnerable.  They are in molt, often flightless, and have goslings.    Beyond planned protests, Goose Watch needs you to help document these activities.
http://www.goosewatchnyc.com/

Guess Who Came to Dinner? Mrs Feeder Duck Makes Her Appearance.

 When I first saw the Mrs. though the window, and ran to get my camera, she was far back in the yard with web feet rooted while  Night Duck strode forward toward the duck water pan and it's adjacent pile of bird seed with a glance back now and again to see if she was getting the idea.


By the time I got back with the camera, Mrs Night Duck had closed the distance and appeared to be heading for the drake.

 Not so.  She marched over to the feeder and started shoveling it in.  This told me that though she was a bit shy at seeing me at the door she likely has been here before and knows where the fresh supply of bird seed is everyday.

Night Duck isn't looking all that happy that Mrs. Mallard is between he and I as opposed to he being between us.  I decide I'll head towards the garden and stand behind the Milkweed, which will place him in the middle again.  Not that they won't know I'm there but somehow they seem to feel better when there is some kind of barrier.

I round the corner of the garden and stop dead.  Who should be grazing behind the mulch pile but one of the baby bunnies.  I think we're up to nine now. This may even be Strawberry Bunny (And you wonder why the garden is fenced.) who has a tale all his own rather like Peter Rabbit.  One day we'll get around to the Tale of Strawberry Bunny.

But the issue at this point is that if I hold to my plan, I have to get past little bunny.  And likely little bunny will take off like a shot hippity hopping toward the spruce trees and in the meantime spread the panic to the ducks, who'll take to their wings, and that rather defeats the whole comfort plan.


I turn around and retrace my steps.  Except this time I stand further back from the flower bed.

Drake doesn't notice at first but Hen does.  As does the Mourning Dove and the squirrel who likely wonder why I'm acting so uncharacteristically furtive.

 Night Duck then cares very much.

 As does the Mrs.

 Squirrel could care less and Mrs Night Duck takes the cue.

 Part of the trick here, is not to cause the Mourning Dove or the squirrel to flush, which tends to cause everybody to flee.  In this case of course the Dove and the squirrel are regular visitors who are used to me so likely Mrs. Mallard is taking their behavior as a partial clue to my possible identity as a non-predator.

But by the time I'd made it back to the front door, gone in, and am looking out the glass door in the back, everyone is gone.

Best laid plans and all that...

Then a day later, SURPRISE!!  I look out and there they both are hunkered down under the feeder giving me a look...

They then go back to the business of eating which entails putting their bills to the ground near their bodies and sliding their bills forward "shoveling" whatever into their mouths.  Bits fall out here and there.  

The "bits" are the non-eatables. No they aren't sloppy eaters.  They're very selective eaters.

 It turns out that Mallards have a dozen or so receptors in their mouths which start "selecting" what is eatable and what is not. What is not is chucked out,  as the mouthful travels from the front to the back of the mouth.

Who knew?  

Without having fingers to do the selecting, while having eyes in the sides of your head which makes seeing what your bill is shoveling in not all that stellar,  it makes perfect sense.

Evolution is a wonder.

Donegal Browne

Pale Male Waits, the Highbridge Red-tail Nest, and the Songbird Nest Report: Robin, Cowbird, Chipping Sparrow, Mourning Dove

 Photograph courtesy of http://www.palemale.com/
 Pale Male as dapper and self assured as usual surveys his domain on Saturday from one of his favorite perches on the Linda Building.  No doubt as usual, mentally absorbing the many prey patterns spread out before him which he will put to good use when the mad rush of hunting for hungry eyasses begins.

 Photo taken on April 28th.  Things have changed since then.
 Just exactly whose eggs are what has become slightly clearer.  This year the Cowbird eggs do not match those of the, I think now, Chipping Sparrow host.  They were the brown heavily speckled eggs as opposed to the pale greenish blue with a few flecks as were all the eggs last season-both Chipping and Cowbird.

 The nestling above with the giant red mouth is a cowbird chick.

It turns out that one of the ways that a parent bird knows who is hungriest in many song bird chicks is that that chick's mouth will have the heaviest blood flow.  Hence another survival quirk for Cowbird young is a constantly bright red mouth.

 

The nest in question is deep inside this clematis.  Early the morning of the 29th I heard an enormous racket and looked out the window next to the trellis. It was a Crows vs every-other-bird-in-the-neighborhood melee.  By the time I got outside the Crows were being chased across the park by a feathered posse of mostly Grackles.  I took a very very quick peek into the nest.  I couldn't see  the chick and it appears to have been predated.  I'm not sure about the status of the eggs, (I got a glimpse of one of the pale ones), as to get a really good look requires a tippie toe stance and some peering as opposed to seeing the red mouth of the chick which really stands out.   I didn't want to be the last straw for abandonment of the nest by gawking  if it wasn't abandoned already.

Later in the day I did see a parent whip into the Clematis and I didn't see it come out again right away so perhaps there is still hope.  I'll chance another look once in a day or two.

THE CASE OF THE EXTREMELY LOW ROBIN'S NEST

 

Remember the nest that we'd decided belonged to a Robin?  Indeed it does.  Note that sky blue egg.  

In fact it appears to belong to a rather human habituated Robin though she will flush out by a surprise thump of the front door. (I've stopped using it for the time being.) 


This is the lowest Robin's nest I've ever seen.  The bush is less than four feet tall besides the fact that if you stand on the front step you could reach out and pull mom's tail without even leaning.  Look carefully near the top of the bush and you'll see her tail feathers sticking out the back of the nest.  Though perhaps the fact that the nest is so close to human habitation may be one of its selling points. 

The nest robbers, mostly Crows here, (The Blue Jays were extirpated from the area by West Nile virus.), never come this close to the front door. 

 I have a feeling that since the township's new garbage collection agency supplies large covered wheeled bins for both recycling and garbage that perhaps any domestic garbage picking, if any, the Crows were doing has been completely eliminated, making nest robbing, once again, an important source of Crow protein.

That is until the softball games in the park with their resultant refuse of hot dog and brat goodies in open cans take some of the heat off.

THE CASE OF THE DISAPPEARING DOVE NEST

 

Remember the dove nest in the tall bush?  Yesterday I noticed that the twigs appeared disturbed and there was no dove eye peering through the greenery.  

The nest has disappeared.   Not to worry too much as  there were no feathers at all to give away the demise or even the disturbance of the parents.

And do check out Rob Schmunk's beautiful photos of Martha and the eyasses at the Highbridge nest on his blog at--  http://morningsidehawks.blogspot.com/

Donegal Browne

Hatch at the Cathedral! Pale Male, a Leucistic Grackle and a Saturday Miscellany

 Photo by Rob Schmunk  

 FROM ROB SCHMUNK UP AT THE CATHEDRAL NEST OF ST. JOHN THE DIVINE--

"It looks like a definite hatch at the red-tailed hawk nest at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine. On Tuesday we saw the "concerned staring at the bottom of the nest" which often suggests a hatch in progress, and today it seems confirmed by Isolde spending 12-13 minutes leaning into the nest in fairly obvious feeding behavior."

For more on the beautiful Isolde (right) and the energetic Stormin' Norman (left), click on Rob's blog link below

http://morningsidehawks.blogspot.com/

 Photo courtesy of http://www.palemale.com/

Pale Male still a Dad-in-waiting, takes off on the hunt.

 Photo Donegal Browne
The  leucistic Grackle finally obliged to have her photograph taken albeit in the rain.  Note just below the white on her neck she has a bit of the standard Grackle  iridescence .

                  Do you notice anything unusual about this bush?

If you look very very closely in person you can see Doorstep, the Mourning Dove, keeping an eye peeled through the evergreen twigs.  At least I think it is Doorstep, as she didn't flush out when she was spied and returned my head bob.

 And for you wildflower buffs, can you name this flower?

And how about this one?   It's sepals close late in the day.

A grumpy Song Sparrow, Melospiza melodia, paid a visit.

 A White-throated Sparrow, Zonotrichia albicollis, stared.

Then scrutinized.

Then finally, with his beady eyes glued to mine, decided it was okay to get down to eating.

In the meantime his cohort a tan striped form of the White-throated Sparrow refused to even look my way.  According to the research the females of this species prefer his looks to the white striped version.

And last but not least, who built this nest?  It is approximately three feet from the ground.  Thus far I haven't seen anyone in it.

Donegal Browne