Distraction Displays: Mass Breeding Bird Atlas 2

Chester 03 - The Jewel of the Pioneer Valley

From The Department of Parulas and Minor Miracles

Chester 03, my new home for June 12 and 13, 2011. Hampden County -  unexplored, sparsely populated, and rich in historical and natural wonders. Chester fit right in with my other atlas rambles in Tolland Center and Sandisfield.

The SW corner of Massachusetts is a gem - the pike swings north out there, and there is 30 miles between the Westfield and Lee exits, so it doesn't have the "exit sprawl" you see along major highways. There is little development, and lots of public land.

My best bird was a singing Parula - we'll see if that stays - it was right on Rt. 20, about 1/4 mile west of Sanderson Brook State Park. There is a store with a parking lot (for rent sign on the building, unoccupied) across from a stand of tall spruce (?) trees. He was singing all afternoon on June 13.  

The Big Tease

 
Don't you just love it when red-shouldered hawks find true love? Mass Audubon's South Shore Sanctuaries' Friday Morning Birders stumbled onto this pair on March 25 in the most romantic of places, the parking lot of the Norwell Post Office. It's a classic probable "C" for courtship, but it's too early. Safe dates for red-shouldered hawks begin on April 10, meaning that atlasers in the area will need to do some work to push this pair into posterity as a confirmed breeding record. Finding them exhibiting the same behavior in the same block (Weymouth 12) after April 10 would be good; finding the nest to go from probable to confirmed would be excellent.

And so it will be with hundreds of dangling records this final summer of the Breeding Bird Atlas 2 project. While nest finding is never easy - if it was, there would probably be a lot fewer birds in the world - it's up to us to try! These red-shoulders are giving us the big tease: here we are, now come find us when it counts. First stop - right across the street at the Norris Reservation, perfect habitat for red-shoulders.

They think they're so smart...

Japan Quake Tsunami Kills 1,000s of Birds

From The Department of No Humor Here

The species who call the Pacific Isalands "Home" have it pretty tough. Many are pelagic, and require long periods of maturation for their young and seemingly endless foraging flights. Add to this the insults of living in a modern world (rats that eat your eggs and young, mountains of floating plastic that looks just like food, longline fishing, poisons leftover from WW2, etc) and it can be tough to stay alive.

Well, how about if you add on a tsunami.

Clearly the loss of human life and attending disasters far outweigh our concerns for nesting albatross, but this story is none-the-less heartbreaking.

Read about it here:

Japan quake tsunami kills 1 000s of birds.

(Photo Wiki Commons, James Lloyd)

Atlas Returns From Vacation

From The Department of Travel and Leisure

 Atlas came back from a short but very nice vacation to Belize. For those of you looking for a winter escape, or an affordable and easy immersion into tropical birding, let me suggest Belize.

To whet the appetite, the photo at left is taken at the Jabiru nest which is about 30 minutes from the airport. The big thing in front is not a Jabiru, you need to zoom in and look to the left of the mammal's ear/sunglasses to see the nest. The mammal is also known as Margaret Rubega, UCONN professor, friend of The Atlas, and CT. State Ornithologist.

Belize is easy - english as a first language, same electricity/plugs, good cell service, fairly quick flight, very ecotourist friendly, and buckets of birds. We saw 140+ species in 4 days, and we are not listers.

Anyway, Mass Audubon runs trips to Belize with Dave Larson and sometimes with Rene Laubach (how much fun would that be!). Rumor has it that there may be a special trip next year with Mass Audubon and Dave Sibley to raise money for the bird conservation programs at Mass Audubon. Sounds like fun to me - more details as they emerge or email me if you want more information!

Zombie Ant Fungi in Brazil

From the Department of Zombie Ant Fungi

Check this out at Science Daily.....very cool and news to me!

 

 

Very Late Screech-Owl Nestling

From The Department of Inbox Sanitation

On August 27, 2010 Bob Senk found this young-of-the-year Screech-Owl near his workplace in Salem 03.

Now, we have been looking at breeding birds for four years, we have spent more than 20,000 hours doing that, and have collected more than 100,000 records of breeding birds.

Our latest Screech-Owl record in August 8 for a fledgling, and our earliest is February 19 for a nest with eggs.

This little guy moves the bar notably.We haven't even had a nest with young reported in July, let alone in the last week of August.

The more you look, the more you learn. Thanks Bob.

Northern Parula Confirmed

From The Department of Hen's Teeth

Mary Keleher confirmed Northern Parula nesting in Mashpee over the weekend. Her account is below the fold.

This is one tough critter to confirm in MA. We certainly get a share of passage migrants, and late hangers-on, but before the weekend we only had one other confirmation. That was a bird banded with a brood patch - with no information after that event that the bird bred.

The NOPA population in NY seems to be growing (NY BBA2) nicely, and they point to evidence from the BBS that there is modest growth since 1980 along BBS routes in NY.

We can't use the BBS data to support our increasing numbers of NOPA because they are still too rare in MASS - indeed we have blank slots in the place in the table where NOPA should be on the BBS chart - that is a first for me.

In MA,  we  have plenty of POSS (14) and PROB (5) sightings, but it is very hard to get these birds into the CONF category. 

If anyone is looking for a fun project for 2011, working in July to CONF birds we have recorded as POSS or PROB would be a lot of fun, and contribute in a meaningful way to our understanding of this bird. Are we looking too early for them? or are we just not returning often enough to get the info we need for CONF?

(Photo from Wikipedia)

Read Mary's account below.

Turkey Vulture Nest Site: Hudson 06

From The Department of Sanitation

 
Kudos to Steve Sutton who sent the following description, and a bunch of photos, to give you an idea of what a Turkey Vulture nest site can look like, and to make you sigh at how many possible sites there are in Massachusetts. The nest cave-let was right in the center of this outcrop of rocks in the forest. From Steve:

Turkey Vulture nest site (in Hudson 6, at Garfield Woods in Berlin). On July 15th I discovered a fledgling, still with extensive white down on the neck, breast, and legs, at the entrance to what I believe to be the nest burrow. It was halfway up a rocky outcropping, and large enough to hold several TVs. I didn't have my camera, and when I returned two days later the fledgling was gone, so I went over to photograph the nest site.

This project continues to amaze me - when you get dedicated people to engage their passion, look carefully and methodically, and document what they find, you can create a huge knowledge base. Atlasers have photographed several TUVU nest sites during this project, probably more than were found in the last 20 years in Mass. 

Two more photos below the fold.

Atlas Goes To The Vineyard

Y'all know my fondness for all things Atlas. Well this was the vehicle directly in front of me as I got on the ferry this morning. 

Good omen. 

Don't tell anyone, but I heard A Barred Owl on the Vineyard. Details to follow , but either this was a tape, a person doing a really great Barred, or it was the real deal. Go figure.

Blog posted here.

A Swiftly LIved Life

We're proud of our chimney swift tower at the Daniel Webster Wildlife Sanctuary in Marshfield, better know to atlasers as Duxbury 4. It's produced chicks for many years - except for the one year that our property manager left the flue open in May and the birds never used it. He still kicks himself for that one.

Sadly, though, when we checked the nest today for the first time this year, we found something was tragically wrong. We opened the flue and the chicks and the eggs fell onto the ground. Two of the chicks were already dead, and the third was panting heavily in the heat. A glimpse with a mirror showed that the nest was still in the same place it has been for a month, secured to the interior tower wall, several feet above.

Adults have been seen flying in and out of the chimney on a regular basis. In the typical life of a chimney swift nestling, life is precarious. The adults kick the egg shells out of the nest, and the young even eventually slide to the edge to defecate over the side. What went wrong with this year's brood at Daniel Webster? We may never know. Was it the 100-degree heat? Did it loosen the saliva hold on the tower wall enough to cause a drop? We placed the youngster back in the tower and hoped for the best. It was chirping as loudly as it could, so mom definitely knew it was there.