Transitions in the birding year
The first full day of spring, which in Montana means weather straight out of the ADHD mind of the godhead. Warm sun, thunder, torrential rain, freezing rain, snow, and, finally sun again, arrives with much faith and hope for the eager birder. Just as the weather is a chaotic mixture of winter and spring, the local avian assemblage also exists in a state of interfusion and flux. The last lingerers of the winter migrants are holding on into the spring months. A few Common Redpolls huddle around well-stocked feeders. A lone Rough-legged Hawk hunts in a field even as competition from arriving...
Read MorePonderosa Enigma – The Flammulated Owl
Say goodbye to Otus flammeolus and hello to Psiloscops flammeolus. Flammulated Owls have always been an enigma. They are tiny, secretive, and quite easy to overlook. Take the Flammulated Owl’s historical status in Montana, where the birds went largely undetected until the 1980s. The little, and I mean little, owls tend to live higher in the canopy of dry ponderosa pine forests. They hunt mostly insects in the pitch black of the summer nights. The Flammulated Owl is so secretive that we are still debating its taxonomic status and genetic relationships to other owls. Now it has been...
Read MoreFrom the Brink – Peregrine Falcon Recovery in Montana
The following post is part of the Raptor Blog Tour celebrating the release of Crossley ID Guide: Raptors. Make sure to check out all the really great articles about this superbly fine guide. By early 1980s, the skies over Montana were missing the fastest aerial predator. The Peregrine Falcon had ceased to breed in a state where it was once considered common. The Peregrine population was at the tail end of a roughly 40 year decline that started with post-World War II modernization. The post-war American was focused to better living through chemistry and technology, and removal of...
Read MoreChairman Mao and the Sparrows
They started waving bright red flags, and banging pots and pans at dusk. The frantic commotion sustained for days. Terrified Eurasian Tree and House Sparrows wheeled in distraught flight overhead as they searched in vain for a place of respite. Exhaustion took hold of the little birds, and they soon littered the ground. Children and adults wringed their necks with evangelistic zeal. The Sparrow – the enemy of the People’s Republic – was vanquished, no longer would they cause the famines. The blame surely lay on the birds because the infallible Chairman Mao and obedient Eighth Party...
Read MoreReview: The Unfeathered Bird
Feathers. We see birds as collections of feathers. The majority of our identification tools are based on the feathers of a bird. We note the feather color, structure, and location of almost every bird we see, almost unconsciously . We even pay considerable attention to which feathers are missing as a result of the molting process. But it is rare that we ponder what is underneath those gorgeous feathers. This is strange as the majority of a bird’s weight is hidden from our view. Do you ever think about the unfeathered bird. The Unfeathered Bird from Katrina van Grouw is a beautifully...
Read MoreBeach Boys and the Birds of Aruba, Curaçao, and Bonaire
Sometimes I dream about escaping the lingering flurries and barely tolerable temperatures of February in Montana. I want to feel sand filtering its way through my toes as the tropical sun ever so gently radiates upon my shoulders (maybe even a little sunburn). I start thinking of Jack Johnson and the Beach Boys tunes – oh yeah, “Aruba, Jamaica, Babe I wanna take ya.” Aruba, yeah that’s the ticket. A trip to Aruba cures the winter blahs for certain. But alas, the funds have not materialized in the old bank account. Guess, I will have to settle for reading about the...
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