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[wegie]

I admit defeat.

A squirrel-proof feeder will be with us bext week.

It has to be said that the squirrels look in excellent fettle . . .

[anthroid]

I am not having squirrel problems with my feeders, Wegie.  Perhaps having a dog whose greatest joy in life seems to be chasing squirrels may have something to do with this...but I have my feeders up poles that squirrels appear to have trouble traversing.

I have attached the suet feeder at around 4.5 feet  on my bird feeder pole (sunk well into the ground) and am anxiously awaiting the Pileated.  I keep hearing its calls (e.g., the "wild laugh") so I know it's around.  I washed out my other feeders today as well--I haven't been getting many birds lately, and I thought maybe the thistle/seed/whatever was getting moldy or stale or something.  So I emptied everything out and washed out the feeders.  Once they air-dried, I refilled them.  I also hung up a new thistle sock.  With hope I'll be seeing little birdies again soon! 

(I do hope the dog isn't scaring them away--but she doesn't hang out in the same area as the bird feeders, so I have to think the dog is not the variable here.)

[biomancer]

I've got a question for the bird experts - when loons migrate, do they fly in formation like ducks and geese do?  While I was walking Biopup at the park yesterday, we saw a flock that wasn't quite a V but more of a branching pattern, and the birds' calls sounded much more like the common loons we've seen up on Lake Erie than like any duck or goose I've ever heard.  The birds were too far up, and the sky too bright behind them, for me to see any markings on them, but they were too small to be Canada geese.

[barred_owl]

Hi, biomancer.  Probably not loons, I'm afraid.  Loons migrate solo or, at most, in small groups (fewer than 5 individuals in a group), and they don't call in flight.*  In fact, loons are silent, for the most part, during the non-breeding season, except for occasional hoots exchanged at close range when they're at staging areas or on the wintering grounds.  That's the bad news...the good news is that you could have seen any one of, say, a dozen or so duck or goose species when you were out the other day.  Vocalization-wise, there are several duck and goose species that make sounds that are distinctly not 'quacks' or 'honks', so may sound more loonlike.  It would be hard to say for sure which species you might have seen, but some possibilities (based on my guess-timation of the general geographic location) would be Snow Geese, Oldsquaw, Buffleheads, or Goldeneye.  The last two are pretty small, but all four would at least be passing through about this time of year, anyway.  As for the loons, most of them are already out to sea by now, with only a few stragglers still making their way out to the coasts.** 

Good sighting, though!  And, given how little is known about the in-transit portion of loon migrations,*** who knows?  There is always a possibility that the birds you saw were, indeed, loons, and you've managed to observe a behavior that no one else has documented yet.


* There are unpublished reports of individual male Common Loons yodeling in flight during extremely aggressive territorial encounters during the breeding season, but these are rare events.

** Some of the stragglers don't necessarily get all the way out to salt water environments during winter (every year, Christmas bird count reports from the midwest or Great Lakes will report sightings on COLO's trapped on inland lakes that have started to ice-over, for instance).

***Loons equipped with satellite tags may fly up to 400 miles/day during migration (pretty much non-stop, in other words), and they may fly at altitudes up to 8,000 feet.  They rest on ice-free inland lakes, and during spring migration will aggregate in staging areas until their territorial/breeding lakes are free of ice (and individuals probably take reconaissance flights from the staging areas to check on the status of their lakes, too, from time to time).  Apart from the distance and altitude data, though, no one is quite sure what else happens while they're in flight.

[anthroid]

I saw an immature bald eagle at the top of a relatively short tree yesterday--not more than 50 feet from the freeway!  Amazing!  And a whole lot of eagles circling above.  What a wonder to see!

[malcha]

barred_owl, thank you for your helpful reply on mobbing (the kind with crows and hawks, not the kind with DSMs and newbies) a while back.  I posted the question and then forgot all about it, so I only came across the reply today.  Now I want to see a flock of chickadees mobbing a bald eagle.

[barred_owl]

barred_owl, thank you for your helpful reply on mobbing (the kind with crows and hawks, not the kind with DSMs and newbies) a while back.  I posted the question and then forgot all about it, so I only came across the reply today.  Now I want to see a flock of chickadees mobbing a bald eagle.

You're welcome, malcha!  The kind with DSMs and newbies is kinda fun, though, too.

Unrelated to mobbing, but it occurred to me that I would love to see a live Wild Turkey on Thursday.  I might have to make some time before the family descends on us to try and do just that.

[biomancer]

Thanks, Barred_Owl!  I was hoping they were loons, but I can be pretty happy with any of the species you mentioned. 

[mouseman]

On my way back from NM, I stopped at Bosque del Apache.  It was the Crane Festival, so I saw many many sandhill cranes :-)  I also saw a northern harrier, a kestrel, and so many ducks and coots that I didn't have the time or patience to ID them all.  I'm bBack in Chicagoland and I need to buy a new sack of seeds for the feeder that has sat empty since the the last bag was finished (the Mousewoman did not buy new seed...).  I will not go to the shops until after "Black Friday", though.
I did get the Mouselet a Birder's Log at the Bosque gift shop, though.  Barred Owl - you would like the other two gifts I got her: a Owl pin (which she wants to wear every day), and an "Owl Crossing" sign.

[barred_owl]

Welcome back home, Mouseman!  It's been too quiet around here since you've been far afield.  And, yes, I do like your taste in jewelry and trinkets for Mouselet!  Congrats on the great southwestern bird sightings, too!

[anthroid]

I have a totally and completely stoopid-head ignoramus question.  Now that the leaves are off the trees, I can see the various nests in the neighborhood trees--squirrel nests, little birds' nests, big birds' nests.  Here's what I don't get.  There are many, many birds around but there aren't so many nests.  (Stoopid head question alert!)  How can there be so many birds around without a commensurate number of visible nests?

Yours in perplexity,

Stoopid-head Anthroid

[barred_owl]

Dear Most Beautiful and Intelligent Woman in the Whole World (after Mrs. Aandsdean, of course) <interthreaduality, for those who haven't caught up yet>,

The paucity of visible nests can be attributed to a number of things:  (1) some birds nest in cavities (e.g., the PIWOs discussed up-thread, other woodpeckers, chickadees, bluebirds, swallows), (2) some birds nest on the ground (Ovenbirds, some sparrows, killdeer), (3) some nest on rooftops or other flat surfaces (e.g., nighthawks), and (4) some build no nests at all (e.g., cowbirds that parasitize other birds' nests), plus, (5) some of the birds you see during the breeding season may not be breeding/nesting that particular year--there are juveniles, for instance, that aren't reproductively mature, or there may be individuals who were unsuccessful in finding a mate. 

Once upon a time, I was interested in studying the phenomenon of nest re-use by passerine birds, based on a similar observation, Anthroid.  In winter, the visible nests were intriguing to me--it just seemed like a lot of effort went into building some of them, so I wondered if they'd be suitable for use in the next breeding season.  Quite a few people beat me to it, though, on the subject.  The lit review I did, though, suggested that for most passerines who build twig/stick nests, re-using a nest the next year can be problematic.  For one, nest predators (like crows, e.g.) can remember the locations of the exposed nests and zero-in on them when eggs are laid.  Also, some parasite larvae can overwinter in the nests and cause potentially fatal problems for nestlings later on.  And, of course, the winter weather can severely compromise the structural integrity of the nests, so it's probably "smarter" for a bird to build a new nest in the spring than risk having an old nest collapse or be moldy.  Some birds--especially larger ones, like eagles--will re-use their nests, but it's pretty rare among the smaller open-nesting passerines.

Great observation, though, MBAIWITWW(AMA,OC)!

[wegie]

Some birds--especially larger ones, like eagles--will re-use their nests, but it's pretty rare among the smaller open-nesting passerines.

Ah, does that mean that there's not really a North American analogue of the rook, that not only reuses nests, but passes them down the family?

In other news . . . OK, get the seeds out of this, you furry vermin rodent bastards!

[barred_owl]

Good question, wegie.  I'd have to look into the possibilities that crows or scrub jays might hand-down nests, but, off the top of my head, I can't think of any North American birds that do this. 

Those feeders look great--the little birds can get in and out, but the squirrels should be baffled (or at least frustrated) by them.  Good luck!

[malcha]

Nothing defeats the squirrels.  My mother eventually gave in and got them special squirrel feeding houses.  Now flocks of pigeons come and steal the squirrel food.  The cycle of natural justice is awe-inspiring but messy.