Today I saw: American Kestrel

For a while I've been kicking around in my mind the idea of doing some serial-style posts that detail bird sightings and observations that I think you, my dear readers, might find interesting. Think of it as a "birders notebook" type of entry. I have shied away from the idea partly because there will invariably be birds that I do not have photos of from my own personal collection, meaning I will have to rely on online sources where I can get free images that are allowed to be used for public/educational distribution. Why? Because no one wants to read a post where there are NO pictures, but I will not just "lift" photos willy-nilly from web pages just to get images for a blog post. So we'll see how this goes. This will be my first installment of "Today I saw..."

Kestrel image provided by Clipart ETC, originally published in 1869 in Louis Figuier's Reptiles and Birds.

Today I saw an American Kestrel. It was perched on a phone wire along a mildly traveled county road, looking out into a corn field, prime habitat for this falcon. At first glance I wasn't sure that it was a kestrel because it was not doing its characteristic tail bobbing, a behavior that is a "gimme" for quick field identification. Luckily, there was a spot just up the road where I could safely pull off, and I was able to hop out with my binoculars and work my way toward the bird. Not having had a ton of experience with kestrels, I wanted to get a better look at it, just to be sure about the ID. My curiosity was well-rewarded.

As I approached I noticed another bird on the wire, which was a Rock Pigeon, and the still-in-question kestrel was quite a bit smaller than the pigeon. American Kestrels (also known as "Sparrow Hawks") are the smallest falcon in North America, so it was good to see this size comparison in person. For reference, Rock Pigeons are about 12"-14" long, whereas American Kestrels are about 9"-12" long. As far as field marks go, the lighting was not great, so it was a bit difficult to see any field marks well, but I was able to pick up barring in the wings and some vertical striping on the head, so I was pretty confident by this time that I was looking at a kestrel, even though it never bobbed its tail once while I saw it on that wire.

A cold, biting breeze was blowing, so it was time to head back to the car. Just a few feet from my car I took another look out into the field, and saw a dove-like figure flying over the field, except it wasn't behaving in a dove-like fashion. This bird was obviously hunting, so I knew I was seeing the kestrel. I quickly forgot about the chilly breeze and enjoyed the show this small raptor was putting on. It was hovering with shallow but fluid wing beats, and at times it was able to catch the breeze just right and simply hang in the air for 5 seconds at a time. When not hovering, it would fly in a roughly circular pattern over the area it was hunting, and I was finally able to pick up the rusty coloring of its back and tail. Such a slim, graceful bird it was. It dove to the ground twice, but both times it come up empty-taloned. Here's an interesting factoid that I gleaned from the Cornell Lab of Ornithology's All About Birds site:

Unlike humans, birds can see ultraviolet light. This enables kestrels to make out the trails of urine that voles, a common prey mammal, leave as they run along the ground. Like neon diner signs, these bright paths may highlight the way to a meal—as has been observed in the Eurasian Kestrel, a close relative.

It then took off to another portion of the field, and maybe eventually made its way back to the perch on the phone wire where I had originally spotted it. I was glad I took the time to stop and watch this bird. The observations gave me a good field experience that adds to my growing mental library of bird behavior, and gave me a good opportunity to share this bird with you.

Putting birding skills to use

One of the most rewarding aspects of birding for me is being able to put something that I recently learned to use by making new discoveries of my own based on that learning.  I had one such experience today.

I was walking along our rural road, enjoying the sunshine and abnormally warm temperatures for January.  I stopped often to look and listen for birds.  One particular area caught my interest for some reason, maybe because I don't normally pay much attention to this particular spot, or maybe I caught some special birdie vibes.  I saw movement in the grass, heard some Song Sparrows and saw some other sparrows that I couldn't make out well enough to positively identify.  Then I heard a chip note that caught my ear.  At first I thought it was an Eastern Phoebe, which would have been a really cool find for this time of year.  Once I got my binoculars on the culprit, though, I realized it was a Swamp Sparrow.  I was especially excited about this because this was a new find for me along our road.

What was more intriguing to me, though, was the fact that I had been tricked by this Phoebe-sounding chip note just about a week ago while doing the Hocking Hills Christmas Bird Count (CBC).  My neighborhood habitat is very similar to that of our CBC Swamp Sparrow habitat: close to a creek, with lots of overgrown grasses in a low-lying area that's known to get wet (and stay wet) after too much rain, and with moderate but spotty tree density.  When we first heard the "chip!" during the count, our group leader, Jim McCormac, thought it was a Phoebe.  The closer we got to the source, though, the less convinced we were that it was actually a Phoebe.  It eventually dawned on Jim that it was more likely to be a Swamp Sparrow.  While we never actually saw the bird in question that day, after comparing recordings of a Phoebe "chip" to that of a Swamp Sparrow "chip," all 3 of us agreed that what we were hearing was a Swamp Sparrow.


Swamp Sparrow in winter plumage. Photo by Kevin Bearcaw, via Wikipedia
Sure enough, I was being confronted with the same situation on my home turf.  Only this time I got to see the bird.  I even went so far as to walk back home and get my spotting scope so that I could get a really good grasp of what this bird looked like.  To look at it, it seems like not a very exciting bird, unless you like trying to categorize different hues of brown, rust and grey.  I have to admit that I would be hard pressed to identify this bird by looks alone simply because I haven't seen very many of them.  (I can tell you a Song Sparrow from a White-throated from a White-crowned from a House, but that's about the extent of my ability to ID sparrows on sight.  They don't get the nickname "Little Brown Jobs" (or LBJs) for nothing!)

Swamp Sparrows winter in southern Ohio, but it seems few stick around these parts for breeding season.  Preliminary data from the recently completed 2nd Ohio Breeding Bird Atlas (2006-2011) show, however, a handful of confirmed breeding locations in the southern 3rd of the state.  This is in stark contrast to the last Ohio Breeding Bird Atlas (1982-1987), which shows possible and confirmed nesting only in the northern 2/3's of the state.  Having now seen (and heard) this bird in my own neighborhood during winter, I will now be keeping a watchful eye out for a possible breeding record this coming summer.  Now THAT would be exciting!