What follows is a photo essay paying tribute to flowers photographed in the month of August. All hail late summer.
Tuesday, August 30, 2011
Late summer
Days are getting shorter. Nights are getting cooler. Fall, as they say, is in the air. It's the season of early-morning dew and fog, reminding us just how beautiful dawn really is. There's an aural shift from the dawn chorus of the birds to the evening chorus of singing insects. And there's a last hurrah of large, showy wildflowers, many exploding with huge pom-pom like heads to feed the butterflies and bees and myriad of other insects who are racing the clock to reproduce before the first frost hits.
What follows is a photo essay paying tribute to flowers photographed in the month of August. All hail late summer.
What follows is a photo essay paying tribute to flowers photographed in the month of August. All hail late summer.
Wednesday, August 24, 2011
Field marks of an MBS-er
Most days of the week find me outside with my binoculars at some point, even if it's just around our house and on our property. Ninety-nine percent of the time I'm checking out birds, but sometimes I also spy on butterflies, dragonflies, squirrels, and chipmunks.
This evening had me looking at some other things though. I had some strange sightings on the property that I had to check out.
For one thing, there were some odd markings on my car that were puzzling me.
Unfortunately, my field guides were of no help.
But then I remembered something. I had seen similar field marks on a publication I got in the mail earlier in the week. It was all becoming clear.
These were the field marks of a car that has been to the Midwest Birding Symposium before! How appropriate that my Ohio Ornithological Society sticker is right next to my MBS sticker, especially since the OOS is one of the hosts of this year's symposium, along with Bird Watcher's Digest and the Lakeside Association. If you're not already a member of the OOS, they can get you signed up right at the symposium. You ARE coming to the symposium, aren't you?
MBS-er field marks can also be found on people, like my husband. There's a great marketplace at the symposium, where you can get cool hats and t-shirts, ogle over optics, buy your next birdfeeder, plan your next birding vacation, or maybe even pick up a cool binocular harness, as modeled here by Dave along with his MBS hat (the harness helps reduce the strain caused by the weight of heavy bins around your neck).
But wait, Dave has his sights on something, too. When I asked him what he was looking for, he had to whisper his response, as he didn't want to spook his quarry. He was looking at the mysterious Blogger Bird.
Okay, maybe she's not SO mysterious, but she was hard at work. Oh wait - that's me! And I'm in the middle of crafting this very post.
Speaking of bloggers, there will be ten Official Bloggers at the symposium. They are as follows:
Other cool things going on at the symposium include a Lake Erie Island sunset boat cruise, multiple screenings of the documentary film "Ghost Bird" about the search for the Ivory-billed Woodpecker, songbird banding demonstrations, an exhibit of birds of prey by Back to the Wild, and so much more! Not to mention that there will be over 20 amazing speakers addressing all kinds of birding topics.
Oh, and let's not forget the birds themselves. This area of Ohio is a magnet for birds in both spring and fall migration. Great birding can be had right from the lovely town of Lakeside, but there are also other wonderful designated birding areas within driving distance of Lakeside, including the Ottawa National Wildlife Refuge, Magee Marsh, Black Swamp Observatory, Marblehead Lighthouse State Park, and Meadowbrook Marsh (a new birding sight for the area). When I attended the symposium in '09, I had to learn the hard way that there's just not enough time to see all these places during the course of the symposium itself, so this year we're gonna get there a little early to leave time for exploring on our own!
If you can swing it, bring someone you love, be it spouse, family, or friend. Birding is best when it's shared with someone special.
I really hope to see you there!
This evening had me looking at some other things though. I had some strange sightings on the property that I had to check out.
For one thing, there were some odd markings on my car that were puzzling me.
Unfortunately, my field guides were of no help.
But then I remembered something. I had seen similar field marks on a publication I got in the mail earlier in the week. It was all becoming clear.
These were the field marks of a car that has been to the Midwest Birding Symposium before! How appropriate that my Ohio Ornithological Society sticker is right next to my MBS sticker, especially since the OOS is one of the hosts of this year's symposium, along with Bird Watcher's Digest and the Lakeside Association. If you're not already a member of the OOS, they can get you signed up right at the symposium. You ARE coming to the symposium, aren't you?
MBS-er field marks can also be found on people, like my husband. There's a great marketplace at the symposium, where you can get cool hats and t-shirts, ogle over optics, buy your next birdfeeder, plan your next birding vacation, or maybe even pick up a cool binocular harness, as modeled here by Dave along with his MBS hat (the harness helps reduce the strain caused by the weight of heavy bins around your neck).
But wait, Dave has his sights on something, too. When I asked him what he was looking for, he had to whisper his response, as he didn't want to spook his quarry. He was looking at the mysterious Blogger Bird.
Okay, maybe she's not SO mysterious, but she was hard at work. Oh wait - that's me! And I'm in the middle of crafting this very post.
Speaking of bloggers, there will be ten Official Bloggers at the symposium. They are as follows:
- Yours truly, Heather of the Hills
- Wren of Wrenaissance Reflections
- Nancy Castillo of The Zen Birdfeeder
- Corey Finger of 10000 Birds
- Nina Harfmann of Nature Remains
- Ruthie Johnson of Nature Knitter Blog
- Robert Mortensen of Birding is Fun
- Greg Neise of NA Birding
- John Riutta of The Well-read Naturalist
- Lynne Schoenborn of Hasty Brook
- Julie Zickefoose of Julie Zickefoose on Blogspot
Other cool things going on at the symposium include a Lake Erie Island sunset boat cruise, multiple screenings of the documentary film "Ghost Bird" about the search for the Ivory-billed Woodpecker, songbird banding demonstrations, an exhibit of birds of prey by Back to the Wild, and so much more! Not to mention that there will be over 20 amazing speakers addressing all kinds of birding topics.
Oh, and let's not forget the birds themselves. This area of Ohio is a magnet for birds in both spring and fall migration. Great birding can be had right from the lovely town of Lakeside, but there are also other wonderful designated birding areas within driving distance of Lakeside, including the Ottawa National Wildlife Refuge, Magee Marsh, Black Swamp Observatory, Marblehead Lighthouse State Park, and Meadowbrook Marsh (a new birding sight for the area). When I attended the symposium in '09, I had to learn the hard way that there's just not enough time to see all these places during the course of the symposium itself, so this year we're gonna get there a little early to leave time for exploring on our own!
If you can swing it, bring someone you love, be it spouse, family, or friend. Birding is best when it's shared with someone special.
I really hope to see you there!
Awww, nuts!
Walnuts, hickory nuts and beech nuts are all in relative abundance on our property this year. Trees that are not producing much mast this year are buckeyes and oak trees. Regardless, the squirrels are working hard, especially on the hickory nuts. It is not uncommon to wake up in the morning to hear little drops among the leaves, only to realize it isn't raining. Well, not from the sky, anyway. It is raining nuts, though! The metal roof on our house amplifies the sound when nuts and nut bits rain down from the trees. I have an image in my mind of the squirrels maniacally hurling husks and shell down at our house, laughing merrily in the early dawn light as they wake us from sound sleep.
Bits and pieces of nut shell fragments litter the property during late summer and early autumn. Can you pick them out among the gravel?
In addition to all the tiny shell remains, there are also a good number of nuts still in their husks. I can't tell if this one's been chewed, or if it's just rotten (or maybe both).
So what happened here? What caused a squirrel to gnaw and gnaw and gnaw on this hickory nut and then toss it away? Did it decide it wasn't yet ripe enough? Did it get disturbed by a hawk or another squirrel and decided it was better to abandon its post and its meal rather than stay where it was? Whatever the cause for abandonment, it gives us a good chance to see the kind of damage a squirrel's teeth can do. I sure don't ever want to be bitten by a squirrel!
This nut turned out to be a waste of time. It was more intact when I found it, but upon breaking it open, I found that the nut meat was not ripe. If you look closely, you can see some shininess to the meat right in the center of the photo. That is one raw nut. Yuck!
Just to give you an idea of size, here's a husked nut in the hand. I think this is a Shellbark Hickory nut. We definitely have Shagbark Hickories on our property, and this nut, along with some others I found, are much larger than the Shagbark nuts. I'll try to find some nuts from each species of tree to make some comparisons at a later date.
Much daintier is the nut of the Beech tree. I usually only find the husk after it has come open and dispersed the seed pods, but this year I have found quite a few where the seeds are still in the husk.
Without much effort, the 2 seed pods slip right out of the spiny husk. The seed pods kind of remind me of Hershey's kisses, but without the flat bottom.
What nuts are you seeing around these days?
Bits and pieces of nut shell fragments litter the property during late summer and early autumn. Can you pick them out among the gravel?
In addition to all the tiny shell remains, there are also a good number of nuts still in their husks. I can't tell if this one's been chewed, or if it's just rotten (or maybe both).
So what happened here? What caused a squirrel to gnaw and gnaw and gnaw on this hickory nut and then toss it away? Did it decide it wasn't yet ripe enough? Did it get disturbed by a hawk or another squirrel and decided it was better to abandon its post and its meal rather than stay where it was? Whatever the cause for abandonment, it gives us a good chance to see the kind of damage a squirrel's teeth can do. I sure don't ever want to be bitten by a squirrel!
This nut turned out to be a waste of time. It was more intact when I found it, but upon breaking it open, I found that the nut meat was not ripe. If you look closely, you can see some shininess to the meat right in the center of the photo. That is one raw nut. Yuck!
Just to give you an idea of size, here's a husked nut in the hand. I think this is a Shellbark Hickory nut. We definitely have Shagbark Hickories on our property, and this nut, along with some others I found, are much larger than the Shagbark nuts. I'll try to find some nuts from each species of tree to make some comparisons at a later date.
Much daintier is the nut of the Beech tree. I usually only find the husk after it has come open and dispersed the seed pods, but this year I have found quite a few where the seeds are still in the husk.
Without much effort, the 2 seed pods slip right out of the spiny husk. The seed pods kind of remind me of Hershey's kisses, but without the flat bottom.
What nuts are you seeing around these days?
Tuesday, August 23, 2011
Figuring it out
I love field guides. I started off by borrowing my husband's Peterson's Guide that was given to him by his dad. Then a friend bought me my first flower field guide. I was off to the races after that. I have lots of field guides, and yet I don't have nearly enough. I have at least one field guide for each of the following subjects: butterflies, trees, mammals, wildflowers, birds, owls, reptiles and amphibians, insects, singing insects, tracks and scat, spiders, frogs and toads. I'm sure there's a few I forgot.In instances where I have multiple field guides on one topic (birds, or wildflowers, for instance), each one serves its own purpose. Some of them are laid out so differently from each other, or contain such different information, that they complement each other nicely.
As much as I love my field guides, I will admit that they can be intimidating, especially when they cover a subject matter with which I am relatively unfamiliar (like anything that's outside of the realm of birds and wildflowers). This has been the case for me this year when trying to identify various spiders and insects. It reminds me of how I was when I first started birding: I would flip through virtually every page to find a bland brown bird that I had gotten a glimpse of for 2.5 seconds, only to find that every brown bird in the field guide looked virtually the same to my "new" birding eyes.
I figure it's frustrating for everyone at some time or another to use field guides, so I thought I would give you a quick run-through of how I narrowed the beetles in my previous post down to blister beetles (and more specifically, oil beetles).
First, I started off with a top-notch field guide to insects. If you spend any amount of time trying to figure out the identity of any kind of insect, BUY THIS BOOK:
My trusty Kaufman guide also lead me to ID this fantastic metallic-looking beetle as a Dogbane beetle, which was found on - you guessed it - a dogbane plant.
So folks, I'd like your feedback. Was this post helpful and/or informative? Would you like to see more posts like this? I do write this blog for me, but I also like to know if what I'm putting out there is striking a chord with anyone else. Please let me know in the comments! Thanks.
Monday, August 22, 2011
One thing leads to another
The other evening as I was putting the dog to bed, I came across a cicada laying belly up on the ground. It's white abdomen was easy to see, otherwise I never would have known it was there. It was obviously injured, as it made no attempt to flutter or put up a fight when I poked at it lightly with a stick to see if it was even alive. I picked it up and laid it on the deck railing, thinking I would take pictures of it the next morning if it had not managed to fly away by that time.
As luck would have it, the cicada was still there the next morning, where it had somehow managed to hang on through a mild rain storm. Unfortunately, it was not in good shape, and only it's front two legs seemed to show much movement.
I believe this to be a Swamp Cicada, Tibicen tibicen. This is an example of a perfect treat for the young Mississippi Kite I saw last weekend. (Did you miss that post? If so, click HERE to get more info about Ohio's only current breeding family of Mississippi Kites!)
The Swamp Cicada, along with a myriad of other cicadas, gets lumped into the category of annual cicada, which is a bit of a misnomer. The "annual" designation refers to the fact that there are adults out and about each year; their entire life cycle, however, lasts several years, most of which is spent underground. Alternately, there are the periodical cicadas, such as the 13-year or 17-year cicadas. These cicadas spend MANY years underground to emerge as adults synchronously (i.e. all in the same year) on a 13- or 17-year cycle. (The 17-year cycles are mostly in midwest and northern states, whereas the 13-year cycles are mostly in the southern states). For more information and brood maps showing when the next hatching of periodical cicadas is scheduled to hit your area, click HERE.
When I was a kid, I remember coming across the exoskeleton of a recently emerged adult of some cicada species, attached to a tree, and I was quite terrified. Who knew that so many years later I would nonchalantly hold one in my hand? I can attest to the grabbing power of the "feet" of this cicada. Here you can see how it was latched onto my finger by just these two little feet. While this poor swampie was in no condition to be "singing," I remember the song of the Swamp Cicada as THE cicada song of the hot summer days of my childhood. You can listen to it HERE.
After the photo shoot was over I was looking for someplace to put the cicada other than our deck railing when my attention was shifted to another odd-looking insect altogether. Actually, a LOT of odd-looking insects. There was quite a swarm of these blue-black beetles in my flower bed, and they were making short work of the leaves of my hellebore!
After determining that these are a type of blister beetle, I read that most of them feed on flower nectar or flowers themselves, but some species, like this one, feed on foliage. Hopefully the plant will recover, but honestly, it doesn't look good for the hellebore.
Okay, they might look odd, but they are also kind of handsome. I believe this is Meloe impressus. This turns out to be one insect species that is sexually dimorphic, meaning that there is a visible way for my human eyes to discern male from female. (di- meaning "two" and morph meaning "form" or "shape") Those funny looking "c"-shaped kinks in the middle of the antennae indicate that this is a male.
Here's where things get weird (at least to my non-beetle brain!), and fascinating. The males use that kink in their antennae as part of the courtship process. From what I was able to personally observe over a limited amount of time with these beetles, the male would mount the female from behind and use that portion of his antennae to stroke the antennae of the female. To make matters more interesting, I observed several mated pairs where male and female are going about their conjoined business, but then I also observed just as many TRIOS where a male and female were already joined, but a second male was on the female's back, doing the antennae-to-antennae tango! What on earth is THAT all about?! In the photo just above, the male on her back is the extraneous male (you can barely make out her actual mate, who's out of focus directly beyond her in this shot). Bet you never guessed you were going to get a discourse on beetle sex when you started reading this post, did you?!
In addition to the antennae giving away gender, the relative size is also an indication of sex. In general, the females are larger than the males, both in length and girth. In these side-by-side photos, the male (at left) and female (at right) are roughly the same length, but you will notice the much more swollen abdomen of the female, who is very likely gravid (carrying eggs).
In my next post, I'll talk briefly about how I came to identify this as a blister beetle in the first place. Stay tuned!
As luck would have it, the cicada was still there the next morning, where it had somehow managed to hang on through a mild rain storm. Unfortunately, it was not in good shape, and only it's front two legs seemed to show much movement.
I believe this to be a Swamp Cicada, Tibicen tibicen. This is an example of a perfect treat for the young Mississippi Kite I saw last weekend. (Did you miss that post? If so, click HERE to get more info about Ohio's only current breeding family of Mississippi Kites!)
The Swamp Cicada, along with a myriad of other cicadas, gets lumped into the category of annual cicada, which is a bit of a misnomer. The "annual" designation refers to the fact that there are adults out and about each year; their entire life cycle, however, lasts several years, most of which is spent underground. Alternately, there are the periodical cicadas, such as the 13-year or 17-year cicadas. These cicadas spend MANY years underground to emerge as adults synchronously (i.e. all in the same year) on a 13- or 17-year cycle. (The 17-year cycles are mostly in midwest and northern states, whereas the 13-year cycles are mostly in the southern states). For more information and brood maps showing when the next hatching of periodical cicadas is scheduled to hit your area, click HERE.
When I was a kid, I remember coming across the exoskeleton of a recently emerged adult of some cicada species, attached to a tree, and I was quite terrified. Who knew that so many years later I would nonchalantly hold one in my hand? I can attest to the grabbing power of the "feet" of this cicada. Here you can see how it was latched onto my finger by just these two little feet. While this poor swampie was in no condition to be "singing," I remember the song of the Swamp Cicada as THE cicada song of the hot summer days of my childhood. You can listen to it HERE.
After the photo shoot was over I was looking for someplace to put the cicada other than our deck railing when my attention was shifted to another odd-looking insect altogether. Actually, a LOT of odd-looking insects. There was quite a swarm of these blue-black beetles in my flower bed, and they were making short work of the leaves of my hellebore!
After determining that these are a type of blister beetle, I read that most of them feed on flower nectar or flowers themselves, but some species, like this one, feed on foliage. Hopefully the plant will recover, but honestly, it doesn't look good for the hellebore.
Okay, they might look odd, but they are also kind of handsome. I believe this is Meloe impressus. This turns out to be one insect species that is sexually dimorphic, meaning that there is a visible way for my human eyes to discern male from female. (di- meaning "two" and morph meaning "form" or "shape") Those funny looking "c"-shaped kinks in the middle of the antennae indicate that this is a male.
Here's where things get weird (at least to my non-beetle brain!), and fascinating. The males use that kink in their antennae as part of the courtship process. From what I was able to personally observe over a limited amount of time with these beetles, the male would mount the female from behind and use that portion of his antennae to stroke the antennae of the female. To make matters more interesting, I observed several mated pairs where male and female are going about their conjoined business, but then I also observed just as many TRIOS where a male and female were already joined, but a second male was on the female's back, doing the antennae-to-antennae tango! What on earth is THAT all about?! In the photo just above, the male on her back is the extraneous male (you can barely make out her actual mate, who's out of focus directly beyond her in this shot). Bet you never guessed you were going to get a discourse on beetle sex when you started reading this post, did you?!
In addition to the antennae giving away gender, the relative size is also an indication of sex. In general, the females are larger than the males, both in length and girth. In these side-by-side photos, the male (at left) and female (at right) are roughly the same length, but you will notice the much more swollen abdomen of the female, who is very likely gravid (carrying eggs).
In my next post, I'll talk briefly about how I came to identify this as a blister beetle in the first place. Stay tuned!
Monday, August 15, 2011
The kindness of birders
Thanks to the kindness of birders, I was lucky enough to be able to see a family of nesting Mississippi Kites within easy driving distance of my home in southeast Ohio this weekend. Birders, in case you haven't already heard, tend to have a reputation for being extremely nice, and helpful, and will do just about anything to help you see a bird. There is a very gracious couple of birders who lives in a small gated community nestled near the Hocking Hills area, and their graciousness was extended out through this community when they opened their gates to approximately 100 outsiders this past Sunday. They opened their arms and welcomed us to see this fantastic spectacle of nature.
Juvenile Mississippi Kite from behind. You'll get a better view in a minute.
The thing that makes this bird species special is that this is currently the only known breeding location in the state of Ohio. Luckily, the birders in this community had a hunch at what they were looking at when a pair of Mississippi Kites raised a family there last year, and word got around in the Ohio birding community. Some other kind birders handled the logistics and arranged a special day to view the kite family last year, and then again this year. I am so grateful for this kindness.
From this angle it may look like jr. kite is eating something, but it's actually just preening.
To give you an idea of how spectacular it is to see this bird breeding in Ohio, I checked the first Breeding Bird Atlas done in the state back in 1982-1987, and it was not even on our radar at that time. Now, that's not definitive proof that it wasn't breeding in Ohio at that time, but in blocks where birders were surveying, they were not even observed. What has changed and brought them to Ohio since then? I don't know. Is it by luck that for two years now these kites have decided to nest in a woody area populated by people who would notice it? Maybe.
This is a reminder that conservation starts right in your own yard. These kites took up residence in a community that, from what I observed, seems to believe in disturbing the land as little as possible, so there is a lot of wonderful, suitable habitat for them to use. Great habitat = great biodiversity. And great biodiversity means you never know what might show up! (And with that in mind, it means you've got to keep your eyes open all the time, just in case something unexpected drops in to stay for a while. Well, I feel that's MY duty, anyway...)
Parental unit coming in with a juicy morsel for the youngster. Look how poised and ready that juvenile is to receive its meal!
The Mississippi Kite's diet is mainly comprised of insects like cicadas and dragonflies. They leave the exoskeleton (or outer shell) behind, only picking out the meat from within. I was amazed to watch bits of cicada wing flutter to the ground as the young one picked its way to the meat of its meal.
Getting ready for the hand-off. As soon as the juvenile kite demonstrates that it's able to feed itself, the family will begin their migration south toward their wintering grounds in central South America.
Birding and blogging friends Susan Gets Native (sitting) and KatDoc (with camera snapping) enjoying the view. This was a life bird for all 3 of us!
The adult takes off after dropping off a bite to eat. It's hard to get an idea of size in these photos, but the average wing span of this raptor is 3 feet (smaller than a Red-tailed Hawk, but larger than a Kestrel, for those keeping track). Notice the rufous, or rust-colored, primary feathers (the "finger tips") that are so nicely back lit by the sun here.
Here the juvenile is begging for food, calling to an adult in the vicinity. One theory being tossed around was that the youngster didn't actually start vocalizing until it had one of the parents within visual range. Speaking of begging behavior, when I was there watching the bird, I noticed it wasn't exhibiting the type of begging behavior I'm used to seeing in songbirds. Songbird youngsters, once out of the nest, will sit on a branch or a wire and peep almost continuously, with their wings puffed out and rapidly fluttering. This is an obvious visual cue to the parents, most likely to gain an upper hand over a nearby sibling who is also exhibiting similar behavior.
"I hear ya, kid. Just hold your horses, dinner's comin'!
Once I started looking at my pictures, though, I realized that while the begging is not as prolonged as a juvenile songbird's, the concept is still the same, as seen here: "I must make myself as large as possible so you know that you are supposed to feed ME!!" There was only one mouth to feed this year (last year's brood consisted of two young), but the instinct remains despite that fact.
This was one of the longer feeding sessions that we got to observe, and it made for great photo opportunities, thus giving me a chance to study field marks in-depth after I got home. Here you can really see the differences in appearance between the adult on the left and immature on the right. Notice the clean white breast and underside of the wings on the adult. Compare this to a chest and underwing area that is very dappled on the juvenile. Also, notice that the tail of the adult is completely dark with no banding (again, we've got a little but of rufous coloring peeking through at the tail tip). By contrast, the immature's tail has very distinct banding.
Once again, my sincere thanks goes out to the kind folks who brought this kite family to the attention of the Ohio birding community, and to those who arranged this get-together for us. It was a very special treat that made my day.
Juvenile Mississippi Kite from behind. You'll get a better view in a minute.
The thing that makes this bird species special is that this is currently the only known breeding location in the state of Ohio. Luckily, the birders in this community had a hunch at what they were looking at when a pair of Mississippi Kites raised a family there last year, and word got around in the Ohio birding community. Some other kind birders handled the logistics and arranged a special day to view the kite family last year, and then again this year. I am so grateful for this kindness.
From this angle it may look like jr. kite is eating something, but it's actually just preening.
To give you an idea of how spectacular it is to see this bird breeding in Ohio, I checked the first Breeding Bird Atlas done in the state back in 1982-1987, and it was not even on our radar at that time. Now, that's not definitive proof that it wasn't breeding in Ohio at that time, but in blocks where birders were surveying, they were not even observed. What has changed and brought them to Ohio since then? I don't know. Is it by luck that for two years now these kites have decided to nest in a woody area populated by people who would notice it? Maybe.
This is a reminder that conservation starts right in your own yard. These kites took up residence in a community that, from what I observed, seems to believe in disturbing the land as little as possible, so there is a lot of wonderful, suitable habitat for them to use. Great habitat = great biodiversity. And great biodiversity means you never know what might show up! (And with that in mind, it means you've got to keep your eyes open all the time, just in case something unexpected drops in to stay for a while. Well, I feel that's MY duty, anyway...)
Parental unit coming in with a juicy morsel for the youngster. Look how poised and ready that juvenile is to receive its meal!
The Mississippi Kite's diet is mainly comprised of insects like cicadas and dragonflies. They leave the exoskeleton (or outer shell) behind, only picking out the meat from within. I was amazed to watch bits of cicada wing flutter to the ground as the young one picked its way to the meat of its meal.
Getting ready for the hand-off. As soon as the juvenile kite demonstrates that it's able to feed itself, the family will begin their migration south toward their wintering grounds in central South America.
Birding and blogging friends Susan Gets Native (sitting) and KatDoc (with camera snapping) enjoying the view. This was a life bird for all 3 of us!
The adult takes off after dropping off a bite to eat. It's hard to get an idea of size in these photos, but the average wing span of this raptor is 3 feet (smaller than a Red-tailed Hawk, but larger than a Kestrel, for those keeping track). Notice the rufous, or rust-colored, primary feathers (the "finger tips") that are so nicely back lit by the sun here.
Here the juvenile is begging for food, calling to an adult in the vicinity. One theory being tossed around was that the youngster didn't actually start vocalizing until it had one of the parents within visual range. Speaking of begging behavior, when I was there watching the bird, I noticed it wasn't exhibiting the type of begging behavior I'm used to seeing in songbirds. Songbird youngsters, once out of the nest, will sit on a branch or a wire and peep almost continuously, with their wings puffed out and rapidly fluttering. This is an obvious visual cue to the parents, most likely to gain an upper hand over a nearby sibling who is also exhibiting similar behavior.
"I hear ya, kid. Just hold your horses, dinner's comin'!
Once I started looking at my pictures, though, I realized that while the begging is not as prolonged as a juvenile songbird's, the concept is still the same, as seen here: "I must make myself as large as possible so you know that you are supposed to feed ME!!" There was only one mouth to feed this year (last year's brood consisted of two young), but the instinct remains despite that fact.
This was one of the longer feeding sessions that we got to observe, and it made for great photo opportunities, thus giving me a chance to study field marks in-depth after I got home. Here you can really see the differences in appearance between the adult on the left and immature on the right. Notice the clean white breast and underside of the wings on the adult. Compare this to a chest and underwing area that is very dappled on the juvenile. Also, notice that the tail of the adult is completely dark with no banding (again, we've got a little but of rufous coloring peeking through at the tail tip). By contrast, the immature's tail has very distinct banding.
Once again, my sincere thanks goes out to the kind folks who brought this kite family to the attention of the Ohio birding community, and to those who arranged this get-together for us. It was a very special treat that made my day.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)