Dawn Chorus
I got up at 5:00am today to be out and
about listening to “The Dawn Chorus” by 6:00am with a small group of avid birders.
The moon was just descending behind some mountains by the time we got to the
location. I got to see an Osprey (Pandion
haliaetus) feeding its young in a nest on a utility pole and a
White-throated Sparrow (Zonotrichia
albicollis), two birds I had never seen before this trip.
Osprey
White-throated Sparrow
It was very cold
this morning, around 2 degrees, but it heated up significantly throughout the
day.
Ecological Restoration: Partnering for the Birds
At around 9:00 to 1:00pm my family and I did
a little bit of off-roading to attend the next workshop about a project being carried out by a few different organizations partnering to protect the area. Located between the Fairmont Hot springs
and the Canal Flats, this project works in rehabilitating and conserving prime
habitat for the Red-listed Lewis’s Woodpecker (Melanerpes lewis). About 10 to 15% of Canada’s Lewis’s Woodpeckers breed
in this small 30-hectare piece of land. Around 16-20 active nesting sites have
been found and monitored here.
Since this is a fire-base ecosystem, our guide talked
a lot about the effects of prescribed burning in the area and how that effects
populations of mammals and birds along with the composition of the plant
community. These are low-intensity burns that aren’t even hot enough to burn
off the cryptogamic layer of lichens and moss which inhibits the growth of
non-native plants.
They also inject Red Belted Polypore (Fomitopsis pinicola), a tree heart rot, into living trees – preferably
Douglas-fir (Pseudotsuga menziesii) or
Larch (Larix spp.) – to weaken one section
of the tree and leave the rest healthy and strong; this is called making a “window.” Windows
are made, as they would potentially be prime habitat, for a Lewis’s Woodpecker. The tree’s core weakens making it easier for Primary Cavity Excavators.
Windowed Ponderosa Pine
Although
we didn’t get to see a Lewis’s Woodpecker, there were multiple Mountain
Bluebirds, Northern Flickers, a Red-breasted Nuthatch and a sapsucker.
Red-breasted Nuthatch
Male and Female Mountain Bluebirds
Some plants of notice on this excursion were
the Hooker’s Townsendia (Townsendia
hookeri) and the prairie crocus (Anemone patens ssp. multifida).
Hooker's Townsendia
Prairie Crocus
The Hydrological Cycles in the Columbia Valley: The Role
of Weather
Once we finished off-roading, we had a
donut break and then went to the Hoodoos to talk about the Hydrological Cycles
in the Columbia Valley. By this time (2:00pm) the sun was
high in the sky and jackets and gloves from the morning adventures could be
left in the car! While hiking up the Hoodoos, we saw lots of prairie crucuses
along with tons of Rocky Mountain juniper (Juniperus
scopulorum).
Rocky Mountain Juniper
Sitting on the top of the Hoodoos looking down on the entire
valley and just listening to someone spout off tons of random facts was
amazing.
The Columbia Valley
Part of the Hoodoos Formation
There were some swallows and swifts that I could not identify to
specific species at the top as well. After we all got nice sunburns we headed
back down to our cars seeing a perfectly positioned hawk that I of course had
to be too slow to get my camera out for. There was also a Red Squirrel eating seeds in a Douglas-fir on the way down. We finished that workshop at around
4:30pm.
Life Among Birds
The main reason this talk was amazing is
because the speaker had done most of his early research on the life styles and
characteristics of crows. On the specific island he did his research, the crows
had different social platforms. The richest (smartest/highest in the social
order) crows got the “beach front property” or the rocks right next to the
water while the other crows had to find territory in the hills. Living in the
hills means you have to fly further to get food which results in an unprotected
territory and also unprotected young. Since crows are cannibals, this is a big
problem. One way female crows have tried to overcome this problem is by having
one egg, of usually four, a day later than the rest. The egg that is laid last
is not as pigmented as the rest making it lighter in colour. Since crows
intuitively pick shiny, light objects, crows looking for a meal will pick this
egg. If this egg is not taken, it is usually the runt of the family and will
probably not survive anyways. One other cool thing about crows is that it has
been confirmed that they can count to at least seven if not more.
Another topic that was addressed was the
“protection rings” of herons versus eagles. Groups of herons will purposely
nest below a eagle nest as a kind of intimidation factor. If the eagle has a
sufficient supply of food elsewhere, it will not go after the herons or their
eggs. There have even been instances where when the eagle decides to move its
nest, a whole colony of herons will move with it.
Our speaker has also done work with
sandpipers and their migration routes. He went around the world putting up mist
nets and marking these little birds with bands indicating where they were caught.
These little birds have a top speed of 40km/h but can fly from San Francisco to
Alaska at 80km/h by using the low altitude winds to double their speed! Their
main predator is the Peregrine Falcon which significantly affects their
distribution and their time of migration. Sometimes the little sandpipers will migrate early due to a wave of Peregrine Falcons coming.
We then learned about one of the rarest of
the rare birds in the world: the Chinese Crested Tern. There are probably only
about 50 left and they were just discovered by chance a few years ago
after thought to be extinct for decades. This subject brought up the topic to
birding in general. The speaker left us with the phrase “Know your limit and
bird within it.” Some people just like to see the bird, check it off on a list
and leave. We were persuaded to take time to learn about the bird, watch it’s
behaviours and actually watch it. Birding can be a very obsessive activity
which complete destroys the initial point of bird watching.
