Photo credit: Ciar

Alas, my hummingbird feeder project has been delayed.

Right after I wrote about scoring a hummingbird feeder during a white elephant gift exchange, painters showed up to “touch up” the apartment building and fix the roof. Both of these activities involve a lot of loud talking, ladder dragging, and stomping around on the roof. Basically, there’s a lot of noise everywhere around the building.

Hanging a hummingbird feeder during a ruckus doesn’t seem like the best strategy. Based on my observations, hummingbirds are skittish and it doesn’t take much to sending them flying off so quickly that sometimes I wonder if I really saw a hummingbird because it was such as brief encounter.

I asked our landlord how long this painting / roof project might take and he said he didn’t know. So there you have it…the hummingbirds will have to wait for an undetermined amount of time before enjoying sugar water off my balcony. A real bummer because I was looking forward to having them as guests.

Photo credit: Anonymous

One of the surprise treats I received during Christmas was a hummingbird feeder!

Technically, I didn’t receive the hummingbird feeder as a gift, I stole it from another person who opened it during a white elephant gift exchange. Thankfully, the person who opened the hummingbird feeder didn’t really want it anyway. (White elephant gift exchanges are a strange thing…stealing gifts just seems wrong, but it’s all part of the game everyone says, and in this case I ended up with a hummingbird feeder.)

Now that I have a hummingbird feeder, I keep wondering why didn’t I get one before? They’re obviously not that much money since the gift exchange had a 10 dollar limit, which was confirmed by a quick search for hummingbird feeders on the internet.

Plus, I’ve seen hummingbirds in my neighborhood and one time a hummingbird flew right through the tree in front of our window. Only once that I saw anyway, maybe they are constantly flying through and I just don’t notice.

After I scored the hummingbird feeder, someone gave me a box of hummingbird greeting cards as a true gift, meaning I didn’t have to steal them. It’s a sign! 2012 is the year of the hummingbird. The hummingbird feeder experiment will begin soon in a very urban area of Los Angeles…

Ocean aisle at Powell's City of Books

I spent the last week of 2011 in book heaven! It was a wonderful way to wrap up the year and start the New Year with new wildlife books to read and more fascinating information to absorb.

Book heaven happens to be Powell’s City of Books in Portland, Oregon. If you love books, you have to go there! There are several Powell’s locations in Portland, but the biggest and most impressive of all the stores is the Burnside location in the Pearl District. It takes up a full city block, is three stories tall and is literally, a city of books.

The store has split levels that lead into different color-coded sections containing numbered aisles dedicated to subjects with labels categorizing books by specific topics. One of my favorite aisles was 663 in the rose section, where I perused books on oceanography, aquatic life, exploration and shells.

One of the best things about Powell’s is their massive collection of used and out of print books. Even better, they also carry new books, so many times you can inspect all the used copies and find a good deal or if the used copies are really beat up, then you can buy a new copy.

Also, there’s little signs all over the place with staff recommendations, which is how I discovered Amazing Jellies: Jewels of the Sea by Elizabeth Gowell. This is a tiny book packed with information on sea jellies (jellyfish) and for only $9.95 it is now part of my reference collection.

In the bird aisle, I discovered tons of bird books, entire books dedicated to owls, crows, ravens, herons, geese, ducks and on and on. There are also shelves dedicated to birding, bird photography, bird feeders, birds of North America, birds of South America, birds of Europe…well you get the idea. Among the bird books I found a great used copy of Wesley the Owl by Stacey O’Brien, a memoir about raising an injured barn owl, with great information on owls since Stacey also happens to be a biologist. And I picked up a book on hummingbirds called World of Hummingbirds by Erik Hanson.

With some great books waiting to be read, I can tell 2012 is going to be a great year! Happy New Year everyone!

Photo credit: Lupin

Tomorrow is turkey day, but what if everyday was turkey day in the USA?

This almost became reality years ago when Congress was in the process of designing a national seal. Benjamin Franklin happened to be a strong proponent for the wild turkey to serve as the national emblem.

I first came across this bit of trivia while researching the bald eagle. It’s the first fact mentioned in the introduction to bald eagles on the Birds of North America database website: “Selected as the national emblem of the United States in 1782 by Congress, in spite of Benjamin Franklin’s arguments that the Wild Turkey (Meleagris gallopavo) would serve better in that capacity.”

Very interesting I thought…and then forgot about it, but then I was reminded of this fun fact yesterday when a co-worker showed me this cool Thanksgiving quiz. Question #5 is, “What great American statesman lobbied to make the turkey the national symbol?” Answer is: Benjamin Franklin.

Congress doesn’t agree on anything these days and it turns out that members of Congress in 1782 didn’t agree on much either, not even what bird should be the national symbol. But at least their disagreement didn’t prevent them making a decision. (For more detailed information on how the bald eagle became the national symbol and other fascinating historical facts, check out this cool website baldeagleinfo.com. You’ll have the chance to read a pretty funny quote attributed to Benjamin Franklin explaining why he thought the bald eagle was a terrible choice.)

At first I was puzzled by Benjamin Franklin’s choice…I mean the turkey is a cool bird, but a national emblem? I just don’t see it. Then suddenly it made perfect sense! Benjamin Franklin and the turkey look alike, they’re both stout and portly.

Photo credit: Lupin

Benjamin Franklin

Based on a brief review of information on the internet, it’s not clear if Thomas Jefferson was a proponent of the bald eagle. He did serve on the first committee tasked with designing a national seal, but very little from that committee actually went on to become a part of the seal approved three committees later. But guess who else was on that first committee? John Adams and…Benjamin Franklin.

Photo credit: Paul Friel

Thomas Jefferson

Need I say more?

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

The way a tree was meant to be

One of my biggest pet peeves in Los Angeles is the way trees are trimmed.

I always think of a trim as a clip, clip here and clip, clip there, not a chop, chop here and a chop, chop there. But unfortunately for trees all over the Los Angeles area, the chop, chop is how it’s done, which is really a tree cut, not a tree trim.

Tree trimming first came to my attention about four years ago when my landlord had his gardeners trim the two trees next to our apartment building.

When I left for work there were nice leafy green trees and when I returned the magnolia tree had only a few leaves left and no flowers. On the second tree (which I still haven’t identified because I’m not a tree expert) all the branches were cut at the ends, but at least the leaves hadn’t been pulled off.

Even worse, we lost all our shade during one of the hottest months of the year…August. I called my landlord and asked him, “What happened?!” He explained that the trees had to be trimmed to prevent them from damaging the roof where the leaves fall and clog up the drainage pipes. I explained that instead of just trimming the trees near the roof, the gardeners had ripped off most of the leaves on the magnolia tree and now we didn’t have any shade. He said he would talk to the gardeners next time and ask them to trim the trees just near the roof.

We have been having this conversation once a year for the last four years. One time, I heard the gardeners outside and called my landlord in a panic, can you please tell them to just trim the trees near the roof? He said, since you’re there why don’t you just tell them. So I talked to them and it didn’t do a darn thing. Finally this year, I remembered two months in advance and I emailed our landlord asking him if he could talk to the gardeners about just trimming the trees near the roof and he did. They still ripped a lot of leaves off the magnolia tree, but not nearly as bad. (My landlord is the nicest guy ever by the way, and he actually invests money in the building and takes care of it, which is probably the reason I never noticed tree trimming issues at our old building because the manager was too cheap to bother.)

Not long after the first tree trimming incident, I was driving on a road in Venice, one block north of Venice Blvd., and I noticed that a whole row of trees had been trimmed so severely that there weren’t any leaves left, just a sad row of tree trunks with stumpy branches sticking out. What the…I thought as I drove by.

Since then I’ve seen tons of examples of “tree slaughter,” my nickname for this completely unnecessary and annoying phenomenon. The sun shines a lot in Los Angeles, so why on earth would you want to remove natural shade? And what about the birds? They live in the trees, trimming trees so severely could disrupt nesting and take away important habitat. But what’s a person to do? I really only have influence on the trees outside my window.

At least that’s what I thought until I found a booklet of Tree Trimming Guidelines in English or Spanish on the Los Angeles Audubon Chapter website! I was so excited to see this, it’s the first indication I’ve had that I’m not crazy and there really is a tree trimming problem in Los Angeles.

The 12-page booklet is excellent. It’s officially called “Bird-Friendly Tree and Shrub Trimming and Removal,” it discusses why trees are important, why birds need trees, what types of birds live in the Los Angeles area and also fly through, laws protecting birds, what phone numbers to call to report nest harassment or inappropriate tree trimming, and most importantly, how and when to trim trees. Please pay close attention to page five, which provides a detailed account of nesting time frames.

Thanks for reading my tree trimming rant! And please pass along the Tree Trimming Guidelines to every homeowner, building owner and gardener you know in Los Angeles to help turn more chops into clips.

Sequoia the bald eagle

During Cabrillo Marine Aquarium‘s Autumn Sea Fair, I had the chance to meet Sequoia the bald eagle.

Sequoia is an “animal ambassador” for the San Francisco Zoo, a job she is perfect for since she is already dressed to impress in the power suit of the bird kingdom. Her demeanor in the presence of many human gawkers was always calm and professional; this bird was not easily ruffled.

Of course, Sequoia didn’t necessarily plan on becoming an eagle ambassador to humankind, her story is actually much more interesting. Orphaned when she was a very young eaglet in 1988, she was rescued by humans and raised until she was old enough to care for herself in the wild. When she was released, she had all sorts of devices attached to her so researchers could track her whereabouts.

About four months after her release, the tracking devices showed no movement. Researchers headed out and discovered Sequoia had been shot! She was rescued a second time, but the bullet partially paralyzed her tail and damaged one of her toes. Thanks to these injuries, she can’t survive in the wild and is stuck with humans for the rest of her life.

Sequoia facing the wall

Does being rescued twice make up for being shot once? Doubtful. Especially if you happen to be a bald eagle built for soaring with a wingspan of 6 to 7.5 feet. But she seems to graciously accept her lot in life. Although, she did keep her back turned to everyone most of the time, which I thought was pretty funny. When the volunteers turned her around so people could take photos, Sequoia would immediately turn around and face the wall again.

It seemed to me she was saying, “Honestly, you think you can shoot me and then I’m going to pose for your pictures, get real!” I would have to agree with her on that, but I was very appreciative to have the chance to see a bald eagle up close and get a better sense of how powerful and magnificent they truly are. A huge thanks to Kathy Hobson and John Flynn, who drove down to San Pedro with Sequoia all the way from San Francisco and took the time to talk to me about her.

(For more on detailed information on bald eagles check out the column I wrote in honor of the 4th of July.)

Photo credit: Henry Jurgens

I finally have a great reason to write about owls!

Yesterday, two barn owls were released into the wild after being raised in captivity for nine months. The owls were orphaned when they were three months old and rescued by South Bay Wildlife Rehab.

Barn owls are also referred to as common barn owls or their scientific name: Tyto alba. I don’t usually think of Southern California as owl country, but the barn owl is the most widely-distributed owl in the world and Southern California is no exception. In fact, zoologist Pete Bloom is sited in an article on The Owl Pages website for helping tag 10,000 barn owls throughout Southern California in the last 40 years! (This article is also an excellent resource on the benefits of having barn owls around for pest control and how to entice them into your yard with a nest box.)

According to the Birds of North America database, there are 28 subspecies of barn owl and the subspecies found in North America happens to be the largest at around 14 inches long and is officially called Tyto alba pratincola. Barn owls don’t bother building their own nests, which is how they got their common name after frequently taking up residence in barn lofts. But they also feel comfortable moving into trees, cliffs, caves, riverbanks, church steeples, and haystacks.

Despite being so common, barn owls keep a low profile through their nocturnal habits. At night they leave their nests and use their excellent night vision and hearing to hunt for rodents of all types. If you happen to be out at night and hear a creepy raspy screech, it’s probably a barn owl. They don’t use the nice little “hoot, hoots” owls are famous for. To get a better idea of what a barn owl sounds like, the All About Birds website has a great recording of a barn owl call, which is referred to as a “hissing scream.”

Photo credit: Henry Jurgens

To tie in the ocean angle, the barn owls released yesterday took flight in White Point Nature Preserve in San Pedro,CA, a beautiful setting with ocean views where it’s easy to spot Catalina Island. (Barn owls are also found on the Channel Islands.) According to my friend Henry Jurgens, both owls landed on parts of the Preserve, an excellent habitat choice.

Barn owls have received extra attention recently from the Guardians of Ga’Hoole book series by Kathryn Lasky, followed by the movie, which came out last year. The books feature a fantasy world of owls and open with Soren the barn owl and his family. Really fun reading for owl fans of all ages!

I would love to have the chance to see a barn owl, but hear one…not so much. (A big thanks to Henry Jurgens for sharing such awesome photos!)

Adult black-crowned night heron, white plume showing

It’s a statue, it’s a fake bird, no wait, is that a bird? This is the series of thoughts that ran through my mind the first time I saw a stout, squat, perfectly still bird sitting on the Redondo Pier. This bird didn’t move an inch, even when I was standing less than a foot away. Before writing it off as fake, I asked other people standing around if they knew what it was. The answer: a black-crowned night heron or Nycticorax nycticorax.

According to The Audubon Society Encyclopedia of North American Birds, nycticorax derives from the Greek word nyktikorax meaning night raven. Possibly Linnaeus, the father of modern taxonomy who scientifically named thousands of species, suffered a second nervous tic (the first when naming the Mola mola) and wrote the same name down twice on accident for the black-crowned night heron.

Black-crowned night herons usually appear out of nowhere. Suddenly there’s a bird, sitting on a boat in the harbor or at the end of the Redondo Pier. Or maybe it was there all along, but as a master of motionlessness it blended in with the landscape and then suddenly your eyes revealed its presence, just like looking at a 3D optical illusion.

It turns out these mysterious birds are the most wide-spread heron in the world and are found on every continent except Australia and Antarctica. Then why do we only see one black-crowned night heron here or there? The first clue is the word “night” in their name, they are nocturnal. And the reason they are so still? They’re sleeping! Or at least trying to.

According to the Birds of North America database, they “sometimes sleep in direct sunlight, presumably for warming.” Now everything about black-crowned night herons makes so much more sense! But staying still may have another purpose besides sleeping. Roger Hothem, a wildlife research biologist with the U.S. Geological Survey’s Western Ecological Research Center said, “Night herons may be sleeping at times. However, we have observed night herons near water apparently motionless, followed by a quick strike to capture a fish or crab, or crayfish, or rodent or snake.”

This daytime sleeping habit or stationary hunting style is one of the best ways to identify night herons. While most other birds are busy preening, hunting or flying, black-crowned night herons are completely immobile. The next best identifying characteristic is their very unique body-shape. Night herons are stocky, have no real neck, and reach a respectable height of 26 inches. They look very sturdy perched on boat masts and pier railings; you might even think: “That looks like a very practical, no non-sense bird.”

Adult black-crowned night heron with pink legs

Young black-crowned night herons apply practical to their plumage with sensible brown and white-spotted feathers sitting atop thick yellow legs. Adults ditch the practicality, molt the juvenile feathers, and eventually acquire a sleek dark blue-black back, gray feathers on the wings and a white underside.

The deep blue-black feathers extend to the top of the head, but the feathers on the side of the face are light gray, which gives the appearance of a cap or crown, hence the name black-crowned night heron. As the sun sets, night herons are easily identified by their loud distinct calls that sound like a yelping small dog with a sore throat.

Adult males and females look identical; both have trendy red eyes and a couple of white plumes that hang from the back of the head down the back. Plumes look like slender white ropes, true accessories considered to be ornamental feathers. Typical of nature, extraneous frills tend to play a role during breeding season and plumes are no exception.

“They are secondary sex characteristics,” said Hothem. In fact, white plumes are so important that if they are removed the chance of males and females pairing up for breeding season is reduced, and if plumes are removed after a pair already ties the knot, it could lead to a break-up.

According to the Birds of North America database: “In a total of 152 [night heron] courtships, 72 percent of the ceremonies initiated by the plumeless male were not answered by the female. Data from control observations, in which the males possessed normal plumes, show that only eight per cent of the [courtship] ceremonies were not answered.”  Clearly, the plume is an important indicator of a male night heron’s manliness.

Plume or no plume, males open breeding season by picking a nest site and trying to attract the ladies using a strange ritual mating dance. This involves marching in place, extending the head and neck forward and down, raising the feathers on the back, head, neck and breast, sticking the plumes straight up, reddening and bulging out the eyes, and singing a special mating song. (The record for the longest song is 36 minutes!)

All this pomp and circumstance might have a greater role by providing social stimulation that reminds other night herons it’s time to begin the mating routine. This domino effect helps ensure successful reproduction within a colony, leading to the successful outcome of up to a dozen black-crowned night heron nests in one tree.

Once a pair officially becomes a couple, their yellow legs turn…pink! It seems that Hallmark’s secondary color of love is a bit more universal than card-buyers might have guessed. And the feathers become extra glossy; that healthy glow couples in love always seem to have. A couple also develops a greeting ceremony “where the approaching bird erects feathers of the head and neck and plumes, stretches its head and neck forward, and gives a disyllabic (two syllable) call,” according to the Birds of North America database.

Baby night herons are hungry, high maintenance offspring. To keep hatchlings well-fed, males and females share the responsibility of taking care of their young and hunting for food. The greeting ceremony keeps the magic in the relationship throughout this busy parenting time and also helps black-crowned night herons differentiate each other from other nesting birds in the same tree.

Night herons hunt primarily for fish to feed their young and themselves. Hence, they mostly live along the coast, inland waterways and lakes. Their fish habit also caused them major problems from DDT, a chemical that was commonly used as a pesticide. DDT converts to DDE in the environment, which causes eggshell thinning and cracking that kills baby birds long before they are ready to hatch.

Juvenile black-crowned night heron

“Like many other primarily fish-eating species, populations of night herons were observed to decline during the period of DDT use (1940s through 1972),” said Hothem. “DDT and its metabolite DDE, contributed to reproductive failure and population declines, even after DDT was banned in 1972.”

Thankfully, “recent studies from California’s Salton Sea and elsewhere indicate that concentrations of DDE in night heron eggs have declined by as much as 90% from 1985 to 2004 to a level well below the threshold for reproductive effects,” said Hothem.

The California population of night herons stays put all year round, which must have something to do with our amazing weather and temperate climate. Black-crowned night herons living elsewhere migrate long distances such as the Canadian group that flies all the way to Mexico and Cuba. Overall, night herons are doing well and are considered to be a species of “least concern.”

Night herons are smart birds, they’ve been observed using bread to bait fish and rapidly opening and closing their bill in water to create a disturbance that may lure prey. But it’s a rare day to actually see a black-crowned night heron do either of these activities because during the day they are usually just perched like statues resting in the sun.

Pelicans flying in formation

On a recent visit to the Point Vicente Interpretive Center, I had the chance to witness California brown pelicans flying in formation.

Now just to be clear, I’ve seen pelicans fly in a V shaped formation before, but this was different. Usually, pelicans fly by in a V shaped formation, everyone exclaims, “Oh, look! The pelicans are flying in V!” And then the pelicans keep on flying and everyone’s attention shifts to something else.

At the Point Vicente Interpretive Center, the pelicans flew by in a V shaped formation and I got pretty excited because they were relatively close and I could snap a few pictures. In fact, the picture on the left is the first shot I took. Then I put my camera down because I figured that was it. But then another group of pelicans came flying by in a V and then another and another!

Then the pelicans would make a return trip back towards Point Vicente, turn around and start all over again. Now I can’t say for certain it was always the same few groups of birds flying back and forth because let’s be honest, pelicans all look the same, but is sure seemed like the same birds.

Pelicans flying in formation, like mini dive bombers

At one point there were so many pelicans that they looked like mini dive bombers flying towards an unknown target, preparing for attack.

We couldn’t figure out what they were really doing. There was a nice wind that day, so they may have been riding the wind or possibly hunting. Either way it was fun to watch.

If you are ever in need of an ocean wildlife fix, visit the Point Vicente Interpretive Center at the tip of the Palos Verdes Peninsula. This is where the ACS/LA Census volunteers watch for gray whales. You never know what you might see!

Wattled crane

As you might have noticed, Ocean Wild Things has been on vacation! During my trip I had the chance to visit the International Crane Foundation in Baraboo, Wisconsin. I highly recommend a visit if you happen to be in the area, Baraboo is a quick drive north from Madison.

While Baraboo is a long way from any coast, cranes are still the perfect topic for Ocean Wild Things because they hang out in wetlands across the globe, often along the coast. The International Crane Foundation keeps very busy working to protect all fifteen species of cranes that live on five different continents. Ten species of cranes are threatened with extinction as humans encroach on their very specialized wetland habitats and grasslands leaving cranes with fewer eating options forcing them into unwelcome areas such as farmers’ fields.

Cranes suffer a variety of untimely deaths at the hands of humans including poisoning by farmers, shotguns fired by hunters, not to mention nets and traps. The size of cranes makes them easy targets, the tallest flying bird in the world is the sarus crane measuring in at close to six feet tall!

Seeing a crane is a magical experience. They are tall, elegant, poised, regal and delicate all at once. Many crane species fly thousands of miles for their migrations making protecting them more complicated as they traverse human boundaries without passports. The International Crane Foundation was founded in 1973 by two ornithologists who met in graduate school. The foundation still follows it’s original mission of protecting cranes through five specific activities: research, education, ecosystem protection, captive breeding and reintroduction. As you can imagine this is a huge job and requires staff across the globe.

If you want to support such a great cause, donations can be made at the International Crane Foundation’s website. Watch for posts on specific cranes in the near future.