Invariably, someone asks, "Why have raptors at a native plant conference?" I don't answer the question for them, I let them answer it themselves.
Put native plants in your yard.
This attracts lots of great insects and other animals who depend on the native plants.
Raptors and other predators come and eat the prey that is attracted to the insects, etc, that are attracted to the native plants. And the balance is achieved. Easy.
So enough about native plants for now. Let's get to the gravy of my day. I'm going to keep the words short because frankly, the photos and video stand well on their own.
I set up by some doors that led to a courtyard. Well, there were ducks. A mama duck and BABY DUCKS.
Baby ducks are my Kryptonite. This loud and obnoxious gal turns into sugary goo when baby ducks are involved.
Here they are:
And after all the squealing and melting was done, I went back inside, where Sylvester was trying to cast a pellet.
Check out the laughing in the background...this woman seems to be a little bit off-balance.
But anyway....pellet time:
A male cardinal visited my car today, while I was in it... I thought he was just showing territory aggression, but after observing him for a while, I wonder if he was just in love with my car.
Very little crest-raising, very little battling the mirror image...
He spent a lot of time at the corner of the windshield, and made motions like he was drinking. Looking for liquid water?
Interestingly, he occasionally tapped on the glass, then preened that bald spot on his chest. He did this multiple times. OCD?
*Especially when you are in a work truck, making it extremely easy for me to tell on you. Because I WILL.
Hello everyone! I'm back, and with a story to share. I saw a flock of ring-billed gulls in the Kmart parking lot, so I thought I would grab some lunch and go over and sit with the gulls while I ate. While I was sharing my french fries with the flock, two different people came by and dumped huge amounts of bread and whatnot for the gulls. (Now I know why they congregate there) This was done in a furtive fashion, as if they didn't want anyone to know that they were doing it.
One of the gulls caught my eye as being different than the others. One foot dangled uselessly from his leg.
The general floppiness and the color of it told me that this was probably a dead foot and this poor dude wouldn't make it. I actually, briefly wondered if I could catch him and take him to a rehabber.
I came to my senses. This was a flighted bird, and I had no net.
This particular bird made me laugh out loud. He was ruling the parking lot with his head-throwing and bullying. I was enjoying all of the vocalizations...the typical 'gull' cries, weird gruff moaning, some very eerie chuckling...And check the camo...gulls are well suited for parking lots, at least in their first few years, aren't they?
I set the camera to "Video" to capture all the cool sounds. (Some people hate gulls....like I hate house sparrows. To each his own. Personally, I love gulls)
As the camera ran, a truck came barreling into the shot, scattering the gulls. I followed with my eyes instead of the camera...a township truck had intentionally tried to hit the flock of gulls. I just sat there with my mouth hanging open. I snapped out of it and used my binoculars to read the number on the truck and to get a physical description of the driver (he had parked and gone into Kmart). So here I was, with not only his truck number and what he looked like, I HAD VIDEO EVIDENCE of what he did. Hmmm...what's a girl to do? I emailed his boss at the township headquarters. It felt good. Oh yes it did.
Look for yourself:
But let's take the birds out of the equation. He is still driving diagonally across an active parking lot at about 40 mph. I am awaiting a response. And I will be certain to share that response with you.
When I first heard this song*, all of the photos of the Flock, in all its incarnations, came flooding into my mind. When we are all together, we are constantly snapping away at each other with our cameras like crazed tourists. Yes, we go to birding festivals to see the birds. But it's the faces of our friends that make the trips memorable. I'm in desperate need of new photos of my peeps. I have been recycling the same ones over and over. *I adore Lady Gaga. Can't stop listening to this song!
Next festival for me is New River Bird and Nature Festival. Click here to learn more. (Hey, you Flock members and quasi-Flock members? If you want to go, email me at capricorn1273ATcinci.rr.com so we can talk about lodging. We can try to fill the Farmhouse again. Seriously. We can get a good deal.)
And if I can swing it (i.e. Geoff doesn't have kittens about it), I want to see the great open spaces of North Dakota at the Potholes and Prairies Festival in June.
It's not every day you get to meet someone you have only read about. I met someone today...someone who is unlike anyone else I have ever met.
But you have to wait until the end. Read on.
Today's program was for the Midwest Native Plant Conference in Dayton, Ohio.
A native plant thing? I was so there.
Sylvester disapproved of the decor. But he blended in nicely.
(I put him by the fake tree on purpose)
Also in attendence was Lucy the Peregrine (on the right) and Angle the Screech Owl (on the table in front)
*You will notice that I placed the screech owl in front of our display so she couldn't see the GHOW. We don't want a screech owl stroke.*
Non-birders: Screech owls are FOOD for GHOW in the wild. She did catch a glimpse of him while I was holding her, and her pupils dilated so much I thought she might faint. :)
Lucy's perch is so low, I placed her on two chairs so the public could see her.
And though I carefully placed paper towels under her, she sprayed the chairs anyway.
Wonder if the hotel will ask us back after that?
I talked to many excited, interested people today...even a few who recognized me from the RAPTOR newsletter and my blog. Why do I cringe when someone says they read my blog?
Low self-esteem? Unsure of how people take me?
Anyhoo. On to the Celebrity.
I first read about this gorgeous and unique creature here on Jim's blog.
*Go read his account of this fantastic thing.
He does a way better job of describing it, what with all the "radically awesomes" and "pinkiliciousness's".
Yep. That's a PINK katydid.
Non-nature peeps: Katydids are supposed to be GREEN. This is a one-in-a-million bug.
And even better...I got to keep her on my display table. Made us quite popular.
I couldn't help but think of this scene from the musical "Wicked".
A pretty, popular girl in PINK, talking to a drab, unpopular girl who is GREEN:
Birding can expose you to so many things, can't it? New places, new faces... This morning found me getting out of bed at Zero-Dark-Thirty to go meet Les (from this post) all the way over on the other side of town for some birding.
With his schedule, it's tough for him to get bird time other than banding, and I have such a poor sense of "bird" hearing, we both jumped at the chance to get out to the woods.
Les has great ears. There's a vast knowledge base in that brain of his, and I used it as much as I could today. And just like our first meeting, there was more to see than just birds...
I took this photo just for Delia's friend Matty. He laughs like a 12-year old boy when anyone says anything remotely vulgar. (I can hear his voice now, saying "Hehehe...you said "knob") Delia, please make sure Matty sees this.
Pawpaws are starting to develop fruit...and that reminds me that I need to move the pawpaw trees I planted last year. Stupidly planted them in full sun. Duh.
A rare moment of seeing jewelweed in the sun.
Initially thought this was some kind of mint, but we decided it was beardtongue. (Which might also send Matty into fits)
We had no idea what this was....maybe Jim McCormac or some other plant geek could tell us? We assumed it was an exotic invasive, since there was so much of it. Looks like a pea plant with "fern" foliage.
This one brought up a funny story. This is a buckeye nut, before it ripens into the typical shape we are used to. Reminded me of the "infamous buckeye" picture from Cape May last year. I told Les the story. He approved.
He also agreed that I shouldn't put this in my cleavage. Too spiny.
And the inside of a buckeye before maturity: Three little wet "lima bean" things...it smelled good. Smelled green.
And yes, Laura...I have blue nail polish on today. Laura seems to take offense at my choices of nail color. She thinks it must be some "Midwestern Thing"...and she thinks it's weird. Which is exactly why I do it.
A very tired Mourning Cloak butterfly: I've never been able to get a picture of one of these, but I see them in the spring and summer flitting about. This one was very tired and sluggish in the shade on the road, so I picked him up and placed him in the sun. That woke him up a bit.
I got ONE bird picture today. And it's not even a good one: There's a blue-gray gnatcatcher in there. I promise.
Les got me a lifer today. We both heard and saw a Kentucky Warbler. Did I get a photo? No, of course not. That makes 219 on my Life List. We also got fleeting looks at a few broad-winged hawks.
Les made it his mission to teach me as many bird calls as he could today.
He taught me that the Kentucky Warbler sounds like a "musical horse" galloping, the Yellow-breasted Chat making a zillion different sounds, the wood thrushes "night song", White-eyed vireos say "Pick up the beer, Check!"...though I like this mnemonic better: "Pick up a realllllllll CHICK!"
...he is my own personal Yoda. Except he is way taller than me. And he's not green.
Thankfully he didn't quiz me at the end of our walk...but he did text me on the way home as I was listening to songs on my iPod: "Are you studying those bird calls?" I said, "Yes, YODA." He responded, "Bird calls learn, you must."
What a kook. Must be why I enjoy his company so much. :) And his company is a jewel. No one is 'born' a birder, and it's interesting to hear how others came to be these twitchy, nutty types who go to great lengths to see and hear birds. His story was way more interesting than my "cherry tree and birdbath" story. (Geoff got me a bird bath and weeping cherry tree for my first Mother's Day and it's exploded from there.)
Talking with Les, I discovered how similar we are in humor, opinions....nice to find your "People", isn't it?
Here's a quick video of a White-eyed vireo singing, and me begging it to sing some more:
The summer is stretching in front of me like a road with no end. Lorelei's been out of school for a week, and Isabelle's last day is Friday. I have to keep two smart energetic children occupied for three months, and that takes more than just parking them in front of the TV.
Today, Lorelei and I went to RAPTOR. I had seen a neat pellet display at the CNC and wanted to investigate some of my saved pellets and see if I could replicate the display.
Our owl pellets don't hold any secrets...we feed them, so we know what's going in and what will be coming out. I chose one of Storm's pellets, since he is fed mice and swallows them whole (our larger owls seem to pick apart their food and leave leftovers, so their pellets aren't quite as interesting). Quick pellet lesson: All birds of prey (and some other birds, like herons) make pellets. What can't be digested is coughed (cast) up and you can pull it apart and determine their diet. Owl pellets are special in that the owls tend to swallow their food whole, or at least pull it apart and finish it all...so the entire skeleton (give or take a few tiny pieces) is wrapped in the fur or feathers of the prey. Scientists can gather owl pellets and evaluate the food supply of an area. Owl pellets also hold a larger amount of food residue, since their stomach acids are weaker than other birds of prey. Barn owl pellets look a little different from other pellets...they are round, instead of oblong.
Storm's pellet:
I started to pull it open.... Arggh! A treasure trove of bony secrets!
I separated the bones into piles (ribs, tail and vertebrae, skull, legs) and Lorelei got very interested... ...so I let her do some pulling herself. She wanted to know what every piece was, so I explained that the ribs protect the lungs and heart, and the vertebra are the back, etc. I showed her on her body where her ribs and spine were, and there came a moment when something clicked in her. I saw a light come on...
I assumed there were slightly more than one whole skeleton in this pellet. (Lorelei said it was one really BIG mouse) Lorelei has said repeatedly over the past few years that she wants to be a veterinarian. Seeing that light come on in her eyes made me think that this is not just a dream or fancy. She really got into this. And made connections between the bones we were pulling out of the pellet and her own bones. It was so cool to witness, this awakening.
Pulling the bones out, with Daisy the stuffed Puppy looking on:
The last night of the festival, we rocked out with the Swinging Orangutangs. Basically unheard of for a birding festival, we were treated to wonderful, loud music, and we reciprocated by getting on our feet and letting our hair down. The big surprise for us was when Tim was asked to come on up and play the cowbell for a sizzling rendition of "Low Rider".... I apologize for the low light, but you can make out details when the zillion Flock cameras are going off. (The hyena-like yelps are the Flock, whooping and hollering for our "Cock of the Flock!") (I also apologize for the bouncy videography. I think I had four too many beers.) (In fact, this video is no good. So just sit back and enjoy the COWBELL!)
Introducing Tim, Cowbell-er Deluxe!
Moral to this post...Birders and rock music MIX very WELL!
I really wanted to have two cameras at the New River Bird and Nature Festival: One for video and one for stills. My camera does both, but sometimes so much was going on, I didn't know where to turn or what to film.
I had my camera set for "video" on the van Tuesday, and caught this little exchange... (The guy driving is Geoff Heeter. We never knew what was going to come out of his mouth)
Kathi is telling us about a trip leader from another festival who never let anyone stop for a potty break. If you can't catch all of the dialogue, you may have to watch it more than once.
On Wednesday with the Dream Team, we all did the prerequisite "Life Bird Wiggle", immortalized by BT3. I think we had finally seen the Cerulean Warbler who had been taunting and following us all morning.
Note Keith, (aka "Sad, sad Dope from THIS post) way in the back, who thinks that I am taking still shots, so he just stands there with his arms above his head. See? A dope.
I must have whined enough. I must have looked pitiful enough when everyone else used theirs.
Lynne, possibly the sweetest person I have ever met, got herself a new iPod recently. And her old one, complete with birdJam, (Hi, Jay!) needed a home. She might be embarrassed by this post..she's the type to do something wonderful for someone and then flap her hands and say "Oh, no no no..." when they show their appreciation.
It arrived today... I was expecting a little iPod with a tiny black and white screen. What I got was a big iPod with a big color screen.
And an iMainGo speaker carry-case thingy. Now I won't be the dummy in the group who doesn't know any calls except for owls, hawks and falcons. I have a month to learn some warbler calls so I can impress Kathi, our By-Ear-Birderess, on our trip to West Virginia. And speaking of West Virginia, Lynne should plan on relaxing on the porch of the Farmhouse as I massage away all the aches and pains in her feet from hiking and birding. And when she grows weary of all that walking, I will be carrying her on my back.
Now I can go outside, blast barred owl calls and annoy my neighbors.
This is perfect timing. I was hoping to thank Lynnefor a delightful phone conversation yesterday, and I think she will appreciate/love this video.
This week, Cincinnati was host to the IAATE Annual Conference. My workshops included behavior modification and enrichment for captive birds. There were both "parrot" people and "raptor" people there..and one guy who thought up enrichment ideas for his chickens.
I left with so many wonderful ideas for our birds...here's one of them:
Just saw this on Magnificent Frigatebird and had to share... We birders may be called lots of things, but one thing you can say about us is that we can laugh at ourselves. Enjoy:
