Moths, Baby Birds, and Papier-mache

Right now, there are hundreds of moths fluttering like summer snow in the sunset light outside. The birds are ignoring them so they must not be very tasty. The Barn Swallows above the kitchen door have nestlings, and I'm betting most of the Cliff Swallow nests also contain babies. The Quail have been spotted leading fluffy chicks around too. And the Wrentits have already started building their second nests. Their first offspring are forming adolescent gangs in the scrub, and they try singing but sound a little hesitant. Life is everywhere.

The huge papier-mache Hummingbird (nicknamed "Hummy") is coming together, hopefully in time for the 4th of July parade in Bolinas. His tiny counterparts do not seem alarmed at the Frankenhummer coming to life next to their sugar water feeder. Hummy still needs paint, cloth wings and cardboard retrices. The summer is running away into July. Where is the time?

More Veggies, More Questions

So, if a shrub is really a conglomeration of shrubs, is it still a shrub? And what if I spend an hour seeking a snag and find none, is it worth more time to seek snags in the other three quadrants? And, if my 5 meter transect is through vegetation so thick that I have to toss my measuring tape over the shrubs and then disappears into the poison oak, how do I count plants without trampling them?

Such are the ponderings of a vegetation sampler.

Meanwhile, Wrentit YW/WS came in close to see what I was doing, and was not impressed. He expressed his disgust by churring.

Veggies

Veggies are vegetation surveys. I've started to do surveys around the mist-nets, and they offer their own unique challenges and frustrations. I'm feeling disgruntled enough not to want to go into detail.

Inside, cold and eye-sore

Spent the day inside today, filling out site status forms for the owls. Then, I worked on my Sharpie presentation. I'm giving it tomorrow. Should be fun, and I think it's all set. It'll be a strange way to kick off Palo Prom. Speaking of, it looks like it's gearing up to be a blast. Spiked punch, a disco ball, decorations..., good food, fun music, and lots of silly dressing up.

Skunked at Blake Canyon

Didn't find my owls at Blake, as I pretty much suspected. I have the hunch that they disperse pretty widely once the breeding season is over (or for non-nesting birds, once they have determined they will not be nesting this season). They could have been fairly close as the owl flies, but maybe tucked away up some arroyo where they couldn't hear me and I couldn't hear them.

It was a cold blustery day up the Cataract Trail though. Enough so that I was glad to descend and get back to hot food and a shower.

Tonight, I'm heading out again for more hooting.

Banding at Pine Gulch

Banded at PIGU today, after point-counting there. Banding was fairly slow, but it was nice to see Wilson's Warblers and Allen's Hummingbirds in the hand again. Heard and saw a male Black-headed Grosbeak, which was a treat.

We were right on the border of fog, with the cloud coming and going all morning.

Traffic

One doesn't expect to encounter traffic while living as a field biologist studying owls. However, the owls I work for require city driving. Between getting honked at twice, nearly colliding with a vehicle that suddenly switched lanes, and sitting in motionless traffic for an hour before turning around to go the long way home, I'm exhausted. And that doesn't take into account the 80 degree heat and the uncooperative nature of my owls today.

Hot Owls

I checked on the second owl nest today, and didn't find them at home at first. I had to search around and eventually located them upslope from their nest tree. I found mom, pop, and one baby. The young bird was very cute and more interested in me than its parents were. He was fluffy, covered in white down, and his dark eyes were rimmed with his darker facial feathers, creating a masked look. Both baby and mom seemed hot, and it was a hot day, with the warm air invading even the usually cool Redwood forest. The female lifted up her feathers to expose her tarsi (legs), in an apparent effort to cool herself off. I left them in peace after making sure that one fledgling was all I could find.

Tonight, I owl.

De damn owls

They made me run today: over hill and vale, under fallen tree trunks and through plenty of tan oak brush. I started out easily enough, by calling from up top on a ridge where they had been three times before, and where I was sure they would be again. Instead, I got a male and female response from down in the arroyo, opposite of the slope I had just climbed up. Eventually I found them, after much climbing and thrashing through brush, including hauling myself up an embankment by grabbing onto a Bay tree which had fallen but was sprouting all along its trunk. I was soaked in sweat and covered with dust and tree flakes, in addition, the flies were awful. The reason I had come was to check on the male's bands, but he ended up being unbanded anyway. As I was writing up my notes, he suddenly launched from his perch to smack down on the ground, with wings and tail splayed. Had he seen some little tidbit? But instead of returning to his perch immediately, he sat there in the sun, in that fully extended position, blinking sleepily. Eventually he righted himself and flew back to his tree. The female then flew in and began begging which may indicate that he had indeed captured some snack and she wanted a share.

I just love (after the fact) how I assume that my job is going to be simple and clear-cut: find the owls in the same place they always are, and get the male's band status. But it seems that more often than not, they have the upperhand (wing?) and I end up running through the forest, tripping on roots and falling down into arroyos. They are clearly in charge of the situation; I remain a humble biologist.

Banding at Palo

Instead of owling, I helped out with banding at Palomarin field station, where I live and where the PRBO offices are. We open nets 15min after sunrise and close 6 hours later. It was a beautiful, warm, calm day and so were able to stay open for the whole time. We only caught 9 birds of 6 species, but it was nice to be banding again. I miss the WIWAs and the PUFIs (who tried to bite me) and being more keyed into the small birds rather than trying to ignore them while concentrating on finding owls.

My most interesting capture was a young Song Sparrow. While taking him out of the net, I immediately knew he was a baby due to the slightly reddish lores, and the fluffy quality to his body feathers (meaning it was his juvenal plumage, of poorer quality compared to adult feathers). And when I took him back to the lab to take measurements, his skull (which I could see through the translucent skin) was barely ossified, signifying a bird hatched this season.

Barn Swallow on Nest

A Barn Swallow is sitting on her nest just outside of the kitchen door. She peeks over the edge when I walk by, perhaps worried about disturbance? When the pair was building, they were much more skittish and more likely to fly away. Now, though, she sticks to her nest, and her mate visits her with much squeaking and trilling.

I did a point count today and found a Winter Wren Nest and an Osprey Nest. The WIWR was very close, less than 10m, and I watched as it flew into a hole in the bank with food in its bill. It emerged with a fecal sac. There must be babies in there that need food input and to have their nest cleaned out! The Osprey I watched carried a fish, and it dove spectacularly to land on a large stick nest where its nestling was crying for food. The parent left the fish, which the chick began to eat.