Eagles Don't Always Come Home - Birds's Nests

Bald eagle on the nest, Phippsburg, Maine spring 2010

Eagles make enormous nests spanning 4-5 feet across. They are messy, clumsy looking nests. They do hold these giant birds and the chicks, along with whatever food they bring home.

This next nest is a Tree swallow nest. It's sitting on a bed of Thyme in my garden. In the top third of the nest in the center is an egg. This nest came from a Bluebird box on our property which is occupied by Tree Swallows. That's why the nest is square in shape. This nest had been recently abandoned, though not long before. There is feces still on the bottom right corner. This is an elegant, inviting nest.

Like eagles, Ospreys build huge nest, too. Also like eagles, they usually return to the same nest year after year. This one is on top of a utility pole. The photo was taken in February. See the snow? Osprey build nests in high places like this and are often seen atop cell phone towers. The Osprey nests are frequently disruptive to whatever the intended purpose was of their commandeered superstructure.  Under certain circumstances, power and cell phone companies have permission to remove nests.

I have a book about nest identification. It's a Petersen Field Guide titled "Eastern Bird's Nest" by Hal H. Harrison. I find bird's nests harder to identify than the birds themselves, which can be very difficult. Nests vary in appearance depending on available materials. A robin may use hay rather than sticks if that is what available. In that case, the nest would look blond and very different from one constructed of twigs. 

I'm guessing that this is the nest of a type of thrush, but I can't say for sure. It's about 4 inches across and had a mud cup consistent with thrush nest building.

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This nest is tiny by comparison to the others. It's about 3 inches across. It probably is the nest of a vireo or warbler. Moss was used on the lower half. Then, Pine needles and grass were wound around together to form the interior. It looks dry and cozy.

This nest is that of a North American robin. They use mud to make a cup and then weave other material around in the mud. The nests are about 5-6 inches across. Robins aren't too fussy about where they nest and often construct nests on and around houses. This one was attached to the side of a house in a climbing Hydrangea vine.

This nest is probably that of a flycatcher, perhaps Olive sided. Thought it looks quite whimsical, it's solidly constructed.

Baltimore orioles build nests about 40 feet up in deciduous trees and construct this pouch style nest. I love the pieces of tarpaulins that have been woven into it. On the bottom right are some white lumps of stuffing. They have been pulled from a pillow, mattress or sleeping bag.

A few years ago, I used to go almost daily to a Bald eagle nest to see what the birds were up to. I followed the progress of the two chicks born there through to the day they took their first flight. The next year, I went eagerly to the nest again. I hoped to catch another season of wonder in nest building, courting, mating and growing Bald eagle chicks.

It was early in the Maine spring. Bald eagles start courting and working on their nests in March here. The nest is on the shores of the Kennebec River where it empties into the Atlantic Ocean. Unrelenting wind blows hard, raw and cold. My fingers froze. Several times, I pulled them back into the sleeves of my jacket, like retreating turtles. I cupped one hand in the other alternately blowing warm breath into the hand cave. I put in my time in my deep desire to see the eagles. But, no eagles.

Days went by. I wondered, "Geez, where are they?” The Bald eagle pair had nested there for several years, so it was not a new place to them. I had seen them in the air a few times, so I knew they were around. But, they were not nesting. There had not been any construction or other disruptions by man in the area. What could it be? Why had they forsaken me? Me? What about me? Of course, whether they nested there or not had nothing to do with me, but somehow it felt personal.

Like a little kid, I wished really hard for them to bring in a stick or even just light on the rim of the nest to investigate. I wished like a child wishing for a certain Christmas present though she knows that Santa Claus doesn't really exist. When I heard them keening from high in the sky or across the river, I pleaded hard. "Please, please, please," as if they could hear me or understand.

But, no eagles. I had time to look around, to ponder what had changed that made this familiar nest no longer appealing to them. A few years before, they had a different nest a couple of hundred feet away. A wind storm snapped off branches from the huge, White pine that held it. That year, they moved to this newer site. Like a bridge inspector I peered at the superstructure, looking for cracks, signs of crumbling, or changes in integrity. Then, I saw it.

Slithering up the side of the tree, sixty feet into the air above me, meandered a green video cable. It crawled from the woods before climbing up the opposite side of the tree from where I had been watching. The anaconda wire was the feed for a nest cam. The BioDiversity Research Institute had positioned a camera in the nest to monitor the Bald eagle population. In the process, they had captured and banded one of the adults. Should that bird be found dead, they could know about its life history.

             I was outraged like someone had stolen my lunch money! Though heartbroken and angry, I tried to be logical. Wasn't it a good thing to monitor the eagles? Most people can't go sit and freeze their fingers to see a nest and then, hopefully, one day the ensuing young. Most people sit in their offices, stealing moments to look at video cams across the planet. They are voyeurs to the lives of puppies, heinous baby sitters, cheating partners, and eagles. Video cams and photography are ways in which the average person gets to see things they otherwise would not. And in that, they become invested in their welfare. Monitoring of eagle populations is how we came to realize that we were killing them off in the first place!

To protect our resources, it's better to know more about them, even when sometimes there are counterproductive outcomes. There’s risks and always good and bad to everything. And, truthfully, there could have been other reasons the eagles did not come back to that nest having nothing to do with the plastic cable and camera. There are normal, natural reasons that eagles do not nest every year; it’s not always pathological. Perhaps they were just bored and wanted a new place with granite countertops and stainless steel appliances, like everyone else.           

This past spring, a friend of thirty-five years called. She said she wanted to talk to me about something. 

  "What's up?" I asked.

            "I don't want to talk about it on the phone," she said.

            "Oh, come on! Just tell me!" I said, but no, she wouldn't.

So, we made a date to meet. That gave me a week to think about what she could possibly have on her mind.  

            My first thought was that something was wrong with her husband, or kids, or grandkids. "Oh God, I hope nobody's sick." I agonized. I asked my husband what he thought. "Do you think maybe there's something wrong with Mike?" My husband had no idea, either.

            With nothing to get my teeth into for a possible reason, I began to wonder if I had done something to tick her off. We hadn't talked much for months, actually. Come to think of it. So how could it be anything? It must be something. Like walking with a rock in my shoe, I went over and over every conversation between us for the past six months. I analyzed and worked over all of it, but remained mystified. Nothing. I couldn't come up with anything. Though I was at a complete loss, for the week before we were to meet, my guts were in a knot. She was my oldest, dearest friend. Nothing like this had ever gone on between us before.

            When I got to her house we hugged as we always did. Her dogs barked and jumped on me, scratching my leg through my pants as they always did. She screamed at them to get off, as she always did. She poured us each an oversized glass of red wine, as she always did. Then we, sat down in the living room, and she let me have it. Which she never did. 

            She told me I was an arrogant, social elitist snob. She said that I had totally changed and did not even look the same anymore. She said that since I had lost weight and become a celebrity, I thought I was too good for everybody else. She dredged up some year old, now friendship ancient history events, which had made her angry - things I could barely recall, never mind defend, things she had harboured for a year. She beat me over the head with the details, clear and fresh in her mind. She punched me with the word 'arrogant,' slapped me with 'snob,' screamed 'know it all,' until my ears were ringing. It was a first rate mugging.

            Like most people who are assaulted, I forgot that I ever took martial arts classes. Every kick boxing move I practiced in the gym had forsaken me. I was in disbelief at what was happening. I stared blankly at her, then laughed and blurted just the worst possible, wrong thing.

            "You're such an idiot, a moron! You can't be serious! What the hell...." I trailed off. She had to be joking. My glass of wine suddenly seemed all wrong in my hand. I set it down on the side table, carefully, before I dropped the whole thing or snapped the stem in half.

            "And that's another thing!" My old pal's smoking rant had only just begun, as it turned out. And I had just thrown gasoline on it.

            When it was 'over,' I was crying and feeling sick to my stomach. The room was quiet. Even the dogs had stopped their incessant barking, always the background to our conversations. I was still wearing my jacket, but I was cold. My fancy scarf and earrings I had chosen specifically for her to see now seemed ridiculous. My stomach churned and growled.

            "So," said my pal. "Ya ready to go out to dinner now?"

            "No, no," was my weak response.  "Are you kidding? After that?" 

            When she stood up I think I flinched. She said "I gotta let the dogs out. I'll be right back."

            She came back into the room with the bottle of wine. Still standing, she topped off her own glass. Wine dribbled down the neck of the bottle onto the carpet. She made no move to blot it up. Normally, an overly fastidious person, she would have jumped on it with a sprayer of Resolve.

            I thought, "Okay, I’m going to rise above this tantrum, this tirade, this whatever-the-hell." It had obviously bothered her, too. I said we might as well go to dinner, which we did. It was stiff. It was awkward. I watched every word that came out of my mouth. I edited and checked every joke. The spontaneous, apparently arrogant, elitist snob, know it all was having a time out.

           It's been months since that happened. I've thought about it every day. Reliving that verbal vomit session on her couch is replayed in my head nearly every night as I'm drifting off to sleep. She is my oldest friend. Friends should be able to tell each other what they feel like, right? Friends should clear the air, right? Friends should be honest, right? Friends should forgive each other, stay loyal, and get over it, right? But, I can't. I've lost some golden thread of trust. I've been told I'm a monster, a self serving, hideous beast that has stomped on my friend. And not just once. No! Apparently many times! I've been told I'm oblivious, self absorbed and uncaring!  I've been told I'm not lovable. And I can't get over it.

        There's a crevasse between us now. I see it every time we speak. My off the cuff, slap stick, jokester self dangles over the darkness waiting to die in every conversation. I can't be me anymore. In a friendship, if you can't be who you are, what is there? A friendship is where trust, loyalty and forgiveness are everything. In every other social relationship, we are at known risk. We know we would be fired for certain things, thrown out of an office for certain things, or even arrested. But a friendship is a relationship we choose because of safety in the bond.

         I don't know what to do with this. I don't know where it will end up. I take each day with her, one at a time. Maybe I'll forget. Maybe I’ll forgive. One thing I do know is that sometimes eagles do not come back to the nest.              

To watch a live Osprey nest came, visit this site: http://explore.org/#!/live-cams/player/live-osprey-cam

"BOLLOCKS! It's Not A Bullock's!" Bullock's Oriole

 

Bullock's or Baltimore? You decide!

Questionable oriole, species still in debate - Photographed in Phippsburg, Maine November 2, 2010

 

     A reader recently sent to me an explanation for the word "Twitcher" or to "twitch" birds. I said in a previous post that I didn't know why the urge to drop everything and rush off to see a new bird was called twitching. It turns out that the term comes from the twitchy, nervous behavior of well known British birdwatcher Howard Medhurst. Mr. Medhurst is reported to have frequently traveled long distances on short notice to see rare birds. "Twitcher," is most often used in Britain and Europe, and less frequently used to describe North American birders.
     Mr. Medhurst and I share numerous traits it seems; I am a nervous, twitchy kind of person given to chewing my cuticles, tapping my feet and generally not sitting still. Numerous times, I have, in fact, blown my life asunder throwing caution and duties to the wind in search of rare birds. My itchy, squirrely behavior makes me quick to pull the trigger, too. I'm not one to spend a lot of time analyzing and deliberating about things (unless they are emotionally unhealthy concerns. Then, I'll ruminate until the cows come home.). "Go with the gut," is usually my modus operandi. In birding, this isn't always a bad thing, either.
    It's true that much of birding indeed involves lots of studying of the subject, looking at books and web sites and brooding over field marks. It's time consuming and well suited to an unemployed person with some Obsessive Compulsive traits as I also have. But none of that concentration on a bird will suffice or measure up to seeing it in the wild, in it's natural habitat. Study does not replace the experience of a bird's gestalt.
     And what is a bird's gestalt, you ask? That quick flash of a wing, the song and call issued through the trees, a rustle in the leaves or scratch on the ground, the thing you catch from the corner of your eye. These are the flavors and nuances of a bird not quite captured in however beautifully  executed a lithograph, painting or photograph. I say that as a dedicated photographer, too. It's very difficult to represent in a single image all the little details that make a bird all of what it is beyond its physical self.
    With this bird, this damned oriole, I shot from the hip and killed the wrong perpetrator. I committed the Internet version of screaming "FIRE!" in a hotel lobby and exclaimed "BULLOCK'S ORIOLE!"  What rushed me down the river of judgement to start with was that I saw this bird on November second. Fittingly, that was election day. Haven't you ever gone to the polls then been presented with an issue which you realized you were ignorant about? Then, you filled in the little circle with your number two lead pencil (we still do that here, no hanging chads for us) making your best guess or simply going with your party, though not really knowing what the hell you're voting for? Well I voted, and I voted for the wrong bird; I voted for Bullock's oriole and it's probably only a Baltimore Oriole.  Having also voted for a losing gubernatorial candidate, I chose both of the wrong birds.
     To see an oriole of any kind in November in Maine is unusual. They are primarily nectar and insect eaters, so they migrate early as the food supply begins to wizzle up with the cold. I was sure this wasn't any old oriole either. I was sure it was a Bullock's which would be stunningly rare here.  Another reason that I leaped to this conclusion was that on exactly the same date last year, I saw what looked like the same bird. I had photographed it then, as well (photo below). The bird made quite a stir on the Maine birding circuit. With a pile of my photographs it was thoroughly reviewed by the Maine Birds Records Committee. "The Committee" is the body of experts that decides what a reported sighting truly is and if the sighting can be entered into official Maine birding records.
     The final ruling on last year's oriole was that it was probably a hybrid of  Baltimore and Bullock's orioles. So, it was not complete lunacy that I thought I saw that again. Besides, I have in fact, seen so many rare and unusual birds lately, that my identification coals were still hot. All it took to ignite them was a puff of air, a flash of orange wing and the wink of gold in the trees. Again, a stack of photographs has gone to "The Committee" for review. As if waiting for letters of acceptance to a prestigious university or in labor with child, I'm waiting on their decision. I'm thinking about taking up smoking again and drinking Scotch in the middle of the day and I've torn out patches of my own hair. I've got a whole lot of twitching going on. In my heart, I know I was wrong, though. I'm going to have runny egg on my face when the decision comes down. My bird and part of myself will be rejected. I will shout then, too. "BOLLOCKS! IT'S NOT A BULLOCK'S!"   
     "Bollocks," a fabulous British word meaning "testicles," is used figuratively to mean "nonsense." It's usually exclaimed after a minor incident or something unfortunate has happened. I find it a very satisfying expletive. And if "The Committee's" decision goes my way, if the bird is a Bullock's, there will be approval, admiration and respect for my birding skills, rather than the disdain I'm expecting. I can then declare "Top bollocks!" You've really got to love the British for their contributions to birding and the English language.

 Bullock's x Baltimore Oriole Photographed in Phippsburg, November 2, 2009
William Bullock (c. 1773 – 1849) was an English traveller, naturalist and antiquarian

Do You Hear Me Now? Pishing, Does It Work? Is It Cool?

Recently, a friend who enjoys feeder birds enthusiastically, but is not a birder in the capital 'B' sense, asked,  "What is pishing?"

Pishing is the name given to the sounds that birders make to get birds to turn to them, or sometimes to take flight, so that the birder can get a better look. Scientists use the technique to increase the effectiveness of bird diversity surveys; more birds identified means better survey results. I use pishing to get birds to turn to me for photographs. All of the birds in the above collages were responding to my pishing for photographs.  Sometimes, the birds will emerge from the interior of brush toward the birder to investigate the noise. To pish, all you do is say "pish-pish-pish" softly and repeatedly making a kind of squealing sound on the front end and shooshing on the back end. Clench your front teeth, open your lips and whisper the word 'pish' or kiss the back of your hand.  You can also follow that with chatter, "Chit-chit-chit" uttered sharply. But truthfully, anything goes. You could read The Gettysburg Address, recite poetry or sing country western tunes and it might work. I make a high pitched reedy sound by forcing air over my tongue which is parked at the back of my top front teeth. In my experience, raptors, like the Bald eagle and Broad-winged hawk above, find that specific noise of interest over conventional pish-pishing. Maybe it sounds more like a rodent squealing to them. Who knows. Some think that the reason birds respond to pishing is because the sounds resemble the scolding noises and alarm calls made by small birds mobbing or fleeing a predator. Birders and scientists frown upon the use of pishing beyond getting the bird's attention for identification purposes. It's not okay to disturb, scare the birds or otherwise alter their behavior for your own amusement. I also whistle in imitation as closely as I can the whistling of the bird I'm trying to attract. Northern Cardinals and Tufted titmice are especially responsive to this and will return my whistles nearly endlessly. Chickadees are a good subject for learning to pish as they are sociable by nature and will reward your efforts. No matter how silly you may feel doing it or bad you are at it, Chickadees will turn to you. The birds have told me though that they don't like head banging heavy metal acid rock. Only the Grackles,  Starlings and Cowbirds go in for that kind of noise. If that's who you want at your feeders, crank up the volume and let the tunes rock!
 (Clockwise from the top of the first collage, the birds are: Eastern Phoebe, Rose-breasted grosbeak, Northern hawk owl, Black-capped chickadee, Baltimore oriole. Clockwise from the top of the second collage, the birds are: Cedar waxwing, Canada goose and goslings, Catbird, Canada goose and goslings, Barred owlet, Broad-winged hawk, Bald eagle, Scarlet tanager, Tufted titmouse, White-crowned sparrow, White-breasted nuthatch)
Amazon has a bunch of books on pishing. Click here for more on that: Amazon.com/Art-Pishing-Attract-Birds-Mimicking/dp/0811732959
 There's a very informative and interesting PDF file on pishing here: http://www.bsc-eoc.org/download/BWCfa05.pdf
Thanks to Wikipedia  for some of the information.