home + garden
Jim Williams has been watching birds and writing about their antics since before "Gilligan's Island" went into reruns. Join him for his unique insights, his everyday adventures and an open conversation about the birds in your back yard and beyond.
resize text 
find us on Facebook
subscribe via RSS
Posts about Bird travels
Our Christmas star
Posted by: Jim Williams Updated: January 2, 2013 - 9:05 PM
We spent Christmas in California, looking for birds along the shorelines near Monterey. This Western Gull was found on one of the wharfs in town. It wanted to eat the starfish. but had two problems: the obvious size issue, and all of the other gulls that wanted a taste. The bird tried hard, when it had the chance, to rip a starfish arm free, but those starfish are made of tough stuff. The gull eventually flew away, taking with it the end of the story.
Adding insult to injury
Posted by: Jim Williams Updated: December 30, 2012 - 7:52 PMThis is about birds in that I was looking for Surfbirds along a Monterey, California, wharf when I heard the pounding noise. In the water to my left was a Sea Otter. It had a plate-sized crab balanced on its stomach. The otter had broken the large claw from the crab and was using it as a hammer to pound open the shell and expose dinner, assault of the crab with its own part adding insult to injury. The otter used a two-handed -- so to speak -- downstroke to batter the clam, large claw clasped between front paws. You can see the claw in the photos here. The otter eventually quit pounding and began eating, gnawing on the claw leg for openers. The crab slowly wagged its remaining legs as the otter ate. I did find a Surf Bird a few minutes later. This was seen during a Christmas visit to California.
The otter is rolling over. The crab claw and its attendant leg is held between the otter's paws.
The otter is gnawing on the leg removed from the claw, which can be seen in the center of the photo.
Here is the Surfbird, a winter visitor to the Pacific Shore from British Columbia to South America.
Finally, Bohemian Waxwings
Posted by: Jim Williams Updated: November 29, 2012 - 11:02 AMA friend began a grosbeak/waxwing trek a few days ago, beginning in Chisago County and working his way west to Wadena and Todd counties. He keeps lists by county, and this being an exceptional year for sightings of Pine Grosbeaks and Bohemian Waxwings, off he went from his Rochester home. Lots of miles, yes, but he had a good time.
I’ve been waiting for the waxwings to appear close to the metro area. Friend Bob found them in Kanabec County, which is pretty close. I figured it was worth a chance and some driving. I headed north on Highway 169, skipping Elk River and Princeton as search sites, beginning a block-by-block canvas for ornamental crab apple trees in Milaca. Both the grosbeaks and the waxwings are most easily found in those trees, feeding on apples.
I found Pine Grosbeaks in Milaca, Garrison, and Aitkin. I found a pair of Bohemian Waxwings in Garrison. The waxwings were birds of the day for me. They were sharing an apple tree with grosbeaks, the tree in the front yard of a house. That’s where you find ornamental crabs. Pointing cameras at people’s houses, uninvited, poses the obvious risk. But if you get out of the car to ask permission, the birds could be put to flight. Ask permission or apologize? The old question. I took half a dozen quick shots from the street, then pulled into the driveway to explain myself. The lady of the house said, sure, take photos. No problem. When I left her front steps the waxwings flew away.
The apple orchard near our home where I look two or three times a week for those birds was full of robins this morning, dozens of them. It’s the first time I’ve found any birds there for a couple of weeks. I’ll keep checking. Carlson Parkway, as it passes the west side of the Carlson Towers near the intersection of I-394 and I-494 in Minnetonka, is lined with ornamental crab apple trees, a quarter mile of bird potential. I’ll keep an eye on those, too. My waxwing pictures were not as good as I want. I need to find more of those birds.
Here is the pair of Garrison waxwings. Bohemians differ from Cedar Waxwings in subtle ways, the white patches on the wings the most obvious mark. If you look closely at the bird on the right you can see one of those white wing marks.
Grosbeaks and redpolls
Posted by: Jim Williams Updated: November 19, 2012 - 2:12 PMWe went north this past weekend to visit friends and family. The route was cleverly created to offer birding opportunities that never materialized. Going to a specific site tomorrow to see yesterday's specific bird is a long-odds venture.
Entering Moose Lake, our first destination, we found two ornamental crap apple trees five feet from the roadway, holding about a dozen Pine Grosbeaks. That was our first true observation and photo opportunity; that was better. Sunday morning, with a five-hour gap before we left for destination number two, I drove to Duluth. A friend had written about Bohemian Waxwings in his yard. That was my target bird. Read again the sentence above about finding yesterday's bird tomorrow. I did see more grosbeaks there, however, and found yet more on a short visit to Two Harbors.
There is a trail along the Two Harbors lakeshore that begins at the lighthouse. It's a good birding spot. I tried briefly it for whatever offered. In the past I've seen both Black-backed and Three-toed woodpeckers there. This time, I found a cooperative flock of Common Redpolls, with a possible Hoary Redpoll or two. (I'm having photos of those birds examined by someone better at this fussy ID decision than I am.) The possible Hoary Redpoll is shown in the second photo below. Hoary means frosty or white. Compare it with the redpolls in the first photo. Some of these birds are simply light Common Redpolls, however. Thus, the question to my Duluth friend.
As you can see in the photo below the cap on the redpolls, from which they get their name, is red at one angle and black at another. The light refracts differently depending on angle, as it does with hummingbirds. I hadn't noticed that before.
There are waxwings around. There was a report from Shoreview last week, a report from Detroit Lakes this morning. Don't even think about looking for those birds today.
The third photo is of a Pine Grosbeak. I like the way these birds twist themselves into position to pick berries. They have smooth, sleek lines, and colors that flow one into the other.
Sunflower seeds -- the real thing
Posted by: Jim Williams Updated: October 24, 2012 - 11:31 AMWhile in North Dakota last week I scavenged a half dozen sunflower heads, complete with seeds, from a harvested field. These were heads missed by the picker. I wish I had taken more. The finches at our feeders choose the heads first, at least this morning. We saw thousands of acres of sunflowers, about half harvested, in western North and South Dakota and eastern Montana. North Dakota had more by far. There were no birds to be seen in the unpicked fields, although flocks of thousands of Red-winged Blackbirds were seen in many places. Blackbirds are said by some growers to take up to 10 percent of black oil seeds before harvest. Horned Larks and unidentified sparrows were foraging in the debris of harvested fields.
ADVERTISEMENT
recent posts
- Our Christmas star
- Adding insult to injury
- Eagle attacks child -- not!
- A redpoll winter
- On becoming a better birder
- Bird Watcher's Bible -- a complete treasure
- Pelicans on the Gulf
- Early birds
- Birds look better in snow
- Water!
- Nesting habits, neat and messy
- Greenland's melting ice
- Finally, Bohemian Waxwings
- Pelicans arriving at Gulf
- Grosbeaks and redpolls
- Tufted Titmouse and winter finches
- Watch the wind
- Winter birds
Post By Category
ADVERTISEMENT
Links
- American Birding Assoc.
- Blog: Birding to the edge
- 10,000 Birds: conservation, nature
- Buteo Books
- Cornell Lab of Ornithology
- eBird
- grrlScientist
- Blog: Laura Erickson
- Blog: Colder by the Lake
- Blog: Minnesota Birdnerd
- MInnesota Ornithologists' Union
- Patuxent Wildlife Research Center
- Blog: Ornitholature
- ARKive
- Better View Desired
- Birdnet
- DNR stewardship tips
- Saint Paul Audubon Society
- Sax-Zim Winter Birding Festival
inside the StarTribune
-
425 Portland Av. S.
Minneapolis, MN 55488
(612) 673-4000
- Company
- Subscriber Services
- Website
- Buy Ads
- Store
- Connect with Us
© 2013 StarTribune. All rights reserved.
StarTribune.com is powered by Limelight Networks
Newspaper Subscriptions
eEdition
RSS
Newsletters