Innehållsförteckning för July/August 2017 från BirdWatching

This issue features the first piece we’ve ever published from a successful television personality. Ian Harding, who stars in the popular show Pretty Little Liars, which recently ended after seven seasons, has written Odd Birds, a warm and engaging memoir about how the seemingly different pursuits of birding and acting have defined his life. In the chapter “Rediscovering Birds,” excerpted on page 32, he writes about reviving his passion for birds during a break from the show. The 30-year-old sees a connection between acting and birding. “There’s this whole thing about being in the moment,” he says. “In acting, between ‘action’ and ‘cut’ you have to get very focused, and [it’s] very much so with birding. Your eyes and ears are open, and you’re taking in everything around you, and…

Through September 17, the Museum of American Bird Art at Massachusetts Audubon in Canton, Massachusetts, will present “In a Natural State: Barry Van Dusen Paints the Nature of Mass Audubon.” Van Dusen, the museum’s artistin- residence and an illustrator whose works have appeared in variety of nature-related books and publications, has visited nearly all of Massachusetts Audubon’s 56 wildlife refuges over the past two years. The exhibit of his watercolors chronicles the diversity of habitats and wildlife found in the refuges; nearly half of the more than 100 paintings he has created for his residency are on display. “Field sketching has become my way of exploring and discovering the natural world,” Van Dusen says. “My sketchbooks are my science lab and my art workshop. Through the drawing process, I’m able…

It’s in September that the Fork-tailed Flycatchers show up in Puerto Ordaz, Venezuela, on the eastern edge of the llanos, grasslands that stretch hundreds of miles west into Colombia and are big enough to fit the state of California and then some. Late each afternoon, the flycatchers converge by the tens of thousands on several large trees along a busy city street, swirling in the air like a mass of murmurating starlings before descending to roost. “The sky just darkens, but it’s too early for it to be nightfall,” says Maggie MacPherson, a researcher who witnessed the spectacle in Puerto Ordaz in 2012. “It’s like a tornado.” The swarm of birds swoops down with a racket, a sustained thwacking as thousands of pairs of wings and feet crash into branches…

Situated on the exposed southwest tip of Point Roberts, Lighthouse Marine Park has an abundance of birds (but no lighthouse!). The ocean drops to 400 feet deep offshore, and the mingling of salt water with fresh water from the nearby Fraser River makes it an excellent feeding area for waterbirds. I love visiting in September, when migrating terns and Bonaparte’s Gulls are diving for fish and there’s a chance of seeing them harassed by a Parasitic Jaeger. In winter my fingers turn icy as I scan the pounding surf for Long-tailed Ducks and search for Black Turnstones camouflaged among the wet pebbles of the beach. The dozens of scoters, mergansers, loons, cormorants, and grebes bobbing in the waves test my identification skills to the maximum. Spring brings skeins of Brant…

This favorite spot along South Carolina’s coast features a variety of habitats that can yield many species in a day’s visit. The entrance is a tract of longleaf pine forest where you can look for the highly sought Red-cockaded Woodpecker and Bachman’s Sparrow, as well as Summer Tanager and Brown-headed Nuthatch. Beyond the forest, you will come to an open area with trailheads, picnic tables, and numerous live oaks draped in Spanish moss. From here, you can choose one of several trails that will take you to either a freshwater swamp along an 800-foot boardwalk, old impoundments, pine forest, or tidal wetlands. Along the boardwalk in the breeding season, look for Prothonotary Warbler, as well as Wood Stork and a variety of wading birds perched high in the cypress trees.…

As a field of biological research, the study of extreme climatic events is in its infancy, but interest in the impact of severe droughts, floods, and other events on nature is growing rapidly. That’s partly because it is now increasingly clear that the impact of extreme events on animal behavior, ecology, and evolution could well be greater than that of the “normal” periods in between, and it’s also because the frequency of events is likely to increase due to climate change. In the June issue of Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B, researchers at the Netherlands Institute of Ecology report on how a few bird species, including Eurasian Oystercatcher, are affected. On a Dutch barrier island in the Wadden Sea, Martijn van de Pol and his colleagues used time-lapse…

A VALUABLE EGG: Seurat, an 18-year-old female Whooping Crane steps carefully Secret life of birds around her egg, which she laid in her nest this spring at the International Crane Foundation in Baraboo, Wisconsin. She and her mate are on exhibit to visitors and build a nest in early May each year. Managers remove their eggs, and those that are fertile are hatched and reared in the foundation’s breeding facility — a key part of the ongoing reintroduction program of the world’s rarest crane.…

Alabama Coastal BirdFest A variety of planned and selfdirected birding opportunities are available at this festival in the Five Rivers area east of Mobile. Participants can expect to see gulls, herons, egrets, and sandpipers and other shorebirds. A bird and conservation expo will be held on the Fairhope campus of Coastal Alabama Community College. October 4-7 “Ding” Darling Days During “Ding” Darling Days at J.N. “Ding” Darling National Wildlife Refuge on Sanibel Island, Florida, participants will bird on beach walks, boat tours, and kayak trips. Notable species include Mangrove Cuckoo, Reddish Egret, and Yellow-crowned Night-Heron. Free tram tours, wildlife presentations, and a variety of family events will take place throughout the week. October 15-21 Cape May Fall Festival This southern New Jersey event coincides with peak fall bird migration. Counts…

The northern edge of Forktailed Flycatcher’s yearround range is in southcentral Mexico, and yet, every year a few individuals turn up in the United States or Canada. Flycatchers have been recorded in more than half of the lower 48 states, as well as Ontario, Quebec, the Maritime Provinces, and Bermuda. Most records are in Texas, Florida, and along the Atlantic Coast, from North Carolina to Newfoundland. The birds are usually seen in spring or mid- to late fall, and when they stay in one spot for a day or two, they’re sure to draw a crowd. In the 2014 book Rare Birds of North America, Steve N. G. Howell and Will Russell say most of the vagrants appear to be of the migratory T. savana savana subspecies — birds that flew north instead of…

North America’s boreal forest is vast, and vastly important from the standpoint of bird conservation. More than 300 bird species rely on the region for at least part of the year, and dozens of species breed almost entirely within the zone. Included among the boreal breeding avifauna are birds that winter throughout North, Central, and South America, as well as the Caribbean, so protecting the birdlife of the region is a goal with widespread consequences. Over such a broad area, threats to the habitat are varied, but their cumulative effect is large. Logging has been a significant threat in the past, but recently there have been encouraging moves toward more sustainable forestry practices. However, oil and gas development has been increasing, as have mining activities. Even when local developments cover…

I truly enjoy the diversity of birdlife surrounding the heaping summit of Mt. Pinos, straddling Ventura and Kern counties in southern California. At 8,847 feet, it is the highest summit in the Transverse Ranges and also in Ventura County. Cloaked in fragrant, mixed evergreen forests, the flattop summit is home to one of the most significant populations of birds of prey in the Golden State, including five species of owl, Golden Eagle, and Northern Goshawk. Endangered California Condors typically soar on afternoon thermal updrafts. You can drive nearly to the summit. From the parking area it’s an easy two-mile hike along a dirt road to its high point before entering the Chumash Wilderness. Mt. Pinos is considered by the Chumash Indians to be the center of the world, where everything…

While I was walking a wooded area near a Michigan pond one spring, the forest floor stopped me cold. It was carpeted with White-throated Sparrows — the largest sparrow flock I had ever seen — that apparently had dropped in overnight. The birds were foraging and affirmed the old adage, “Birds of a feather flock together.” Part of a bird’s feeding time is spent looking around and being alert for predators. A single bird must balance the two critical activities and is vulnerable to a sneak attack. If a second or third bird joins the first, and all three randomly check for predators, the total amount of time watching for threats increases significantly. It doesn’t take many individuals grouped together to ensure at least one of them is keeping watch…

The Home Place: Memoirs of a Colored Man’s Love Affair with Nature, by J. Drew Lanham, Milkweed Editions, 2016, hardcover, 232 pages, $24; 2017, paperback, 240 pages, $16. J. Drew Lanham, an alumni distinguished professor of wildlife ecology and master teacher at Clemson University, grew up on a 200-acre farm and forest in Edgefield County, in western South Carolina. Edgefield, he writes is “a hidden gem, a source of biodiversity that is easy to pass by on the way to somewhere else.” It was where Lanham, growing up in the 1970s, gradually fell in love with nature — the place that led to his career and his lifelong interest in birding, hunting, and conservation. In The Home Place, which was a finalist for the John Burroughs Medal, Lanham describes his…

President Trump’s attack on national monuments has struck a nerve with Americans, generating tons of media coverage and an outpouring of support for these spectacular public lands. Secretary Ryan Zinke’s Interior Department has opened a 15-day comment period for Bears Ears National Monument and a 60-day comment period for the rest of them. That’s ostensibly so people can share their thoughts on the administration’s “review” of 27 monuments created since 1996. More likely it’s to give Trump and Republicans political cover when they try to hand monument land over to the oil, gas, coal, and timber industries. There’s a significant amount of misinformation being spread by Trump and other monument opponents, but what’s clear is that national monuments and the Antiquities Act, which gives a president authority to designate national…

Q I saw a peculiar duck in an urban park. It looked like a male Mallard, except that it had a lot of white on its neck and chest. I thought it was Mallard crossed with a white domestic duck, but my friend said it was a variety of domestic duck. Who is right? — Dave Paul Thompson, New York, New York A Technically, you are both likely correct. Nearly all domestic ducks are descended from the familiar Mallard, a duck native to much of the Northern Hemisphere and introduced elsewhere in the world. The all-white domestic duck, often known as the Pekin Duck, was developed from the Mallard. So were several varieties that maintain plumage similar to wild Mallards, such as the Duclair, which is white-bibbed like the one you…

For species in which both parents work together to raise their offspring, cooperation is key — it’s as true for birds as it is for people. A new study from The Auk: Ornithological Advances shows that pairs of Common Murres update each other on their condition so that when one partner needs a break, the other can pick up the slack. Common Murre parents trade duties throughout the day — one stays at the nest while the other leaves to find a fish for the chick. Because brooding the chick requires much less energy than foraging, staying at the nest is preferable for a bird that’s in poor condition. Linda Takahashi, Anne Storey, and Carolyn Walsh of Newfoundland’s Memorial University, along with Sabina Wilhelm of the Canadian Wildlife Service, studied…

FIRST IN MAINE: This immature male Vermilion Flycatcher was spotted April 17 via a web-cam pointed at an Osprey nest on Hog Island. FIRST IN MAINE: This Fieldfare, an Old World thrush, was seen April 19 with a small flock of robins west of Newcastle in Lincoln County. FIRST IN INDIANA: Far from its range in the West, this Golden-crowned Sparrow showed up in mid-April in a suburban Indianapolis garden. FIRST IN ARIZONA: On May 6, birders at Mormon Lake south of Flagstaff spotted this Common Crane, a visitor from Eurasia. SECOND IN MICHIGAN: This Garganey, an Old World duck, was found in early May at the mouth of the Tahquamenon River in the Upper Peninsula. FIFTH IN FLORIDA: Birders found this Bahama Woodstar in mid-May at the Maritime Hammock…

August ranks among the richest of birding months. Southbound shorebirds are near peak diversity, and many songbird species are starting their southern push. One day in early August, I was privileged to be standing on the banks of Great Bear Lake in Arctic Canada and was astounded by the number of migrating warblers bunched up along the rocky shoreline. Farther south, at established hawk-watching junctions, a few raptors can always be counted upon to make an August appearance including Bald Eagle, Osprey, Broad-winged Hawk, and American Kestrel. Watch the weather and enjoy the parade. In my corner of the planet, Cape May, New Jersey, the southbound migration of Yellow Warbler peaks during the first week of August; the exodus of American Redstart and Northern Waterthrush peaks at month’s end. A…

Brittany Woodthorp walked a sandy beach in May 2016 at Waugoshance Point in Michigan’s Wilderness State Park, like she has for nearly a decade, looking for signs of nesting Piping Plovers. The park, 11 miles west of Mackinaw City, at the northern tip of the Lower Peninsula, was once a stronghold for the Great Lakes population of nesting plovers — holding at least 14 nesting pairs decades ago. The last time a pair nested at the point was in 2006. Woodthorp, a plover monitor for the Michigan Department of Natural Resources, heard the telltale piping sound. Then she saw a Piping Plover and then another. A pair! Every day after that, she trekked two miles to the spot. And when she saw the male do its goose-step courtship display next…

I’ve played a handful of different roles in my relatively short career as an actor. I’ve been a French aristocrat, a jellyfish, a heroinaddicted pornographer, a Roman centurion, a cat burglar, Pfizer trainee #1. At a summer theater program, I once played a pair of haunted cowboy boots. Most of all, though, I’ve enjoyed getting to play America’s most beloved pedophile [on Pretty Little Liars]. The role of Ezra Fitz — despite the creep factor and the obvious ethical issues of dating a minor who happens to be one of my students — has been an incredible learning experience. I’ve played the part for seven years now, longer than any other role I’ve had, and I’ve grown substantially as an actor and as a person. The first few seasons were…

Throughout the year, Goose Pond Fish and Wildlife Area never disappoints. I look back at the many times I’ve birded the area, and the memories are too numerous to recount, but here are a few: sorting through all the shorebirds to find a Curlew Sandpiper in May 2012; having both a White-faced Ibis and a Marbled Godwit in the same scope view last fall; and gathering with other birders from around the country to admire a wayward Hooded Crane among the thousands of Sandhills in February 2012. And earlier this year a Prairie Falcon was kind enough to circle above me. Even without the rarities, Goose Pond offers more than 8,000 acres for birders to explore. It provides breeding habitat for Black-necked Stilt, Least Tern, Henslow’s Sparrow, Blue Grosbeak, and…

Every summer, I am thrilled anew by the bounty of birds in my backyard. Our cherry trees draw in tanagers, orioles, warblers, and a host of other colorful birds. Dozens of Ruby-throated Hummingbirds visit our feeders and backyard flowers, dart about capturing insects swarming here and there, and take quiet siestas in our trees. From mid-July through early September, I can count on a dozen or more Cedar Waxwings any time I step outside, feasting on berries and flying insects both. Their soft, sibilant snores define the sleepy, comfortable ambiance of late summer afternoons. Scanning the bushes and trees and keeping a careful watch on my birdbaths, I spot a host of other birds, from flycatchers to finches. A few of them nested in the neighborhood, but the vast majority…