Hairy Woodpecker

Hairy Woodpeckers

Hairy woodpeckers are "heavy" excavators and create a lot of sawdust. Their nostrils are feathered to minimize aspiration of the dust. The eyes close just before the bill hits the wood. 

The bird excavates wood to create a nest or to find insects, which are an important source of food. The insects are lapped up with a very long tongue with a barbed and sticky tip. The tongue is stored in an exceptionally long hyoid bone that wraps around the skull and eye. The tongue ejects and recoils much like the ruler does from a carpenters measuring tape. 

The parents take 17 to 24 days to excavate a nest in a mature live tree. In Southern Alberta nesting is likely in  May. At about 17 days of age, the young are strong enough to come to the nest entrance for food, and by 28 to 30 days of age, they are ready to leave the nest. However, once out of the next, they still continue to be fed by adults for about two weeks. In the June 28th photo above, a male Hairy feeds a youngster at my peanut  feeder.  

Common Merganser

Common Merganser

Last year a Common Merganser brood grew up along the Elbow River behind my home. I watched the babies every week for about a month. As they relocated to the water from shore sites and as they swam, there were clearly a few babies that straggled behind. With each passing week the numbers dwindled from eleven with my first sighting to seven and then to six. The Alberta Breeding Atlas reports that clutch sizes vary from nine to sixteen and that the birds fledge 65 to 85 days after birth. During those first two or three months, coyotes are likely a common predator in this region. 

Merganasers are very common on all the rivers and at my office on the Bow, I regularly see them swimming by. They swim low in the water and they are usually the largest birds on the water. They are strong and fast swimmers and with the current behind them they steam downstream like cruising Battleships.

To take off from the water, these big birds need to run along the surface until he have enough speed to lift off.  

April 22, 2013, along Elbow River. Mergansers are not keen on human company and are quick to flush.



References

The Atlas of Breeding Birds of Alberta. Federation of Alberta Naturalists. 2007.

Sibley, David A. The Sibley Guide to Bird Life & Behavior. Alfred A Knopf, Inc. New York. 2001.

Tudge, Colin. The Bird. Crown Publishers. New York. 2008

Bohemian Waxwing

Bohemian Waxwings - Bombycilla garrulus

Waxwings fly in nifty cohesive flocks and they often turn abruptly in unison. The only other winter bird around my home that flies in cohesive flocks is the starling, which is smaller and stubbier, and nowhere near as pretty.


Waxwings eat fruit and the carotenoid pigments in their diet are responsible for the brilliant red and yellow colours at the tips of their feathers. The name "waxwing" is derived from the red waxy "droplets" that are on the ends of the secondary flight feathers of adults. Deposits of astaxanthin, a bright red carotenoid, are concentrated in the flat, expanded extensions of the rachis that project beyond the feather vanes. 

Yellow carotenoids, incorporated into the vanes at the tips of the tail feathers, are responsible for the trademark yellow tail band.

Waxwings drinking from Elbow River March 28, 2013

For about seven months from fall to spring, the waxwing diet is almost exclusively fruit. The birds arrive on the Mountain Ash, Dogwood, or Chokecherry in my backyard, and a large flock can consume all the fruit from an entire tree in one session. The birds pluck the whole fruit. The birds breed later in the season to coicide with the ripening of the local fruit. 

During the summer, the birds also eat insects, especially emerging aquatic insects. The perched birds in my photos above were doing just that. They demonstrated typical flycatcher eating behavior along the Elbow River. Since waxwings are related to flycatchers, this makes sense.    

The waxwings in the photos above and below were among dozens that congregated on ice along the Elbow River during a sunny warmer January day. The ice was melting and the birds were eating something red, likely berries, that had been frozen in the ice.


References

Sibley, David A. The Sibley Guide to Bird Life & Behavior. Alfred A Knopf, Inc. New York. 2001.

Tudge, Colin. The Bird. Crown Publishers. New York. 2008

American Dipper

American Dipper

There are dippers along the Elbow River behind my home. The birds migrate south in the fall to feed along streams that are still open and that offer access to the aquatic invertebrates that are a principle source of nutrition. During spring they relocate north to nest and after breeding they will move even further north.  

These birds are the only truly aquatic passerines. They have their own Family (Cinclidae) and are related to thrushes. 
These birds are adapted to freezing-cold rushing water. With twice as many contour feathers as non-aquatic passerines and a thick coat of down, they are antithesis of the human snow birds; they seem to enjoy Canadian winters. Dippers preen a lot to maintain the waterproof and insulation properties of their feathers.  

Their eyelids are covered in white feathers and when they blink, the effect is startling.  

Their two most common feeding techniques are to either walk along the ice edge of the stream or paddle with their flippers in the turbulent water. Either way, they intermittently submerge their head and once they identify food, they dive and then walk along the bottom of the stream. Their stong legs and toes are adpated to walk on stream floors and their stubby wings are adapted to paddle on the surface.  

The ability to see both above and below water is fasciliated by iris muscles adapted to change the shape of the lens.

Their blood oxygen capacity is much higher than non-aquatic songbirds and allows them to remain sumerged for up to 30 seconds while foraging.


References

Sibley, David A. The Sibley Guide to Bird Life & Behavior. Alfred A Knopf, Inc. New York. 2001.

Tudge, Colin. The Bird. Crown Publishers. New York. 2008

Old Refrigerators

Old Refrigerators

Energy conservation is important.

Today I learned that the CO2 in our atmosphere currently 387 parts per million (ppm) and the amount has been rising about 2 ppm per year. Prior to the start of the Industrial Revolution the level had been less than 290 ppm. This rate of increase is alarming.

This weekend Louise mentioned that our old "beer fridge" was a real energy consumer. A quick check on the Internet revealed that fridge technology has resulted in energy reducing improvements of 190% in the last few decades. In 1984 the kilowatt hours (kwh) expended per year by the average fridge was about 1500 kwh. By 1994 the amount was down to 100 kwh and currently the average is about 400 kwh. Louise and I visited the local appliance mega mart and confirmed that new fridges with the EnergyStar rating expend about 380 to 500 kwh depending on overall, size, freezer capacity (freezers use more energy), and external drinking water availability. We found a fridge without a freezer that consumed only about 300 kwh per year. We didn't purchase the fridge because I wondered whether we needed an extra fridge at all. As soon as we arrived home I disconnected the "beer fridge" and transferred the contents into our regular freezer and fridge or into the pantry.