1. When Heather Dalton, a British-born historian who lives in Melbourne, Australia, took a moment to examine the painting Madonna della Vittoria,” by the Renaissance painter Andrea Mantegna some years ago, she was not in Paris but at home, leafing through a book about Mantegna. Although the Madonna image had been reproduced at a fraction of its true size, Dalton noticed something that she well might have missed had she been peering up at the framed original: perched on the pergola, directly above a gem-encrusted crucifix on a staff, was a slender white bird with a black beak, an alert expression, and an impressive greenish-yellow crest. Moreover, without the context of her own surroundings, Dalton might not have registered the bird’s incongruity. “If I hadn’t been in Australia, I wouldn’t have thought, That’s a bloody sulfur-crested cockatoo!” (via The New Yorker)
2. One bright October morning, James Failing sat on his truck’s tailgate and watched hundreds of shorebirds—Stilt Sandpipers, Long-billed Dowitchers, Roseate Spoonbills—flitting amid the broken cornstalks that rose above flooded fields. Like his grandfather and father before him, Mr. Failing has dedicated his life to farming in the fertile Mississippi Delta. But fall 2020 marked only his third year of creating temporary habitat for bird migration. “If you put a little water out, it’s amazing,” Failing said. “You have all sorts of birds, and I don’t know where they come from or how they know, but they really come bombing in incredibly quickly.” (via Living Bird Magazine)
3. It was 1889 and a fashion craze, which involved adorning hats with not just feathers, but wings and whole birds, was showing no signs of slowing down. It was driving some species, such as egrets, great-crested grebes and a host of beautiful birds of paradise towards extinction. Appalled by the slaughter, a 34-year-old Mrs. Williamson invited a group of women to her home in Didsbury, on the outskirts of Manchester, to discuss how to put a stop to the plumage trade. It was from that meeting that the Society for the Protection of Birds, later known as the RSPB, would bloom and would see her pledge become law 30 years later. On 1 July 1921, the Importation of Plumage (Prohibition) Act was passed, banning the import of exotic feathers and saving many species from extinction. (via BBC)
4. For ornithologists, the elusive nature of birds is just part of the job. Beyond fieldwork, though, access to rare or extinct species or those with a limited range can be especially difficult to get. If you were, say, hoping to study the green-headed tanager (a riotously multicolored songbird native to South America) and unable to travel to the northeastern region of the continent where it can be found, you would have to ask a museum to send you a specimen in the mail. Access to rare specimens, such as those of extinct birds, can be especially difficult to get. That situation may now be changing: TheMoore Lab of Zoology at Occidental College has begun an extensive effort to put 2,000 of its over 60,000 bird specimens online in high-definition virtual representations. (via Scientific American, Occidental College)
5. Across America and beyond, farmers and vineyard and orchard owners are enlisting wild birds—from raptors to songbirds—in a sustainable battle against pests. They erect nest boxes, install raptor perches, or plant inviting native cover—all of which offer less expensive natural pest control than other traditional methods. Birds are environmentally benign, while poisons are not. And pest-controlling birds stay on the job, while pesticides must be reapplied, and the effect of bird-scaring balloons, hawk silhouettes, and propane cannons quickly wears off. (via Living Bird)
6. When the climate in a plant’s usual range becomes hotter than it can tolerate, it must colonize new, cooler areas that might lie many kilometres away. It is not fully clear how plants distribute their seeds across great distances, let alone how they cross geographical barriers. One explanation for long-distance seed dispersal is through transport by migratory birds. Such birds ingest viable seeds when eating fruit (Fig. 1) and can move them tens or hundreds of kilometres outside the range of a plant species3. In this mode of dispersal, the seeds pass through the bird’s digestive tract unharmed and are deposited in feces, which provides fertilizer that aids plant growth. (via Nature)
7. Distress: Conservationists say one of the world's largest eagles has "nearly zero" chance of surviving Amazon deforestation. About 17% of the Amazon has been destroyed over the past 50 years, and losses have recently been on the rise. The harpy eagle is the largest in the Americas, with huge talons for hunting monkeys and sloths in the treetops. The Amazon is regarded as the "last stronghold" for the harpy, with more than 90% of the existing population thought to reside there. Conservation measures, such as moving young eagles and supplementing their diets, will be critical to the survival of the species, Carlos Peres, professor of environmental sciences at the University of East Anglia, UK. added. (via BBC)
8. Hope: On the morning of 16 June, Snowflake spread its wings and let the strong, cold wind of Guadalupe Island help it take a first flight away from its nest. But this was not the first time the young black-footed albatross had soared above the North Pacific Ocean: Five months before, as an egg, Snowflake had been flown more than 6000 kilometers on a commercial airline—in economy plus seating—from Midway Atoll northwest of Hawaii to the remote Guadalupe Island in Mexico. Snowflake's own flight, just 3 days before World Albatross Day, marked a milestone in a binational project of the United States and Mexico, aimed at keeping the birds safe from the rising sea levels that threaten their survival. (via Science)
9. In case you were wondering: Oregon State University researchers have some good news for the well-meaning masses who place bird feeders in their yards: The small songbirds who visit the feeders seem unlikely to develop an unhealthy reliance on them. "There's still much we don't know about how intentional feeding might induce changes in wild bird populations, but our study suggests that putting out food for small birds in winter will not lead to an increased dependence on human-provided food," said Jim Rivers, an animal ecologist with the OSU College of Forestry. (via Science Daily)
10. Concerning: Since May, wildlife officials in various states have had numerous reports of several dead birds or birds with similar symptoms. If they're not dead, they're having symptoms of some sort of neurological issue. Puffy, swollen eyes with a crusty discharge are some of the symptoms spotted in the birds that are falling sick in parts of Cincinnati. "Lots of neurological-type issues with the eyes with blindness, feather loss on the head," Brian Banbury, Executive Administration of Info and Education for Ohio Division of Wildlife, said. Officials in Ohio, Kentucky and Indiana say if you see a potentially infected bird, report it to your state's wildlife department. (via WLWT News)
Bird Photo of the Week
Photo by Hap Ellis, Bald Eagle.
Bird Videos of the Week
By Vice News, “Feral Chickens Are Taking Over Florida”.
Cornell Live Bird Cam - Albatross at Sunset.
Cornell Live Bird Cam - Barred Owl at Night.