1. Let’s start with “Birds are my eyesight” from the New York Times: On an average morning, Susan Glass can sit on the patio at her condominium complex in Saratoga, Calif., and identify as many as 15 different bird species by ear: a stellar’s jay, an acorn woodpecker, an oak titmouse. For her, birding is more than a hobby. “Birds are my eyesight,” said Ms. Glass, a poet and a professor of English at West Valley Community College who has been blind since birth. “When I check into a hotel in Pittsburgh, I might remember the rock dove and the house finch in the parking lot, rather than the architecture.” (via The New York Times)
2. World-renowned songster continues to amaze: Male nightingales have very large repertoires of up to 150 to 200 different song types, one of which is known as a whistle song. During the mating season, male nightingales perform these songs in duels to defend territory and attract mates, sometimes for many consecutive nights. Giacomo Costalunga at the Max Planck Institute for Biological Intelligence in Germany and his colleagues recorded whistle songs from pairs of male nightingales during their mating season in Brandenburg, Germany. They also conducted playback experiments during the mating season and at the birds’ wintering grounds in The Gambia in West Africa. They found that nightingales flexibly adjusted the pitch of their whistle songs to match that of their opponent. When the researchers played pitch-controlled artificial whistle sounds from speakers, the nightingales also matched their pitch to these across a wide range of frequencies. (via New Scientist)
3. The remarkable Veery: It’s summer, and veery thrush birds have nearly finished mating and hatching this year’s generation throughout the northern U.S. and southern Canada. Soon, the brown-feathered, white-bellied bird will make a monumental move, migrating thousands of miles south—across the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea—to South America. It’s a dangerous journey for a small songbird only weighing about 30 grams, and if a hurricane happens to transect that migration, some of those birds may never make it. But every hurricane season is different, and veeries, research shows, have plugged into the global climate cycles that allow them to anticipate how dangerous a season will be. A study published in the journal Scientific Reports in 2018 showed that for two decades, veery migration patterns from Delaware to South America accurately predicted the intensity of the Atlantic Basin hurricane season. (via National Geographic)
4. The Atlantic ran a grim but good article on avian flu: Bird flu has never done this before. At bird breeding grounds this spring and summer, the skies have been clearer and quieter, the flocks drastically thinned. Last year, more than 60 percent of the Caspian terns at Lake Michigan vanished; the flock of great skuas at the Hermaness reserve, in Scotland, may have shrunk by 90 percent. Now more broken bodies are turning up: a massacre of 600 arctic-tern chicks in the United Kingdom; a rash of pelicans, cormorants, gulls, and terns washed up along West African coasts. The deaths are the latest casualties of the outbreak of H5N1 avian flu that’s been tearing its way across the world. (via The Atlantic)
5. And then there is this report from the BBC on avian flu’s impact on Coquet Island’s huge seabird population: RSPB wardens on Coquet Island have called for more research into bird flu after observing how some seabirds appear to have developed immunity. The sanctuary is located a mile off the Northumberland coast and is a breeding ground for up to 80,000 seabirds. Since bird flu was confirmed in June, black-headed gulls, common terns and rare roseate terns have been worst hit. But the sandwich terns have not been affected despite the virus having a "catastrophic" effect on them in 2022. Site manager Stephen Westerberg said more research into the immunity of seabirds was needed as "as some breeds are coping better than others.” (via BBC)
6. Horseshoe crabs, LAL and Red Knots – “…an impossible choice”?: A primordial sea animal that lives on the tidal mudflats of the East Coast and serves as a linchpin for the production of vital medicines stands to benefit from new protective standards. But conservationists who have been trying for years to save a declining bird species — the red knot — that depends on horseshoe crabs fear the protections still don’t go far enough. Drug and medical device makers are dependent on the valuable blue blood of the crabs — helmet-shaped invertebrates that have scuttled in the ocean and tidal pools for more than 400 million years — to test for potentially dangerous impurities. The animals are drained of some of their blood and returned to the environment, but many die from the bleeding. (via Fortune)
7. Promising new North Woods (Maine) study on bird population growth: The northern half of Maine contains 10 million acres of forest with no paved roads, towns, or other significant development. These unorganized territories represent a huge amount of habitat for the Maine plant and animal life. Most of this land is commercial forest. The owners regularly harvest trees to provide the timber and paper we all depend on. The timber harvesting provides a significant number of jobs in northern Maine. With all the bad news about declining bird populations, the 2021-22 data provided some positive news. Forest management practices have improved the population trajectory of many birds. Forty-two species are more abundant now than they were in 1992-94 and only 19 species show a decline. American redstarts increased in density three-fold and black-and-white warblers doubled. Magnolia warblers showed the sharpest decline, about a 33% loss. (via Maine Press Herald)
8. Women birders, Uganda beckons: Bird-watching enthusiasts in Uganda are looking forward to the first-ever international women birder’s conference, which aims to enhance the country’s birding tourism product. The groundbreaking women birders’ conference, scheduled for December 6th to 8th, will see participation from delegates representing over 10 countries. Despite having an impressive 1,100 different bird species, most of which are unique to Uganda, bird-watching (known as birding in tourism) is less developed compared to other attractions such as cultural and physical features, and the famous gorilla trails. (via The Independent)
9. Take that! Fork-tailed drongos outsmarting African cuckoos: Cuckoos have evolved a clever trick that allows them to reproduce without having to do the energy-intensive and time-consuming work of parenting: They lay their eggs in the nests of other bird species. If the unsuspecting parents fail to notice the imposter egg, they’ll accidentally end up raising an interloper chick. But one type of bird—the fork-tailed drongo—is particularly good at foiling the cuckoos’ sneaky plan known as brood parasitism, according to a new paper published Wednesday in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B. Fork-tailed drongos—medium-sized, black or dark grey birds with red eyes that live throughout southern Africa—can suss out and reject African cuckoo eggs in their nests with 93.7 percent accuracy. (via Smithsonian)
10. This is disheartening: Birds get electrocuted on power lines. But people shooting at birds perched on power poles may be even more of a problem. In a survey of five sites in the western United States, two-thirds of birds found dead beneath power lines had been shot. Avians found dead along power lines are often assumed to have died from electrocution, especially if their bodies show burns or singeing, said Eve Thomason, a wildlife biologist at Boise State University in Idaho. Thomason and her colleagues walked along 122 miles of power lines in Idaho, Oregon, Utah and Wyoming, collecting 410 bird carcasses. Back in the lab, the researchers X-rayed the birds, looking for evidence of gunshot wounds or other trauma. (via The New York Times)
11. Identifying those “new kids on the block”: In summer, new and often puzzling birds appear in the garden. It’s tempting to assume that you’ve found something exotic, but what you’re really looking at are the first fledglings of the year. Once their parents stop feeding them, working out the identity of the new kids on the block can be hard (few field guides illustrate recently fledged individuals), but this identification parade should help. Start by asking yourself which adult birds the youngsters most resemble in size, profile, bill-shape and behaviour. Plumage colour and pattern are much less important. Many young birds retain their juvenile plumage for several months until their first moult – and it’s this that can be confusing. (via Discover Wildlife)
12. Back after 180 years!: Bird watchers are flocking to northeastern Wisconsin in the hopes of glimpsing a southern shorebird last seen in the state almost 180 years ago. Logan Lasee, a member of the Bay Area Bird Club, spotted a roseate spoonbill in the Ken Euers Nature Area in Green Bay on July 26. More than 450 people have visited the nature area as of Tuesday. James Andersen, deputy director of the city of Green Bay’s parks, recreation and forestry department, which runs the nature area, told The Associated Press that the bird was last spotted Wednesday evening. He said usually only about a dozen people use the nature area at a time, but that 60 to 70 people were in the area looking for the bird at that time. (via Sentinel-Tribune)
13. No surprise: When the world shut down in the earliest days of the COVID-19 pandemic, people needed to find entertainment and stimulation somewhere. Binging Tiger King on Netflix or making sourdough starter or taking daily walks in nature rapidly became the thing to do. Now, scientists are beginning to quantify just how much collective interest in another COVID hobby—watching and feeding birds—picked up during lockdown. In a study published August 2 in the open-access journal PLOS ONE, a team of researchers used data from Google search index and found that interest in bird feeding surged 115 countries while people were home due to the lockdowns. The work is offering new insight into human-bird interactions around the world. (via Popular Science)
14. Unleashed dogs – is it too much to ask?: Near the mouth of the Santa Ana River, between Newport Beach and Huntington State Beach, lies the habitat of two at-risk bird species whose survival is threatened by jumping, splashing, barking dogs. But local authorities may also be partly to blame for the increased risk to the birds by failing to strictly enforce the rules about dog activity near the habitat, according to environmentalists. The California least tern, an endangered species, and the western snowy plover, a threatened species, nest near the mouth of the river and rely on it to survive. Of the almost 2,400 dogs that were observed on the beach in 2022, about 70% were off their leash, which threatens the bird habitat, according to a recent report by Orange County Coastkeeper, a nonprofit clean water organization. (via Los Angeles Times)
15. Finally, another year, another chance for extinct birds to shine in New Zealand’s annual avian beauty contest: Five extinct species have been included on the ballot to find New Zealand's most popular feathered friend as competition organizers hope to draw attention to endangered birds. New Zealand's annual avian beauty contest has proven highly contentious over the years. The kakapo, a chubby parrot resembling a green-feathered bowling ball which can't fly, couldn't run in last year's Bird of the Year competition. The twice former winner was dropped from the 2022 vote by organizers to help less popular species have a shot at the title. Feathers were also ruffled when a native bat was allowed to enter, then flew off with the 2021 title. This year, competition organizers Forest & Bird will celebrate their centenary by crowning New Zealand's most popular feathered friend in the last 100 years—even if the potential winner no longer exists. (via Phys Org)
Bird Videos of the Week
Video by RVM, “Man Plays Flute While Raven Sings Along”.
Cornell Live Bird Cam - Blue-gray Tanager
Cornell Live Bird Cam - Red-winged blackbirds.