1. Let’s start with a fun article from the NY Times on what birding has meant to this birder: Last September, I drove to a protected wetland near my home in Oakland, Calif., walked to the end of a pier and started looking at birds. Throughout the summer, I was breaking in my first pair of binoculars, a Sibley field guide and the Merlin song-identification app, but always while hiking or walking the dog. On that pier, for the first time, I had gone somewhere solely to watch birds. In some birding circles, people say that anyone who looks at birds is a birder — a kind, inclusive sentiment that overlooks the forces that create and shape subcultures. Anyone can dance, but not everyone would identify as a dancer, because the term suggests, if not skill, then at least effort and intent. Similarly, I’ve cared about birds and other animals for my entire life, and I’ve written about them throughout my two decades as a science writer, but I mark the moment when I specifically chose to devote time and energy to them as the moment I became a birder. (via The New York Times)
By Hap Ellis, Red-winged Blackbird - Green Cay Nature Center & Wetlands, Boynton Beach, FL.
2. And then from The Atlantic, another look how the changing climate is upsetting the migration timetables: At a glance, the male western tanager looks like a little flame, its ruby head blending seamlessly into its bright, lemon-colored body. Females are less showy, a dusty yellow. The birds spend their winters in Central America and can be found in a variety of habitats, from central Costa Rica to the deserts of southeastern Sonora, in western Mexico. In the spring, they prepare to migrate thousands of miles to the conifer forests of the Mountain West, flying through grasslands, deserts, and occasionally, suburban yards. To fuel them on their lengthy journey, western tanagers fill up on insects and berries. Like most migrating birds, they eat enormous amounts of food. But as global climate change causes spring to start earlier, birds such as western tanagers are arriving at their destination after what’s known as “green-up,” when flowers begin blooming and insects emerge. (via The Atlantic)
3. Recent news of cows infected with bird flu is “always concerning”: Cornell virology experts are sequencing the bird flu virus that struck cows in the Texas panhandle last week, after work at Cornell and two other veterinary diagnostic laboratories found the highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) virus in cattle samples, a first for this species. Sequencing of the virus may help scientists understand why it jumped to cows and how future outbreaks may be prevented. (via Cornell Chronicle)
4. And from NPR, what to know about bird flu - “A heap of unknowns”: The recent spread of avian influenza in dairy cattle in the U.S. has startled even some scientists who've tracked a global outbreak of the virus over the last few years. “There's a heap of unknowns right now," says Richard Webby, a virologist at St Jude Children's Research Hospital. How widespread is the virus in dairy cattle? What could this mean for humans? None of this is clear yet. The first cases of this H5N1 bird flu strain emerged in North America among wild migratory birds in late 2021 and soon spread to poultry farms. It's now showing up among dairy cows and at a major egg producer and one person who had close contact with cows has been infected. (via National Public Radio)
By Hap Ellis, Blue-winged Teal - Green Cay Nature Center & Wetlands, Boynton Beach, FL
5. “Barcode-like memories” in some birds: While adults might be spending the weekend trying to remember where they have hidden a hoard of Easter eggs, the black-capped chickadee has no trouble recalling where its treats are stashed. Now researchers have discovered why: the diminutive birds create a barcode-like memory each time they stash food. Black-capped chickadees are known for tucking food away during the warmer months – with some estimates suggesting a single bird can hide up to 500,000 food itemsa year. But more remarkable still is their reliability in finding the morsels again. (via The Guardian)
6. More on the “sticky piece of DNA” that is rewriting the story of avian evolution: Keeping birds organized in a neat family tree is a bit of a Herculean task, since there are so many species and their evolution has been a little unclear. However, some advances in genomic sequencing and analysis are beginning to create a more lucid picture of how the planet’s living dinosaurs evolved. In two studies published April 1 in the journals Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) and Nature, scientists reveal that a genetic event about 65 million years ago has misled them about the true history of avian evolution. A section of one chromosome hasn’t mixed together with nearby DNA as it should have. This section is only tiny fraction of the bird genome, but was enough to make it difficult for scientists to build a more detailed bird family tree. (via Popular Science)
7. And this from two of the study’s authors: The largest-ever study of bird genomes has produced a remarkably clear picture of the bird family tree. Published in the journal Nature today, our study shows that most of the modern groups of birds first appeared within 5 million years after the extinction of the dinosaurs. Birds are a large part of our lives, a sign of nature even in cities. They are popular among the general public and well studied by scientists. But placing all of these birds into a family tree has been frustratingly difficult. By analysing the genomes of more than 360 bird species, our study has identified the fundamental relationships among the major groups of living birds. The new family tree overturns some previous ideas about bird relationships, while also revealing some new groupings. (via The Conversation)
8. Are bird bodies changing? Birds' bodies are changing and so are their songs. Over the last 70 years, birds worldwide have been noticeably shrinking in mass or expanding in wing length. Many scientists believe this to be a response to climate change. The changes increase birds' surface area to volume ratio, which allows heat to be released faster from their bodies. But it also impacts how the birds communicate, including the very chirp of their songs. Eleanor Hay recently completed her Ph.D. in trait evolution at Monash University's School of Biological Sciences. She's also a talented artist, illustrating many of the species she studies. Ellie says we've known that many animals, including birds, have been universally getting smaller for a while now. And small birds seem to be getting smaller faster. (via Phys Org)
By Hap Ellis, Purple Gallinule - Green Cay Nature Center & Wetlands, Boynton Beach, FL
9. Sandhill Cranes making a comeback in Lake Tahoe area!: For centuries, there was a familiar spring and summer element in the Sierra Nevada skies: hundreds of enormous white birds soaring over the lakes and mountains. On land, their courtship displays were notable from afar as they leaped, twirled and flapped their elegant black-tipped wings in complicated shows to find a lifelong mate. With a wingspan of around 7 feet and an average height of 5 feet, sandhill cranes were once easy to spot around Lake Tahoe, even from a distance. Due to overhunting and habitat loss, there were only three or four breeding pairs throughout the entire state by 1944, despite once likely numbering in the hundreds of thousands. However, the state of California didn’t grant the birds “fully protected” status until 1970. (via SF Gate)
10. Share the shore! (And get ready for another summer’s Piping Plover stories): As the weather warms up, many of us will be visiting the beach this summer. We’re not the only ones who love the sun and sand—tiny, cotton-ball-sized chicks like Western Snowy Plovers will soon be hatching and running around on those same beaches. They’re well camouflaged and easy to miss, so they need our help to make sure they can grow up safely, even while we’re nearby enjoying the beach with our families and pets. That’s where Audubon’s Coastal Bird Stewardship Program comes in. Audubon staff, partners, and volunteers work together across the hemisphere to protect a multitude of coastal bird species from stressors as they nest, raise their chicks, migrate, or winter on beaches and islands. (via Audubon)
11. From the MIT Climate Portal, this look at birds and wind turbines: There’s a lot to know about climate change — touching on Earth science, engineering, policy, economics, and more. To inform and empower the public on this urgent issue, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) created the MIT Climate Portal, an online hub for timely, science-based information about the causes and consequences of climate change, along with its solutions. We’ve partnered with the Climate Portal to showcase some of the questions submitted to their “Ask MIT Climate” series. Here, MIT faculty and scientists lend their expertise to provide clear and informative answers about how our planet is changing, how it will impact humanity and life on Earth, and what we can do about it. (via The MIT Press Reader)
By Hap Ellis, Black-bellied Whistling-Duck - Green Cay Nature Center & Wetlands, Boynton Beach, FL
12. Nature can be brutal: This week, researchers conducting bird surveys on Pelican Island, located about 9 miles off the coast of Queensland, Australia, captured a rare yet brutal moment in nature: a crocodile emerging from the ocean to snatch a migratory bird. “We believe it is the first recorded meeting between an estuarine crocodile and a pomarine jaeger,” said Lee Hess, a senior ranger with Queensland’s Department of Environment, Science and Innovation, in a press release. “And unfortunately it was a long way to fly to end up like this.” “Pomarine jaegers are an arctic, migratory bird and while it is not uncommon to see them in Australian waters or on coastal islands, there isn’t many recorded sightings on Great Barrier Reef islands,” Hess added. Video released by the agency shows the jaegers walking along the beach and the croc slowly walking out of the water, and as soon as one of the jaegers nears the croc, the croc grabs him and then retreats back into the ocean. (via Outdoors)
13. Partnerships for conservation in action…in Chile: In January, we celebrated the second anniversary of the official launch of the National Bird Conservation Strategy in Chile (ENCAChile), an unprecedented collaborative platform composed of eight public services, eight NGOs, and nine research centers. The goal of this collaboration is to strengthen the conservation of birds and their habitats in the country. Together with these 24 institutions, Audubon is sharing its strategic vision, funding, and experience as a member of the Board of Directors, the Public Policy Working Group, and as a facilitator of the Funding Working Group. (via Audubon)
By Hap Ellis, Red-shouldered Hawk - Green Cay Nature Center & Wetlands, Boynton Beach, FL
14. And finally, the straw-headed bulbul, decimated by the southeast Asian songbird trade, is holding its own…in Singapore!: The early morning air at Hindhede Nature Park in central Singapore is filled with bird calls. But one birdsong clearly stands out from the rest—the long, gurgling call of the straw-headed bulbul (Pycnonotus zeylanicus). Each year, thousands of birds with pleasing calls are taken from Southeast Asia’s forests to be kept at home for entertainment or to participate in singing competitions, leading to a rapid decline in their wild populations. More than 40 species are severely threatened by the songbird trade. The straw-headed bulbul’s population across its range in Southeast Asia has been decimated to meet this demand. The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) currently lists the bird as critically endangered. The species is believed to be already extinct in Thailand and likely Myanmar, as well as likely extinct on the Indonesian islands of Java and Sumatra. The populations in peninsular Malaysia and Indonesian Borneo are also declining rapidly. (via Smithsonian Magazine)
Videos of the Week
By Business Insider, “Why Adam Cement Chickens are so Expensive”.
Cornell Live Bird Cam - Swinhoe's White-eye.
Cornell Live Bird Cam - Townsend's Warbler.