1. Introducing “an Australian supermodel for the ages”: Meet an Australian supermodel for the ages: six feet tall with a sculptured visage, endless legs and piercing orange eyes. “They’re the glamour animal for the rainforest, here in North Queensland,” said Justin McMahon, a land manager for Rainforest Rescue, an environmental nonprofit that protects and restores the Australian rainforest. But the southern cassowary, a secretive, emu-like bird famed for its killer kick and razor-sharp, throat-slitting talons on each foot, isn’t just a pretty face. As the draft of a government recovery plan for the species released this week describes, the birds are what is known as a “keystone species,” indicating that they play an important role in the ecosystem. (via The New York Times)
2. Talk about a lifetime achievement! Documenting 441 species in one California county – worth reading in full: Retired high school teachers Tom and Joanne Heindel had spent decades pursuing a daunting challenge in bird science: A survey of every species in Inyo County’s otherworldly tableau of lofty peaks glazed with snow, desert plains, spiky lava fields, rivers and canyonlands. Armed with notebooks and matching Questar telescopes, they prowled every remote dirt road as far as they could in a 4-wheel-drive truck. Along the way, there was much to learn from each species. Whether it was a great blue heron perched on top of a sand dune or a cactus wren in full song at 10,500 feet in a bristlecone pine forest, they all provided lessons on adaptation to changing ecological conditions in the area southeast of Yosemite National Park, where the eastern Sierra Nevada range and the Mojave Desert collide. (via The Los Angeles Times)
3. Interesting piece by Cornell Lab Fellow Jeffrey Wells on how boreal wildfires affect birds: With wildfire smoke warnings in parts of Maine this past weekend, we are experiencing some of the unhealthy air that people in New York City and other urban areas dealt with a few weeks ago. Our discomfort is minor compared to those who live in the Boreal Forest region of Canada where the fires generating this smoke are occurring. Many people across Canada have lost homes and cabins already this season from these fires. Others have had to evacuate to places far away, not knowing whether the flames will spare their communities from destruction. Birds, too, are impacted by these massive fires and the smoke they generate. But there has been little research on exactly what happens to individual birds or their populations overall in these circumstances. (via Penobscot Bay Pilot)
4. “An audio postcard to future generations” – from Acadia National Park: The mountains, lakes, deep woods and rugged coastlines of Maine's Acadia National Park are home to more than 300 species of birds. Volunteers are now making recordings to document the avian soundscape, which is changing quickly. Maine Public's Murray Carpenter reports. At sunrise on a June morning, Laura Sebastianelli is starting off down a trail in Acadia National Park. She's wearing headphones and holding a big microphone that looks like a satellite dish about the diameter of a large pizza. Soon, she aims it in the direction of a warbler. (via Wyoming Public Radio)
5. And speaking of Maine, any reader on the Maine coast who is looking for Atlantic Puffins or Arctic Terns, take note: What a week! It only rained twice — once for three days, once for four. The fog rolled into Stonington on Saturday, and it’s probably still there. It looked like my second attempt this year to visit the Atlantic puffin colony on Seal Island would be as futile as the first. By the time of our 1 p.m. departure last Sunday, the Seal Island trip was a go. It was still foggy, but I had reason for optimism. First, there are different kinds of fog. When warm air comes off the land and hits cold water, the fog can get impossibly thick. But when warm southerly air is blowing over the ocean, the fog is often thinner. Also, a south wind meant that we would be in the lee of the mile-long island. The water would be calm while we were watching the birds. Furthermore, I knew that the puffins would be buzzing all around us, as well as just sitting on the water close by. This was going to be a good trip
6. Birds and glass – one Spring day in NYC: Every year, up to 230,000 birds meet an untimely death in New York City by colliding with building glass. During migration, artificial lights lure birds into the thick of the city, where they find themselves surrounded by a house of mirrors. Disoriented and exhausted, perhaps drawn to inviting vegetation reflected or framed by a window, they crash as they try to escape. At a national scale, these losses pile up: The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service estimates that as many as 988 million birds die in building-glass collisions each year. That’s more than 3,000 times the death toll from collisions with wind turbines. Others say the annual total likely reaches 1 billion birds. (via Audubon)
7. Understanding bird flocks - synchronizing “so precisely”: Though we understand the main reasons why birds flock, some aspects of this phenomenon are still debated. Clearly, there’s safety in numbers – and not just because of the odds. Solitary individuals are easily picked off by predators, but in crowds many eyes watch for danger. The effort of finding mates is also reduced, and flocking may improve aerodynamic efficiency. Each individual must follow three basic rules: move in the same direction as your neighbour, stay close to them, and avoid collisions. This relies on sensory systems that detect position and movement accurately, and on rapid responses that co-ordinate directional changes. Nevertheless, a single bird can alter the direction of a whole flock – and which bird that is can change during each movement. (via Discover Wildlife)
8. A good piece on the Motus Wildlife Tracking System: For those who study bird migration using state-of-the-art radio technology, the heart of Berkshire County has a great big dead zone. Birds simply can’t be tracked. The pulses from tiny radio transmitters carried on their backs can’t be picked up because receiving stations are too far away. Now, there’s a proposal to site a 30-foot radio tower at the top of Washington Mountain Road — in one of that town’s scenic vistas. Siting a tower there would help fill in a piece of a grid that is used to track birds that are studied in Massachusetts throughout North and Central America. Researchers are paying close attention to birds to determine why there has been such a profound loss in the migratory bird population and what, if anything, can be done to reverse course. (via The Berkshire Eagle)
9. Breakthrough!: A key defense that blocks nearly all bird flu when it attempts to invade our body has been discovered by scientists. Bird flus have been involved in four pandemics since 1918 - killing millions of people. The research, led by the University of Glasgow, showed those pandemics and normal winter flus had evolved ways of getting round this "powerful barrier". The team think we will soon be able to predict which of the flus currently in birds pose the biggest risk. The scientists were investigating spillover events. These are the moments a person catches an infection from an animal. This jump across species is a critical step in the start of a new pandemic. (via BBC)
10. Listing the White-tailed Ptarmigan – the effort continues: As climate change warms Washington's mountain ranges, environmentalists are suing the federal government to protect one snow-loving bird of the Cascades. The Center for Biological Diversity filed a lawsuit against the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in federal court in Arizona on Thursday, demanding the agency provide Endangered Species Act protections for the Mount Rainier white-tailed ptarmigan, a beloved species that thrives in the fluffy snow and alpine meadows from southern British Columbia to Mount Adams. The agency missed a deadline to complete the process of listing the ptarmigan as threatened, the lawsuit alleges. The center first petitioned for the listing in 2010. (via Phys Org)
11. So many islands need this kind of effort: On a bright Sunday morning the wildlife-lovers gather in Miramar, a scenic peninsula. They are on an exterminating mission. Predator-Free Miramar aims to protect birds in this area of Wellington, New Zealand's capital, by ridding it of rats - every last one of them. After donning hi-vis jackets, the volunteers are handed peanut butter - ideal bait for rodents - and poison. Each is assigned a patch where they will check coil traps and toxin-laced bait boxes. "Good luck fellows," says Dan Coup, who leads the group. (via BBC)
12. Hope this helps: Speaking before Hawaii’s conservation community on Tuesday, an emotional U.S. Interior Secretary Deb Haaland announced more federal help in the increasingly urgent effort to save native forest birds facing extinction, largely due to climate change. The Department of the Interior, she said, has committed $16 million toward helping 12 honeycreeper species whose numbers have been battered by avian malaria under the agency’s new Hawaiian Forest Bird Conservation Keystone Initiative. That includes $14 million in a long-term plan to help the birds released late last year, plus an added $2 million from this year, according to Interior officials. All of the funding comes from the recently passed Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, they added. (via Civil Beat)
13. Getting more “bird-friendly” on college campuses: Three days a week, Marie Muñiz, ecology student and campus chapter member at the University of North Texas, wakes up at dawn and walks around certain campus buildings looking for dead birds. More than a thousand miles east, Rebekah Davis, PhD student and native plant garden manager at the University of Central Florida, is restoring vital habitats for birds in her community. From the coastal shores of California to the Florida Everglades, student leaders are ensuring that birds and the places they need are protected through the Audubon on Campus program. There are more than 70 campus chapters across the country, and the Audubon on Campus program is currently working with 130 schools nationwide to activate their Campus efforts. (via Audubon)
14. Put those sheers down!: A KXAN viewer’s discovery of a nest full of baby cardinals in her backyard begged the following question: Is it illegal to remove or handle a bird’s nest in Texas? Central Texas resident Julia Maloy went to trim a small, bushy tree in her backyard when she spotted the babies. She said she was tipped off by an adult cardinal flying close to the bush. A spokesperson for the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department said both state and federal legislation prohibit the intentional removal or destruction of nongame birds, their eggs and nests. (via KXAN News)
15. Finally, a short – but beautiful – set of photos of Blue-throated bee-eaters from Hubei province, China: A group of blue-throated bee-eaters gathered recently on a sandbar in Yuliangzhou, Xiangyang, Hubei province, attracting bird enthusiasts and nature lovers. The birds, acclaimed by many as the most beautiful small birds in China, are known for their distinctive blue throats and feathers that display a variety of colors, including blue, green, chestnut and black. In summer, the birds nest and breed in regions south of the Yangtze River. They are commonly found in open areas near the edges of forests and sparse woodlands, in shrubs and on grassy slopes. (via China Daily)
Bird Videos of the Week
By National Geographic, “Banding a baby bald eagle at the National Arboretum”.
Cornell Live Bird Cam - Albatross Weigh-in.
Cornell Live Bird Cam - Hummingbirds.