Posts Tagged ‘winter’

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American Pipit

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Thursday, February 2nd, 2012

American Pipit by Lisa Densmore

 

Location: Beartooth Mountains, Montana

Though much of the mountain regions in the country are crying for snow, it’s already been an epic winter in Montana’s Beartooth Mountains where I live. Red Lodge Mountain, my local ski area, reported a 50-inch base prior to New Year’s. The region’s reputation is for moderate snow at best early in the winter, but lots of snow late in the season, often into May. As I watch the wind blow the snow into deep drifts around my house, I recall the plight of 17 American Pipit (Anthus rubescens) nests which were reportedly buried in a snowstorm for 24 hours. The average pipit lays a clutch of three eggs. All of the 51 or so fledglings that were at least 11 days old survived, which was most of them. These brown-striped sparrow-like songbirds are heartier than me!

Adult American Pipit © Rob Curtis/VIREO

American Pipits inhabit open grassland, even in the high country. You can tell an American Pipit from a similar sparrow by its thin bill and its funny habit of constantly bobbing its tail. It breeds in the arctic tundra and similar alpine zones, such as the pass over which the Beartooth Highway travels, which crests 8,000 feet. During the winter, American Pipits migrate to coastal beaches, marshes, fields and river plains where they can forage for insects and seeds. They look like nervous Nellies, pecking at the ground as they run while twitching their tails. This one was photographed by a thermal spring in Yellowstone National Park, which is on the opposite end of the Beartooth Highway from Red Lodge. Though this trickle was hardly a hot pot, it provided plenty of heat to warm up this little bird.

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The Comfort Zone

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Wednesday, February 1st, 2012

White-tailed Deer by Jack Ballard

The question comes from the back seat of the car, not a critical inquiry about my driving, but a query about a half-dozen white-tailed deer.

“Why are those deer all lying on that hump?”

I swivel my eyes to the side of the street and sure enough, a modest bevy of does and fawns are bedded on a mound of grass, a barren and windswept island in a sea of snow.

“They’re just trying to get comfortable.”

“It looks too cold out there to be comfortable.”

It is cold. But “comfort” is a relative word and animals seek it as much as humans. Compared to lying in the snow, the deer have found a fairly dry spot to nap that also absorbs solar radiation better than the white stuff. In fact, thinking about an animal’s comfort is often a good way to find them. On windy days, you’ll discover most mammals on the leeward side of slopes where they’re buffered from the breeze. Birds tend toward perching places in sheltered areas as well. When it’s really cold, animals prefer south-facing slopes that maximize their exposure to the sun. In a summer scorcher, they’re just like us, looking for a shady spot to nap.

White-tailed Deer © Mishakoe

As we motor by the napping whitetails, I can’t help but nudge the heat a bit higher in the car. There is one important difference between the comfort-seeking behavior of humans and whitetails: we can adjust the temperature, they can only adapt.

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A Bad Winter for Rodents

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Friday, January 27th, 2012
Great Gray Owl

Adult Great Gray Owl © Brian E. Small/VIREO

It’s been a very mild and almost snow-free winter in Manitoba so far this year. Good news for us. Bad news for mice and shrews and voles. They rely on a thick blanket of snow to survive the winter.

A couple of years ago as I watched a Great Grey Owl along a road in the boreal forest east of Winnipeg, it suddenly left its perch on a hydro pole, swooped over the road-edge, and plunged, talons-first, into the thick snow. It immediately extricated itself and flew back with a small, squirming rodent.

Wow! I wondered. How’d it do that? I knew that owls had great hearing. But the snow was at least a foot thick. That, it seemed to me, was like me hearing a pin drop a block from my house.

Meadow Vole © Rob & Ann Simpson

And what was a rodent doing in a snow-bank? I thought they hibernated all winter or found a warm place like my basement to hang out.

That’s when I first heard about pukak.

Pukak is that small space under the snow and above the ground that forms when the snow piles up more than a foot or so and when the earth’s warmth melts the bottom layer to form passageways for insects, rodents and tiny mammals.

Cinereous Shrew © Audubon Guides

Mice and shrews and voles use these passageways to seek out seeds and grasses and bugs left over from the summer and fall. At irregular intervals vents form to allow gasses to escape. Owls listen to the tiny noises that emanate from these vents.

House Mouse © Rita Summers

With barely three inches of snow on the ground this year, pukak hasn’t yet formed. That means the rodents can’t leave their winter hideouts. They don’t have to worry about owl attacks, but they are in danger of starving. The thicker the snow, the better their chances of surviving the cold.

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Icicles

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Thursday, January 26th, 2012

Icicles by Lisa Densmore

Location: Avalanche Pass, Adirondack Park, New York

Now that the fake icicles adorning houses for the holidays have been put away until next year, I noticed the real icicles are starting to get rather sizeably. This clump of icy stilettos formed on a small ledge of rock above the trail into Avalanche Lake, one of my favorite backcountry ski routes in the Adirondack Park. I’ve admired these glassy spears on any number of overhangs throughout the United States where temperatures regularly drop below freezing during the winter.

Icicles remind me of stalactites inside caves. Both are shaped like a carrot and form by dripping liquid, but they are different. Icicles are made of water that refreezes as it drips. They grow bigger as water continues to dribble down the same spot. Stalactites are made of minerals left behind when water evaporates.

Though icicles are frozen spikes of water, heat is an important part of their formation process. Sunlight or some other heat source such as a warm building melts ice or snow causing it to drip. As the running water moves away from the heat source and cools, it refreezes. This refreezing process also gives off heat at the molecular level which travels up the icicle. As the heat rises, it insulates the icicle. The insulation is thinner at the bottom and thicker at the top causing the tip to grow quickly and the top more slowly, resulting in an icicle’s elongated shape.

Too bad this heat layer is indiscernible to my cold fingers on a subzero day, though I didn’t dally too long under these wintery daggers with my gloves off. I’m always a little nervous under icicles. They often break off due to their own weight and these looked hefty enough to hurt, especially from below.

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Winter Birding – Ducks

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Wednesday, January 25th, 2012

The winter months can seem like a slow time to bird in land-locked Pennsylvania. In general, the bright warblers have completely deserted the region along with the other colorful species such as Baltimore Oriole, Scarlet Tanager and Rose-breasted Grosbeak.

One group of birds that make winter birding more fun is the ducks. Most species of ducks breed in lakes and ponds scattered across the tundra. As winter approaches, the open water across their breeding range freezes and forces the ducks to migrate southward.

American Wigeon by Drew Weber

The best places to look for ducks are deep reservoirs and lakes that will keep their open water even when it drops below freezing. Species such as Ruddy Ducks, Buffleheads, Ring-necked Ducks and Northern Shovelers can form big flocks at these open lakes and attract other, less common species as well.

Since ducks are generally out on open water, it is often possible to observe them for longer periods of times than the typical songbird. This gives me a chance to practice my photography. I generally rely on digiscoping, which is basically lining up my point and shoot camera behind my spotting scope to get a closer shot of distant birds.

There are two main groups of ducks that we get in good numbers in Pennsylvania, dabbling ducks and divers. Dabbling ducks, like the Blue-winged Teal below, are often found in shallower water, as well as smaller ponds and rivers. They feed primarily along the surface of the water or by tipping headfirst into the water, looking for aquatic plants.

Blue-winged Teal by Drew Weber

Diving ducks, like the Ring-necked Ducks below, feed by diving beneath the surface of the water in search of food and can spend long periods of time feeding along the lake bottom. This can make them harder to observe as they continually disappear from view. The diving ducks are usually found in much deeper water than dabblers. An interesting thing about the diving ducks is that their legs are closer to the rear of the body, making walking on land difficult.

Ring-necked Duck by Drew Weber

When you are out birding your local lake, you are likely to see other birds as well. American Coots are often feeding in medium to large flocks and if you are lucky, you will get to see them wandering around on land, looking positively goofy. Keep an eye out for their big lobed feet that enable them to swim so well.

American Coot by Drew Weber

For more birding tips and photography, be sure to check out my blog, Nemesis Bird.

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Roughing It

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Wednesday, January 11th, 2012
Rough-legged Hawk

Rough-legged Hawk by Jack Ballard

They show up in late fall and stay until spring. Breeding in the far north, in places such as Alaska and northern Canada, Rough-legged hawks (buteo lagopus) are most commonly spotted by residents of the United States in winter. In Montana, these winsome, winged hunters of the sky are very common from December to March in the south-central and southeastern portions of the state. I often spot them perched on fence posts along Interstate 90 between Billings and the Wyoming border.

Rough-legged Hawk Female Light Morph

Rough-legged Hawk, Adult Female Light Morph © Brian K. Wheeler/VIREO

Varied plumage characterizes Rough-legged hawks, sometimes confusing novice birders. I often spot “roughs” with typical, mottled plumage in hues of cream, tan and brown. However, birds that are extremely pale and those exhibiting a dark morph consisting of an overall chocolate brown color with lighter highlights on the wings and tail are fairly common as well.

Rough-legged Hawk Female Dark Morph

Rough-legged Hawk, Adult Female Dark Morph © Richard Crossley/VIREO

While it might seem the abundance of Rough-legged hawks along roadways is happenstance, I believe these hawks are actually attracted to roads in winter. Capable hunters, Rough-legged hawks are scavengers, too. The best photos I’ve taken have been of birds on or near road-killed rabbits, ground squirrels and other birds. I once spied a comely Rough pecking at the breast of an unidentifiable bird partially covered in snow along the highway. Curious, I pulled over, backed up in the breakdown lane and hopped out to see what avian casualty had attracted the hawk’s interest. The carcass turned out to be the body of another Rough-legged hawk with most of its breast eaten. It seems when these birds have to rough it during the winter, any hawk-sized meal is fair game.

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Chickadee Energetics

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Wednesday, December 28th, 2011

Black-capped Chickadee with Seed

Black-capped Chickadees weigh less than a half-ounce or about the same as two nickels in the palm of your hand. As early winter temperatures bounce up and down here in New England as fast as the chickadees at my feeders, it got me wondering how these tiny birds can survive a cold winter night.

Each night they are confronted with the very high energetic demands of staying alive. If they don’t have adequate energy stores to burn, they may not see the light of day. To compensate for the long and cold nights during winter, chickadees increase proteins associated with intracellular lipid transport. Each evening when they go to roost, they have enough fat stores to supply just a bit more energy than they will need overnight.

More fat to burn isn’t the only answer. Chickadees also have metabolic tricks to save valuable energy. Their daytime body temperature is generally cooking at about 108 F. But on a cold winter night they can crank it down by 18 to 22 degrees into a hypothermic state. One study showed that when a chickadee was exposed to 32 F nighttime temperatures, they could reduce their hourly metabolic expenditure by 23 percent.

Each evening as the sun is dropping below the hills and the chickadees are flitting back and forth to my feeders, I know it’s a metabolic race for them to survive another night in the north woods. And for me, I’ll rely on stored energy from the sun and toss another log into the stove.

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Wildlife Highways

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Friday, December 16th, 2011
Whitetail Deer

Whitetail Deer

With 14 inches of new snow in town, I bless the kind folks who have shoveled their sidewalks. I’m not the only one. On an afternoon hike from the Post Office to home, I spy sets of wild turkey tracks and the pointed hoof prints of a whitetail deer in the light covering of snow that’s blown into the cleared walkways. Like people, wildlife prefer to take the path of least resistance on their daily travels, even if it means following “paths” created by humans.

In some cases it creates inconvenience and trouble. Yellowstone National Park bison, seeking an easier place to travel, have trashed many a cross-country ski trail with their large hooves and big patties. They’ve also followed snowmobile trails and highways right out of the park where they come into conflict with nearby ranching interests.

Wildlife observers can learn much about critters by analyzing wildlife highways in winter. I know exactly where whitetail deer like to travel between their bedding areas above my community and the backyard bushes they browse by night. A beaten trail in the snow on a ridge above town betrays their preferred highway.

Our culture readily separates “humans” and “nature.” But the equation isn’t so simple. In many ways, wildlife species mirror the inclinations of people and vice versa. Ease of travel is just one of many penchants we have in common.

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Bulking Up

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Tuesday, October 25th, 2011

I spot the animal along a roadside in a national park, a glimpse of something large and dark, rustling in the undergrowth. The highway is devoid of oncoming traffic, so I whip a quick U-turn for closer inspection. Mystery solved. Planted on all fours near the roadside is an American Black Bear.

Parked, with full attention to focus on the bruin, I realize the animal is frenetically mouthing and mauling a bush for its berries. Although midday, the bear is feeding as frantically as one of my teenage sons after missing three meals. It’s late summer, a time of bounty. Ripe berries abound. There are lots of nutritious insects and scores of rodents and other mammals for Blackie to hunt, not to mention a bounty of roots and plants. All of these things are palatable to a black bear, perhaps the most omnivorous creature in North America. Why is it attacking this berry bush as if it may be its last meal?

In contrast to humans seeking to shed a dozen unwanted pounds, Blackie is bulking up. Yes, there’s plenty to eat at the moment. But in its haunts here in the northern Rockies, this black bear will retire to a den soon, spending the entire winter underground. To maintain the energy needed to survive its hibernation, the bear relies on fat. The typical black bear loses around 30% of its body weight during hibernation.

In late summer and fall, instinct propels black bears to bulk up. They eat ravenously and nearly continually when food sources are available. At this time, bears prefer high-calorie foods that convert easily to fat such as nuts and berries. Has our bear missed a meal? Probably not. It’s just bulking up for winter.

Many biologists believe humans have some innate potential for hibernation, just like bears. From now until November, if you catch me pigging away at the all-you-can-eat buffet, I’m not over-indulging, just preparing for winter.

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Winter Owls

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Tuesday, March 1st, 2011

The great thing about winter owls is that in a good year they can be easily spotted. Unfortunately, this hasn’t been a particularly good year.
Once they come out of the boreal forest in the late fall, Great Gray Owls, Snowy Owls and Hawk Owls pretty much stay put wherever they settle for the winter. And they are diurnal – they hunt during daylight hours. So, if you get a report from someone that there’s a winter owl at a certain spot, you can bet that it’ll probably be there or nearby.
The number of Great Gray Owl reports near Winnipeg this winter is not very high, relative to previous years; I’ve heard that they’ve been seen, but I haven’t been able to get out to tick them off my winter list.
According to Dr. Jim Duncan, wildlife biologist and owl expert, low numbers of Great Grays in the past have coincided with years with thicker snow cover (>180 cm). That’s been the case this winter. Thick snow cover reduces the number of predators that ordinarily feast on meadow voles, their main prey. With their unmatchable sense of hearing, Great Grays have no problem detecting small mammals even under a thick blanket of snow. So, fat healthy (radio-marked) Great Grays are staying back in the boreal forest.
In my neck of the woods Snowy Owl numbers are low this winter as well. But if you check the electric transmission poles and fence posts on major routes in and out of the city, you can almost be assured of finding a couple. We’re nowhere near the record year of 2001 when one party counted 55 Snowies in one day southwest of Winnipeg. It used to be thought that these tundra natives irrupted when the lemming populations of the north plummeted. That simple theory has since been disputed, though there’s some indication that crashes in lemming numbers can account for early arrivals.
Hawk Owls are more easily found this year. They’re not as widespread as they were in 1996-97 when more than 50 were spotted and even I counted a couple of dozen on one outing. And few have ventured into my suburban neighborhood as one did a couple of years ago. I saw that bird every day on my way to and from work usually sitting on the bent-over top of a small spruce tree. Their long tails, big yellow eyes, and non-erect posture make them easy to identify.
Jim Duncan believes that Hawk Owls have clearly had a good breeding season somewhere within a 1,000 mile radius (their normal yearly range) of Winnipeg. That may account for their numbers. All the Hawk Owls he’s encountered thus far have Hatch Year 2010 birds, and they are in excellent condition. One Hawk Owl weighed a whopping 435 grams, possibly the heaviest he’s caught to date. So, they’re not coming here because they’re hungry.

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