Loose Feathers #421

Black Duck (by Scott Nielsen/USFWS)

Birds and birding

• As most North American birders know by now, there is a major flight of Snowy Owls to the East Coast this winter. One of the more impressive results, in addition to the 138 Snowy Owls found in Newfoundland, is that Snowy Owls have even made it to Bermuda. Multiple Snowy Owls have been seen at Sandy Hook.
• The outbreak of conjunctivitis among House Finches provided new data on how a disease becomes an epidemic.
• The real "game changers" in the world of birding field guides are not to be found among printed guides but in mobile field guide apps.
• Hummingbirds can switch easily from burning glucose to burning fructose to make their metabolism as efficient as possible.
• Peahens focus their attention on the lower parts of a peacock's display train.
• The expansion of a reserve in Ecuador will protect the rare El Oro Parakeet and other birds.
• The fleshy red badge on the head of the Pūkeko (the New Zealand subspecies of Purple Swamphen) advertises its fitness, particularly its physical dominance.
• Hummingbirds can survive in the low-oxygen conditions at high altitude because their hemoglobins have high oxygen-binding properties.
• A sea eagle in Australia picked up a motion-sensitive camera and flew off with it while the camera kept filming.
• A team of scientists is attempting to reintroduce the critically endangered Northern  Bald Ibis to Europe.
• It is hard to establish exactly why the Orange-bellied Parrot is so rare.

Science and nature blogging

• 10,000 Birds: Do Snowy Owls really belong in genus Bubo?
• Outside My Window: The Battle Is On
• Nemesis Bird: Things That Look Like Snowy Owls
• View from the Cape: Snowy Owls in the Cape May area 
• Birding Dude: Enjoy Those Snowy Owls But Don't Forget Birding Ethics
• Kymry: Fork-tailed Flycatcher in Hadlyme, Connecticut
• Beetles In The Bush: Party on a pin oak
• Jessecology: Please stop with the Lyme tick nurseries
• Anything Larus: 1st, 2nd and 3rd Cycle Thayer's: Last Day of November
• The Freiday Bird Blog: Tundra Swan: Too Cool Not to Share!
• Earbirding: The Seven Basic Tone Qualities 
• Bird Ecology Study Group: Little Egrets in combat 
• The Rattling Crow: Blackbird alarm calls 

Environment and biodiversity

• US border policy is a human and environmental disaster.
• The New Jersey Pinelands are threatened by an invasion of southern pine beetles. Thanks to warmer winters, the beetles are now able to survive farther north than they previously could.
• A bill proposed in the Senate would gut the Endangered Species Act more radically than even some proposals during the Bush administration. Luckily it is unlikely to go anywhere in this Congress, but it may become a constant threat in the future.
• A new report argues that the recent IPCC report underestimates future sea level rise from climate change.
• The Obama administration gave approval to a pipeline that would carry light oil from Illinois to Alberta for mixing with tar sands crude.
• Dozens of pilot whales beached this week in Florida's Everglades National Park.
• New fossils suggest that Hymenoptera (wasps, bees, and ants) evolved from ancestors similar to Megaloptera (dobsonflies) and Raphidioptera (snakeflies).
• Witch hazel is one of the few shrubs that blooms in the fall.
• Here is a gallery of some of the many forms of camouflage insects use.
• Geologists believe that there are freshwater aquifers buried deep under the seabed of continental shelves, one of the largest reserves being off the Atlantic coast of North America.