Loose Feathers #500

Blue-winged Teal / Photo: Tom Koerner/USFWS

Birds and birding news

• Learning to use printed field guides can be a challenging process but prepares one to recognize unfamiliar species.
• When birds nest close to reservoirs, some nests get flooded as the reservoirs fill, but other nests benefit from reduced predation and other factors.
• Further speciation among Darwin's finches would require the extinction of one or more species. 
• Gannets in Britain are being tracked via the cellphone network. 
• The Bald Eagle population along the James River in Virginia continues to increase; this year surveys recorded 236 pairs and 313 young, a 6% increase over last year.

Science and nature blogging

• ABA Blog: Think You Know Sharp-tailed Sparrows? Think Again 
• 10,000 Birds: What’s in a Name: What’s in an Adjective?
• Bug Eric: How to Respond to an Identification Request Online
• National Moth Week: The Year of the Sphingidae – Pollination
• Tetrapod Zoology: The Romanian Dinosaur Balaur Seems to Be a Flightless Bird 
• Brooklyn Parrot: Two large wild parrot nests demolished on Staten Island

Environment and biodiversity

• The reasons for honeybee declines are complex and cannot be reduced to pesticides or GMOs.
• Butterfly collections are still important for taxonomic research and for identifying species in need of conservation.
• Congress is updating chemical regulations in the wake of the Elk River spill.
• A rainy June has mostly ended the potential for drought in New Jersey, but there is still an intense drought for much of the western U.S.
• Climate change will bring a greater chance for extreme weather.
• An EPA report estimated that unchecked climate change would cost billions.
• Bayonne residents are concerned about lead paint flakes from a bridge reconstruction project.
• If you go hiking (or birding) in hot weather, remember to bring plenty of water.

This is not only my 500th post in this series, but it also falls close to this blog's 10-year anniversary.

Loose Feathers #499

Ruffed Grouse with chicks / Photo by Lindsay Stedman/USFWS

Birds and birding news

• Hazing ravens with lasers may offer a nonlethal way to protect desert tortoises from predation.
• A study of Saltmarsh and Nelson's Sparrows in New England found that hybrids may not be diagnosable in the field.
• Reintroduction of Northern Bobwhite to the New Jersey Pinelands is going well; so far 45 of the 80 birds released have survived and there are at least 3 nests.
• Researchers are experimenting with ways to coordinate surveys of American Oystercatchers across multiple government agencies.
• Nightingales with more orderly or complex songs feed their offspring more often.
• Male birds that do not hold breeding territories help preserve genetic diversity in endangered species through extra-pair mating.
• A composer in New York combined the songs of the state's breeding birds into a musical composition.
• A Bald Eagle killed by a car near Rochester was the nation's oldest at 38 years old.

Science and nature blogging

• Laura's Birding Blog: 2015 Mourning Dove Survey
• Mark Avery: African vultures plummet in numbers - new study shows
• Extinction Countdown: The Sneaky Ways Two Frogs Are Beating a Killer Fungus
• March of the Fossil Penguins: King Penguins and Ice Ages
• Bug Eric: The Myth of "Good Bugs" and "Bad Bugs"
• Not Exactly Rocket Science: The Distributed Brainpower of Social Insects

Environment and biodiversity

• Yesterday Pope Francis published an encyclical on climate change and the environment.
• Scott Walker has systematically dismantled Wisconsin's environmental laws and muzzled the state's scientists on issues like climate change.
• This is National Pollinator Week. Here are some ways you can help pollinators. More bee species need protection than just the ones that are known to pollinate crops. A new survey is studying Alaska's bumblebees.
• Researchers are experimenting with flies from the Pacific Northwest to control hemlock woolly adelgids in eastern forests.
• Native Bella Moths are helping control invasive Crotalaria plants in Florida.
• The poorest areas are often the most polluted.
• The beach rose manages to survive in conditions too harsh for most plants.

Loose Feathers #498

Great Egret fishing in the Raritan / my photo

Birds and birding news

• The big story this week is that the House of Representatives passed a spending bill that includes a provision that bans enforcement of the Migratory Bird Treaty Act. The ABA Blog has a good summary of what is at stake and what you can do about it.
• Veeries have been able to nest successfully in non-native shrubs.
• Light pollution distracts Balearic Shearwater fledglings so that they have trouble finding their way to the sea on their first flights.
• Gray Catbirds tend to return to the same breeding site each year and tend to winter in the same area as catbirds from the same breeding area.
• Red-throated Loon chicks fledge quickly so that their parents do not spend as much energy flying to and from the nesting site with food.
• Here is a guide for identifying the common gulls on Mid-Atlantic beaches.
• Cuckoo finches evolved to look like harmless species to that their host species, the Tawny-flanked Prinia, would not be suspicious about their presence.
• Male birds that rise early produce more offspring, especially via extra-pair copulation.
• Wildlife density is a better predictor of conservation importance than presence/absence data.
• Shifts in bird ranges due to climate change could trigger more ecological changes.
• The Yellow-breasted Bunting population crashed after being eaten nearly to extinction.
• The European Robin won the vote for the U.K.'s national bird.

Science and nature blogging

• Extinction Countdown: Alaska's Rare Alexander Archipelago Wolves Nearly Wiped Out in 1 Year
• Arthropod Ecology: Landscape structure, insect herbivory, and ecosystem services
• Bug Eric: How to Request an Identification Online
• 10,000 Birds: Manhattan’s first nesting Common Ravens
• Bird Ecology Study Group: Adult Crimson-rumped Waxbill feeding fledglings
• Charismatic Minifauna: The Ants That Smell Like Blue Cheese—Or Is That Pine-Sol?
• Earbirding: Mexico’s Mystery Owl

Environment and biodiversity

• Environmental organizations are trying to intervene to prevent the Exxon settlement proposed by the Christie administration.
• Large butterflies pollinate flame azaleas with their wings.
• Readers in the U.K. can take part in a citizen science project about orchids and climate change.

Loose Feathers #497

Western Tanager / Photo: Tom Koerner/USFWS

Birds and birding news

• Analysis of point count data over several decades from multiple locations shows declines in boreal birds like Bicknell's Thrush and Yellow-bellied Flycatcher.
• The dependence of so many birds on the boreal forest is why it is critical to preserve as much of it as possible.
• Conservation in the wild is more important than captive breeding for endangered species like the Great Indian Bustard.
• The endangered Buff-breasted Button-Quail ​may be threatened by a controversial agricultural project.
• Driving on beaches can do significant harm to coastal wildlife, especially during the breeding season.
• A Red-tailed Hawk has been hunting squirrels on the White House lawn.
• A dozen Peregrine Falcon chicks hatched and were banded on three NYC bridges.
• A fossil bird with ribbon-like tail feathers was found in Brazil.

Science and nature blogging

• Laura's Birding Blog: Protecting Plovers
• Conservancy Talk: Yellow Spring Beauty: Meet the Rare Wildflower of New Jersey
• Ocean Currents: Aftermath of Santa Barbara’s Oil Spill: What’s Happening in the Marine Environment?
• Birding Dude: Franklin's Gull in Brooklyn NY
• Not Exactly Rocket Science: How Do African Grasslands Support So Many Plant-Eaters?
• Anything Larus: The Emergence of 2nd Basic Upperwing Coverts in 1st Summer Ring-billed Gulls

Environment and biodiversity

• A new analysis of temperature data confirms that the so-called global warming pause was not really a pause.
• A proposal to harvest plastic waste from the ocean may not be as effective as beach cleanups and reducing plastic waste at the source.
• Seven new miniaturized frog species were found in the Brazilian Atlantic Rainforest.