GBBC Day 4: National Zoo

This afternoon I visited the National Zoo to see if I could round up any additional species for the Great Backyard Bird Count. I was successful in finding a red-shouldered hawk, a species that had gone unreported in D.C until today. It was perched high above the the bird house. Overall, it was a good afternoon for raptors. Aside from the red-shouldered, I also saw two red-tailed hawks and two Cooper's hawks, both species down by the creek. Separating Cooper's and sharp-shinned hawks is always tricky; this afternoon one of the hawks assisted the identification by calling repeatedly. (Cooper's hawks have a deeper and wheezier call.)

My strangest sighting of the day was a great blue heron. It was not particularly close to a body of water - either the creek or a good fishing spot. Instead, it was perched in a tree about fifty feet above the eagle enclosure.

Wood ducks and mallards were present in good numbers. A very large flock of mallards was feeding in the flamingo pond. I estimated about 120, though it was hard to count them because they were so densely packed together and moving around quickly. Almost all of the wood ducks were along the creek. The path by the creek, by the way, is still covered with snow and ice, though it is not as treacherous as the ice around Hains Point or the Arboretum.

I do not have photographs from this afternoon because I forgot to bring my camera with me.

Here is the checklist I submitted:

Wood Duck	45
Mallard	140
Great Blue Heron	1
Cooper's Hawk	2
Red-shouldered Hawk	1
Red-tailed Hawk	2
Ring-billed Gull	2
Red-bellied Woodpecker	4
Downy Woodpecker	3
Hairy Woodpecker	1
Pileated Woodpecker	2
Blue Jay	1
American Crow	3
Fish Crow	4
Carolina Chickadee	2
Tufted Titmouse	4
White-breasted Nuthatch	1
American Robin	60
Northern Mockingbird	2
European Starling	200
Song Sparrow	1
White-throated Sparrow	13
Northern Cardinal	4
House Sparrow	120

As of 8:55 pm, Washington is up to 63 species and 7,847 individuals for the count. So far 50 checklists have been submitted; this is just one short of the D.C. record. You can follow the D.C. results here. Data entry will be open until February 28, so you still have time to submit a report from this weekend if you have not done so already. I will post the final total at that time.

Zoo Moving Birds

The National Zoo is moving the domesticated ducks and poultry away from its Kids' Farm to guard against poultry flu.

In what was described as a precautionary measure, 18 ducks and 27 chickens were moved to the zoo's Conservation and Research Center in Front Royal, Va., last week to guard against infections caused by influenza viruses that can occur naturally in birds.

This is happening even though there have been no reported cases of H5N1 in North America.

Berry stressed that there have been no known cases in the United States of what is called highly pathogenic avian influenza, including a particularly lethal strain, H5N1, that has spread to many parts of the world. More than 150 million birds have died, killed by the disease or slaughtered to control its spread.

If the zoo waited until a case occurred in this country, Berry said, it might not be able to move the domestic fowl and would probably have to euthanize them.

"We didn't want that to be our only option," he said.

Zoos have to take precautions, I guess. But Washington hardly seems like the first place H5N1 would appear in North America, so presumably there would be adequate time to move the birds if this flu does show up in the Americas. In the meantime, the move seems more likely to feed hysteria than calm visitors.

The article notes that this does not affect any of the birds (domestic or wild) around the bird house.

technorati tags:Birds, Flu, H5N1

Birds of the Mid-Atlantic #12: Black-crowned Night-heron

So far in this series I have mostly written about diurnal birds - those that can be seen during the day. Most North American birds are in fact diurnal species, since birds tend to encounter the world through sight and sound, much like humans. But aside from the diurnal species there is a world of crepuscular and nocturnal birds, some of which are rarely encountered, and others that are more often seen than heard.

Two such species are the night-herons - the yellow-crowned night-heron and the black-crowned night-heron. These two species emerge in the evening as shadows lengthen and return to their roosting spots at sunrise, after a full night of hunting fish and invertebrates. Since night-herons are colonial breeders, the best bet for seeing them during the day is to visit a known nesting or roosting site.

One local spot where seeing black-crowned night-herons is virtually guaranteed (in the proper season) is the National Zoo in Washington, DC. A colony has been nesting over the outdoor flight cages near the bird house for several decades. At this time of year, one can see adults like the above bird perched in the trees around the bird house. Later in the summer, once this year's chicks fledge, immature night-herons will frequently patrol the duck ponds, and do not flee closely-approaching humans. Yes, these are wild birds, despite their nesting location and despite their tameness.

If you enlarge the photograph and look closely, you can see that this individual has been banded. These two photographs show the key identification points for adult black-crowned night-herons. Night-herons have a stocky, hunched appearance, even when not preening, and have a thick, heavy bill. Adult black-crowned night-herons have an obvious black crown, as well as a black back. (Note that the yellow crown of yellow-crowned night-herons is not always apparent.) Like great blue herons, black-crowned night-herons sport long breeding plumes at the backs of their heads.

While black-crowned night-herons are widespread across North America, they are particular about their habitats, and in particular they much prefer the lower elevations of the coastal plain and prairies to mountain ranges.

This entry is crossposted in Blue Ridge Gazette. Images are by the author.

Tags:

• Birds
• Black-crowned Night-heron

Stork Alert

I saw this stork in DC the other day.

Its face had a lot of character.

However, it did not "count" since it was restrained in an enclosure at the National Zoo.

Ducks at the National Zoo

This afternoon I took the Metro over to the National Zoo to see what kind of waterfowl was hanging around in the ponds and stream. As it turned out, the ponds at the bird house were nearly deserted, with only seven mallards staying there. Not a single wood duck or black duck was to be seen up there.

Mallards and Wood Ducks in Rock Creek

So I walked on down to Rock Creek. As I reached the stream there was a burst of activity above my head. Robin after robin flew from one tree to the next. It appeared that a very large flock was moving down the path ahead of me. Mixed in with this crowd were a few ruby-crowned kinglets, downy woodpeckers, and cardinals.

There were plenty of mallards and wood ducks in the stream, but the numbers were still far below what I am used to at the zoo. (I think that the prolonged warm spells must be keeping them somewhere else.) I tried taking photographs of the ducks but with limited success. The mallard shots turned out a little better than the wood ducks. For some reason the camera had a hard time focus on the wood ducks. Whether this was because they are smaller or because they blend in against the bank better, I do not know. (To the right is the best of my wood duck shots from this afternoon.) I love watching wood ducks because their feathers have a silky sheen to them - more so than other birds of their family. Wood ducks are also one of the more exotic-looking birds in this region. Their appearance makes it unsurprising that they are more closely related to Asian mandarin ducks than to other waterfowl in North America.


The path along the creek exits the zoo at Rock Creek Parkway and then follows the creek under two major bridges, the Duke Ellington Bridge (Calvert Street) and the Taft Bridge (Connecticut Avenue). Below is a picture of the latter.


SPECIES SEEN: 13

Wood Duck

Mallard

Sharp-shinned Hawk

Downy Woodpecker

Ruby-crowned Kinglet

Cedar Waxwing

American Robin

White-breasted Nuthatch

Blue Jay

European Starling

House Sparrow

White-throated Sparrow

Northern Cardinal

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First DC Birds for 2006

Yesterday I returned to Washington after spending two weeks out of town. So this afternoon I took some time to start off my DC birding for the new year with trips to some local waterfowl spots.

I started at the National Zoo. The ponds near the bird house held dozens of mallards, as well as a few American black ducks and wood ducks. Nothing beats an up-close look at breeding-plumaged wood ducks! I have been assured by a zoo staffer that the birds in those ponds are currently all wild; the zoo's waterfowl have been moved to other locations for the time being due to renovations. Even so, the zoo has maintained the heated ponds, and continues to leave feed at the regular feeding stations. Wintering at the zoo has to be a pretty good deal for local ducks; it offers a steady food supply, reliably unfrozen water, and no predation or hunting.

Rock Creek below the zoo had more of the same waterfowl. There was a patch of activity near the stone bridge that leads from the zoo to the bicycle path. Most of these turned out to be tufted titmice, white-breasted nuthatches, and white-throated sparrows. The activity went on despite the foreboding presence of a red-tailed hawk watching from a snag high above the creek.

Once I finished my walk through the zoo, I headed over to the Potomac since there was still plenty of light left. I walked the normal circuit, down the Washington Channel side and back along the river. Several large flocks of scaup were on both the channel and the river; most of these turned out to be lesser scaup. A few greater scaup were near the seawall on the far side of the channel. One American coot hugged the channel's boat docks.

When a passing helicopter flushed many birds from the trees, three merlins appeared. Eventually they settled on three snags along the road, perched about ten yards from each other. While all had the dark breast streaking characteristic of merlins, one of the three seemed to have have darker and colder brown streaking than the other two, which had a more reddish tone. I had two more merlin sightings on the walk, but I think these may have been some of the same birds.

As I walked back from the tip of the peninsula, I spotted a brown creeper clinging to the trunk of a tree.

SPECIES SEEN: 32

Canada Goose
Wood Duck
Mallard
American Black Duck
Greater Scaup
Lesser Scaup
Red-tailed Hawk
Merlin
American Coot
Killdeer
Ring-billed Gull
Great Black-backed Gull
American Herring Gull
Rock Pigeon
Mourning Dove
Red-bellied Woodpecker
Downy Woodpecker
Golden-crowned Kinglet
Carolina Wren
Northern Mockingbird
Tufted Titmouse
White-breasted Nuthatch
Brown Creeper
Blue Jay
European Starling
House Sparrow
House Finch
American Goldfinch
Song Sparrow
White-throated Sparrow
Dark-eyed Junco
Northern Cardinal

National Zoo Birding

This morning was bitterly cold; in fact it was the coldest of the winter so far here in Washington. When I woke up, the temperature at National Airport was reported to be 19°F. The high was about 24° or 25°. Naturally it seemed like a good morning for birding. During sustained cold spells like what we experienced over the past two days, local ponds freeze over, leaving waterfowl to seek other open waterways. One place where open water is guaranteed is the National Zoo. Most ponds are heated, and the stretch of Rock Creek below the zoo rarely freezes. So the zoo's waterfowl population will rise considerably during cold snaps.

The best place for birding at the zoo, in my opinion, is the bicycle trail along the creek. I have seen up to 30-40 wood ducks gathered there at times. This morning there were about a dozen. Males in the full breeding plumage were giving their whistling "zipper" calls, while females clucked. Up at the bird house, about fifty mallards and a few wood ducks and American black ducks had gathered in the wetland ponds vacated by the zoo's own birds. (Apparently all the birds in the birdhouse ponds are wild at the moment; a fire caused most of the zoo's birds to be removed temporarily.)

Waterfowl were not all there was to see. Many sparrows - house, song, and white-throated - competed for rights around the feeders in the various animal pens. No unusual ones, though. Woodpeckers also were plentiful. One very good bird was a red-breasted nuthatch. The Washington area seems to have unusually high numbers of this species this year.

SPECIES SEEN: 26

Canada Goose
Wood Duck
Mallard
American Black Duck
Sharp-shinned Hawk
Rock Pigeon
Mourning Dove
Red-bellied Woodpecker
Downy Woodpecker
Hairy Woodpecker
Northern Flicker
Carolina Wren
Northern Mockingbird
American Robin
Carolina Chickadee
Tufted Titmouse
Red-breasted Nuthatch
White-breasted Nuthatch
Blue Jay
European Starling
House Sparrow
American Goldfinch
Song Sparrow
White-throated Sparrow
Dark-eyed Junco
Northern Cardinal

Zoo Birds

Late this afternoon I took a short stroll through the National Zoo and the part of Rock Creek that flows through its lower portions. Despite the stiff wind, it was a beautiful afternoon: plenty of sun with the foliage near its peak. I was a little underdressed for the wind. Once I started birding, though, the chill went away.

There may have been birds out other than the ones I have listed here, but I was primarily interested in checking the waterfowl numbers along the creek. The upper zoo was mostly quiet except for the flocks of starlings and robins that gather in the tree tops at night. The creek held mallards and wood ducks. The close range between the path and the creek allows the best looks at wood ducks that one could hope to see. The males are particularly spectacular at this time of year when their breeding plumage is fresh. Further along the creek there were several robins bathing themselves in the shallows.

SPECIES SEEN: 10

Wood Duck
Mallard
Rock Pigeon
Red-bellied Woodpecker
Downy Woodpecker
American Robin
European Starling
House Sparrow
White-throated Sparrow
Northern Cardinal

Birding at the National Zoo

Among the many options available for birdwatching in Washington, D.C., Kenilworth Aquatic Gardens, Rock Creek Park, and the National Arboretum have proven the most consistently satisfying, with East Potomac Park and Roosevelt Island not far behind. However, the District contains a number of other places to watch birds. One such place is the National Zoo. That is where I took a short walk early this morning.

A zoo is not the first place that comes to mind when one wants to go birding. Certainly the captive waterfowl, cranes, pelicans, and eagles with shorn primaries are not "countable." But because of the heavy vegetation and easily available food sources, quite a lot of wild birds can be found among the cages in all seasons.

In summer, the main draw for birders at the National Zoo is a colony of black-crowned night herons that nest around the bird house. Some nests are placed on top of the old flight cage for captive eagles, while others can be found in the trees. The night-herons that roost here are quite tame. Juveniles will sometimes come down and stand in the ponds not five feet from the path; today I had a close look through my binoculars at two youngsters sitting on top of the flight cage as they peered down at me. Further along the trail, adult night-herons foraged in the crane enclosures. The adults, too, showed little fear of me. One flew out of the enclosure into a tree almost above my head, so that I got a close look at its red eye and the long white plumes that trail from the back of its head. This bird kept an eye on me as I took in the details of its plumage through binoculars. About a dozen more adults could be seen in the trees around the bird house.

The second reason to bird at the zoo is for a section of Rock Creek that passes along one side of the zoo. Because the road that parallels the creek for most of its length goes into a tunnel, the path here is much quieter than it is beyond the zoo in either direction. This section of the creek tends to be better for birding during the winter than during the summer. In the winter the creek remains open while other bodies of water in the area freeze, so that large numbers of mallards and wood ducks, joined by smaller numbers of other waterfowl, concentrate here. Today those crowds were not present, but I did see one wood duck family - a male and female with eight ducklings. Along the path I also encountered tufted titmice, an eastern wood-pewee, and an acadian flycatcher. The latter was detectable only by its wee-seet! call, which I imagine as a sort of sung checkmark. It was a pleasant birding session on a cool morning.

Good birding.