• Late Fall, Snowy Egrets

    By Gerry Traucht

     

    Editor’s Note: Gerry offers us glimpses of what he sees at and near his home. This unique collection embodies the qualities of the Japanese poetic form, Zuihitsu. Zuihitsu is genre of Japanese literature (since adapted by many Western writers) consisting of loosely connected personal essays or fragmented ideas that typically respond to the author’s surroundings. All photos taken by Gerry. 

     

    Early October a surprise: the Snowy Egrets were suddenly back.

    This year, they did something unusual that I hadn’t seen before at the Berkeley Aquatic Park Lagoon. For eight days, morning and afternoon, they stood together in a group by the mud mound, then one by one each egret took off. In an acrobatic flight, they flew in a loop over the water and returned.

    Each egret took turns in skuttling, skimming the water in a surface-bouncing flight in one wide loop, each defining the same space of interest. Each egret flew the loop in a low pointed toe, foot-dragging flight before returning to the group, where the next egret was already taking off, to fly the circle with its acrobatics. As each solo flight took place, the group stood, watching, as if judging or learning from the performance and waiting the impulse for the next turn.

    https://goldengatebirdalliance.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/1__-Traucht-video-P1120739.m4v

     

    The visiting October Snowy Egrets gathered by the mud mound. After a while of standing and watching, one egret took off, drawing a large circle with a wake made of ringlets by skimming, hopping and dragging its extended toes. The others waited and watched. One by one, the egrets took turns, timed like in a relay, one egret taking off as the other landed.

    One by one, well-timed, on it went.

    Egrets flying the loop

     

    Flying the loop This pic shows the ringlets the circular path the egret is flying designating their area of interest for their acrobatic fishing.

    Alternately touching and dragging its toes on water while flying, the egret leaves a circular path made of a chain of ringlets.

    An egret up close

    As the first egret finishes its circle, it returns to shallow water by the mud mound. The next egret is already taking off as the first is landing. Each egret flies the loop. One at a time, they are orderly. Each flies a single loop.

    Fishing while flying

    Frame by frame the camera follows the flight. The egret is fishing, sometimes making 3 strikes, catching 3 fish, as it makes its circle loop and returns to the group.…

  • Food Fest for Birds

    By Leanne Grossman

     

    It’s about 11:45 am on November 14th when I notice thousands of transparent wings lift into the sky. Termite larvae are emerging from the bricks of my backyard patio and becoming alates (their wings develop fairly instantly). In the past, no critters had overtly noticed them, but this year, local birds and migrators are indulging in an endless feast. The female alates are seeking males to mate with and start their own colonies.

    A pair of Oak Titmice fly down from the coastal live oak branches overhead.

    Oak Titmouse by Leanne

    They are dive-bombing the winged insects and grabbing them like flycatchers do. Five Yellow-rumped Warblers take advantage of the termite swarmers, eating them off the ground and flying to and from perches where the birds can spot the biggest groups of insects.

    Termite Alates by Leanne

    It’s noontime and the Western Scrub Jay arrives to his resident territory. He’s a bit late to the party and he is too large to have the agility to catch the termites sky-bound. But he hops around the patio and the dirt eating the larvae, and doesn’t scare off the smaller species of birds that arrived first.

    At 12:30 pm, the Bewick’s Wren, which I hear fairly frequently, arrived and hopped over to the insects on the brick. After an hour or so, I thought the birds were fully engorged, but they only paused, then resumed their foray. It’s kind of like me and chocolate—there’s just no such thing as too much!

    Western Scrub Jay by Leanne

    In the past I’ve guiltily tried to water the termites to death on the patio before they could take flight. I did not want to see my home or my neighbors’ homes infested. But now—no more murder! I feel much better leaving them be so the birds can meet their protein requirements.

    I am hoping the Anna’s Hummingbirds who nectar at the abutilon tree will partake in the termite feast since their diet requires daily protein as well as nectar. But the hummers don’t appear. It could be that the alate wings, about ½ inch in length, are just too hard to get down their tiny throats even with their forked tongues. With excellent vision, hummers pluck tiny insects out of the air, some of the insects being so small humans can’t even see them.

    Often Chestnut-backed Chickadees stop here to nectar, but on this day, although they normally eat insects, they are not interested in this meal.…

  • Fall is the New Spring

    By Liam O’Brien

     

    It’s almost a cliche – comes the Spring comes the butterflies! Since they coevolved with flowering plants for the most part it’s true. But did you know that fall is actually the best time to see them? Females disperse far beyond their known ranges to mix up the genetic pool and one has an opportunity to see species they don’t usually get to see in the spring. Of course the opposite is true as well. Spring butterflies are normally done by mid May.

    Nectar sources were just about spent when I started the second half of this year-long inventory (which has now been extended another three years up here – yippee!) I was pleased to see Field Crescents (Phyciodes puchella) had found the Pacific Aster they need to host on.

    Field Crescent (Phyciodes puchella) by Liam O’Brien

    This pretty little butterfly patrols in and out of the aster all day and takes advantage of the Coyote brush just coming into bloom. Small butterflies visiting smallish flowers. The girls have a different pattern than the boys and it took me awhile when I first began this mania that I wasn’t looking at a different species. This butterfly is bivoltine (two distinct flights in the year) in the city but this fall flight seems to be easier to see for folks. There was no spring flight up here as far as I could see.

    My regulars were present in good numbers up here. There is one particular bush where the Anise Swallowtails (Papilio zelicaon) perch waiting for a mate. Aside from early visits in the spring I’d seen at least one there on every visit. Umber Skippers (Poanes melane): these two, along with Red Admirals, Cabbage Whites and Painted Ladies make up the rarified group of butterflies that can be observed 12 months a year here in San Francisco – one has the ability to see them all on the wing in any month. All the other 30 species have briefer flights. The Umbers by early September were easily becoming the most ubiquitous butterfly on the summit of Sutro.

    It was this time of the year that the first Monarch (Danaus plexippus) floated out of a clearing before me.

    Monarch (Danaus plexippus) by Liam O’Brien

    I have had a strange relationship with this species since my butterfly mania kicked in years back that I’ll go into briefly here.…

  • A World Exposed Volume 2: The (humming)birds and the bees

    By Tara McIntire

     

    Here we are, over six months of sheltering in place and my birding has forever been changed.  First, it was adjusted to include jumping spiders, but now I’ve found another new world and focus.

    Don’t worry, I’m still always looking for birds, and thankfully there seems to be a fairly consistent brigade of hummingbirds with sounds of wing-whirs and chirps, as they zoom about the yard feeding on various plants and at my feeder. Always a fan favorite, these fierce and thoroughly entertaining avian acrobats are territorial wings of terror. In this small yard, sometimes you have to actually get out of their way!  Thank goodness they are small!

    A male Anna’s hummingbird keeps a watchful eye out for intruders at ‘his’ feeder.

    Between seemingly endless Zoom meetings, I have continued to skulk around my tiny yard, camera in hand. One day, I heard a sound that made me look for the hummingbirds, but soon realized it was emanating from the blooming purple basil that I found covered with bees!  The shutter clicking began and the images I captured revealed yet another amazing world.

    As with so many infatuations and love affairs, it started with they eyes. My first few macro images exposed these remarkable honeybee eyes.  They looked ‘hairy’ and with a little ‘googling’ revealed, honeybees indeed have hairs on the largest two of their five eyes (yes, you read that correctly) and it is believed these hairs aid in navigating windy conditions. It gives new meaning to the term ‘hairy eyeball’!

    A European Honeybee feeding on a purple basil bloom.

     

    A closer look reveals the literally ‘hairy’ eyeball.

    I spent the next few days during ‘micro-breaks’ with my camera (who really needs a bio-break or food?) taking an even closer look at these prolific pollinators when I realized there wasn’t just one ‘type’ of bee.  What we know as the common and familiar honeybee is actually an introduced species of European honeybee (Apis mellifera) and one of approximately 90 identified species of bees found in the Bay Area. Who knew? I most definitely did not. Utilizing iNaturalist (a fantastic tool for identification and listing), I have been able to recognize 10 species in my yard, so far.  Of those, I have become quite enamored with one in particular.   The Wool Carder bee, which is also an introduced European species, (a topic for another time), stood out not only in its physical make-up, but also because of its behavior.…

  • Pelagic Rookie

    By Michael Stevens

     

    I have been birding fairly seriously for the last two years and found myself tempted to try a pelagic trip, an offshore boat tour meant to discover ocean-going birds. When I saw that Alvaro Jaramillo, Bay Area birder extraordinaire, was organizing a series of Covid-sensitive pelagic outings this past summer I took the plunge and signed up. Thus I found myself on the dock at Half Moon Bay one calm morning this August. The other birders were a serious lot, carrying serious-looking cameras, and decked out in serious cold-weather field gear.

    I had an unserious camera, wore a hoodie over a sweatshirt, and was the only pelagic rookie in the bunch. Off we went.

    We traveled slowly though the harbor, a riot of friendly species – hundreds of terns, pelicans, and cormorants plus the occasional Common Murre hinting at the exotica to come. I was concerned that the task of sorting out the birds we encountered offshore would be complicated, but it turned out to be simplicity itself: they all looked like gulls and there was no way in hell I could even begin to identify them.

    It was a good day for pelagic birding with lots of gull-like birds to stare at confusedly, but gradually, I noticed one species that seemed a bit larger than the others. With my keen eye I noticed these specimens wore white on the front of the face – you know, the part that’s right where that big hooked bill connects. And voilà – I could recognize a pelagic species, Black-footed Albatross. With that building block, the rest of the pelagic taxonomy quickly fell into… well, no; it didn’t help at all, but hey! I saw an Albatross!

    Black-footed Albatross by Eric Ellingson

    And then there’s the photography thing.

    My keys to a good bird photo are to be very close to a subject that’s standing still. When you’re bouncing around on the ocean, this turns out to be difficult. My picture roll ended up with a lot of views of empty ocean and a lot of views of small black dots on otherwise empty ocean. And one good picture of – what else? – a gull. But Sabine’s Gull, a pelagic species with a very distinctive wing pattern. So, that’s 2!

    Sabine’s Gull by Michael Stevens

    When things settled down in the afternoon, one of the spotters who accompany Alvaro on these trips, the superb birder Malia DeFelice, took things in hand and made sure I had seen a Pink-footed Shearwater and knew that the little ones were Storm-Petrels.…