Black-billed Magpies: Did You Know?

October 30, 2011 by Leave a Comment

We were recently in South Dakota and of course we had to do a little bird watching while we were there.  One of the species that I enjoyed seeing was the Black-billed Magpie.  Although it is not rare and not really hard to find, the striking black and white pattern always makes me smile.

Black-billed Magpie featured at http://tomsbirdfeeders.com

The black and white pattern along with the long tail make identification easy.

When I started bird watching I was startled to see a magpie sitting on the back of a deer.  I watched it land on the deer’s back, fly away and then land on the deer again four times.  This behavior sent me back to the books (this was before the internet) to find out why.  It seems that magpies are tolerated by the deer because the birds are removing ticks.  The magpies will eat some and then cache some for later use as many members of their family do.  The problem with this is that the ticks are stored alive and unharmed.  The ticks simply crawl away and resume their lives.

Black-billed Magpie nest from http://tomsbirdfeeders.com

The large domed nest of the Black-billed Magpie is unmistakable.

 The nest of the Black-billed Magpie is unmistakable.  It is a large domed nest, made primarily of sticks and mud. The interior of the nest is lined with hair, grass, bark, or rootlets. The nest can take the birds up to 40 days to build.  A recent study found that the pair only spent about 1% of their daily energy to build their nest.  The female on the other hand spent 23% of her energy laying the eggs.

 As with other members of the corvidae family, the magpies will predate the nests of  birds taking both eggs and nestlings.  However this predation only makes up a small part of the Black-bill Magpie’s diet.  Most of the time the magpie will forage on the ground for insects, grains, with acorns being a favorite, small mammals and some carrion.

 When we lived in South Dakota the magpies would sometimes visit our suet feeders and our platform bird feeders.  The smaller songbirds would sound the alarm and quickly make the magpie feel unwelcomed.  They never stayed very long and we never seemed to be visited on a regular basis.  Maybe they just came in with the deer that visited our birdbath for a drink  occasionally.   :^)

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Drama at the Bird Feeding Station

December 16, 2010 by 4 Comments

Today started out like most other days. We got up, filled our coffee mugs and sat down to watch the morning breakfast crew at our bird feeders. The White-crowned Sparrows and Brewer’s Sparrows were coming in in numbers with Cactus Wrens on the recycled oriole feeder munching on the peanut butter and jelly. A Curve-billed Thrasher chorkled from the top of an agave stalk adjacent to our four tiered bird pond. A small group of Scaled Quail worked their way down our “wildlife path” which leads down to the pond from the scrub land habitat behind it. As the quail drank, the smaller birds all hit the bushes in a fast panic! In a short moment only one juvenile (We call them teenagers.) Scaled Quail was left at the pond and in the blink of an eye a Cooper’s Hawk had him in his talons and had dispatched him at the pond’s edge. The hawk put the quail down and took a short drink. Then, grabbing the quail in his talons again, the hawk skittered along the ground to the path where it started to eat the unfortunate bird. After a couple of minutes the hawk flew to the top of the agave stalk, screaming loudly. A close look showed a beautiful coyote walking up the wildlife path. The coyote calmly walked up to the quail body, picked it up and carried it away to eat it back in the brush.

Scenes like this are why we always start our day in front of the bird feeders. You just never know what is going to happen and which of nature’s wonders you will have the privilege of observing.

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Fall Bird Migration Means Little Brown Birds

September 7, 2010 by Leave a Comment

OK, be honest, how many of you remember when you first started to get serious about bird watching?  Do you remember your first fall bird migration?  Do you remember trying desperately to ID those “little brown birds”?  You were just getting your confidence up and not heading for the bird book every time you saw a sparrow.  And then the plumage changed.  Not only did you have “little brown birds,”  but all of the warblers became female!

Well, it’s that time of year down here.  As we sipped from our Southwest Canyon Bird Coffee Mug, the fall sparrow migration hit our bird feeders.  We had had a few Lark Sparrows into the recycled platform bird feeder last week.  Today the flock arrived!  We had them enjoying our bath bath and then using both platform feeders.  While we were watching them the Chipping Sparrows started filtering into the triple tube feeder.  Shortly we also had Savannah Sparrows, Lincoln Sparrows, Black Headed Grosbeaks, Blue Grosbeaks and a Green-tailed Towhee.  Most of these species seemed to prefer the platform bird feeders, but many used the various tube feeders we have scattered around the yard, especially the shy species.  Many of these species will stay with us for the winter.  Some will get their field marks back after this molt, making the ID so much easier.

We were surprised that so many species arrived at the same time, perhaps it is because we put up a new novelty crossing sign - ”Wild Bird Crossing!”

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Western Tanager: Did You Know?

August 24, 2010 by 3 Comments

We have had several Western Tanagers into the birdbath in the past week.  These colorful birds have the remarkable ability to hide in plain sight.  It took me a little while to help Tom find the tanager in the mesquite above the birdbath.  The attempt goes something like:

 ”There’s a Western Tanager right above the birdbath.”

“How high up in the mesquite?”

“On the left side of the tree about level with the thistle feeder.  Hold on, let me find it again, it just moved.  There it is, right above the birdbath,  just go straight up from the bath until you find it.’

“I can’t see it.  Is it behind some branches?”

“It just flew down to the water.”

“Oh, you mean that tanager!  I see it now!” 

All bird watchers have been there, done that.

The Western Tanager breeds farther north than any other member of its family.  They nest as far north as the Northwest Territories of Canada.  Most of the other members of its family are considered tropical.

The Western Tanager was originally called the Louisiana Tanager.  The name may seem inappropriate as it is a rare migrant to the state of Louisiana.  When this bird was first identified what was then known as the Louisiana Purchase extended from the Mississippi River to the Continental Divide and northward to British Columbia.  As the bird is distributed over much of that territory, the name was then much more appropriate.

The red in the face of the Western Tanager is rhodoxanthin, a pigment rare in birds.  The rhodoxanthin is ingested from the insects it feeds on.  The insects acquire this rare pigment from the plants they ingest.  Other tanagers are capable of making the pigment that make their feathers red.  In this case, you really are what you eat!

Next time you see a Western Tanager, take a good look at the red and know that that “Louisiana Tanager” has been eating well!

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Lark Sparrows – Did You Know?

May 7, 2010 by Leave a Comment

Our spring bird migration is continuing.  Today we had our first Blue Grosbeak into our sunflower bird feeder.  He then hopped down to have a drink from our tiered bird pond.  He had not completed his molt completely, so he wasn’t the most beautiful grosbeak, but was welcomed to our yard anyway.

The Lark Sparrows are still here in great numbers enjoying the platform bird feeder.  Their face pattern on this sparrow plus the fan shaped tail with the white band make this  one of the easiest to identify of the sparrows. 

 One interesting observation is that Lark Sparrows walk rather than hop across our bird feeder. If fact, hopping is only used during courtship.  During courtship a male Lark Sparrow crouches on the ground, holds his tail up at a 45 degree angle from the ground, spreads the tail feathers to show off the white tips, and then struts with its wings drooping so that the wingtips nearly touch the ground. When the female is receptive, the male gives her a small twig just before copulation.

In our area we have observed Lark Sparrows recycling old Mockingbird and thrasher nests.  I have also read reports where  the eggs and young of two species are found in the same nest, suggesting that the Lark Sparrow shares the nest with the other bird.

I will continue to report on the spring bird migration here in Portal.  Good Birding to all.

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Spring Bird Migration in Portal, Arizona

May 5, 2010 by Leave a Comment

We have been in Wyoming and South Dakota for the past couple of weeks.  The duck migration is in full swing and the Greater Prairie Chickens are on their lecks.  It was great to get the ducks, we don’t get many in my part of the desert (lol).

We came back to Lark Sparrows in great numbers at our bird feeders.  We had 9 in our platform bird  feeder and about 10 more on the ground under the bird feeder.  The Pine Siskins and Lesser Goldfinches are still coming into the stainless steel thistle feeder, but we have not seen the Lawrence’s Goldfinches since we got back. 

We have had a Cassin’s Kingbird into the bird bath and the warblers are bathing on a regular basis with the most common being the Yellow-rumped Warbler.

Our first juvenile Black-throated Sparrow was being fed just above our triple tube bird feeder in the mesquite tree.

The most common birds at our Best 1 hummingbird feeders have been the Broad-tailed and the Black-throated Hummingbirds.  All three of our orioles have be into the saucer oriole feeder and they have been sneaking sips from the hummingbird feeders.

We have reports of the Elegant Trogan in our canyon (see our birding map for directions)

This is a great time to visit Portal, Arizona.

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Lucy’s Warblers – Did you know?

April 5, 2010 by 2 Comments

Today while we sat in front of our bird feeders sipping  from our Southwest Arizona Canyon Birds coffee mug, a Lucy’s Warbler came in to our bird bath for a quick splash.

Lucy’s Warblers are one of the smallest warblers and has chosen to make the desert its home, making its nest in the driest of all warbler habitats.  

Dr. J. G. Cooper discovered this tiny and inconspicuous warbler at Fort Mojave in Arizona in 1861.  He named it after Miss Lucy Baird, daughter of his associate Dr. Spencer F. Baird. 

The Lucy’s Warbler is one of only two warblers that breeds in cavities. (The Prothonotary Warbler is the other.) If using a woodpecker hole, the warbler may fill the cavity nearly to the top with debris and put the nest on top so the bird can see out.  Abandoned Verdin nests are also a favorite nesting place.

I could not find if anyone has established the size of a Lucy’s Warblers territory. However, it is not unusual to find up to 5 nests in 1 acre.  When Tom and I do breeding bird surveys, the over lapping songs make it very hard to impossible to get an accurate count on the number of males singing.

Most people spot this bird while it is gleaning insects off foliage, and its quick movements catch the eye.  Remember, if you are in the dry desert do not eliminate all warblers when trying to identify a little gray bird!   It just may be a Lucy’s Warbler!

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It’s Great to Bird Watch in Portal, Arizona!

September 29, 2009 by Leave a Comment

We have been out of town for a couple of weeks and working on a plant project in South Dakota, so our birdwatching here in Portal has just started up again.  And this is a great time to be bird watching in Portal.

Our hummingbird migration is still going on.  We still have Rufous Hummingbirds coming through and we still have most of the hummingbirds like the Magnificent, Blue-throated, and Violet-crowned coming into our Best 1 Hummingbird feeder.  We have also set up several saucer humming bird feeders around the yard and of course, Tom still has the window mount hummingbird feeder on the kitchen window.

In the past few days we have had warblers filtering through including the Townsend’s, MacGillivray’s, Common Yellowthroat, Wilson’s, Yellow, Yellow-rumped and the Black-throated Gray.  They have been at our birdbath and enjoying the bird mister especially.  The Blue-gray Gnatcatcher only came in for one day and seemed to enjoy the  bird dripper most.

Many of our winter migrants have started coming in.  The Clay-colored and  White-crowned Sparrows are back as well as the Green-tailed Towhees.

All of this going on and in our recycled platform bird feeder we have a Curve-billed Thrasher feeding young.

Have I convinced you?  It’s Great to Bird Watch in Portal!

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Rufous-crowned Sparrows visit Our Bird Feeders

September 15, 2009 by Leave a Comment

This morning we had a Rufous-crowned Sparrow visit us while we were sipping from our coffee cups and doing our daily ritual of bird watching from the easy chair.

Our yard has been fenced off from cattle grazing for about 10 years now.  We are fighting a battle with Russian Thistle and have noticed a definite decrease in this weed and several other noxious weeds.  The return of the Rufous-crowned Sparrow has given us hope that our yard will someday become a true desert scrubland haven for the birds.

Once paired the Rufous-crowned Sparrow remain on their territories year-round and stay bonded for life.  The are ground feeders and like to peck at the base of grass stems.  They are therefore most attracted to platform bird feeders in the winter, however prefer insects in the summer months.  The bird baths we have in our yard seem to be attracting them this year as we have not had much in the way of monsoonal rains. 

To help you find Rufous-crowned Sparrows download our Portal Birding Map and look along the Portal Road and the Foothills Roads in the scrub land before and throughout the big thicket.

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Moving Water Brings in Migrant Warblers in Portal, Arizona

September 10, 2009 by Leave a Comment

The fall warbler migration is in full swing now, here in southeastern Arizona.  During the past week we have had numbers of Wilson’s Warblers, Yellow Warblers, MacGillivray’s Warblers, Townsend’s Warblers, Black-throated Gray Warblers, Virginia’s Warblers and Lucy’s Warblers visiting our four tiered bird pond.  Without this nice water feature these birds would be only a fleeting glimpse through our Chihuahuan Desert property.  The warblers and hummingbirds enjoy the waterfalls where the water flows from one tier to another.  It is so nice to see the colorful warblers bathing in the various levels with our resident Pyrrhuloxias, Canyon Towhees, House Finches and Black-throated Sparrows.  Water is the key to attracting the warblers, flycatchers, vireos and tanagers.  Moving water is even better because birds flying in the vicinity can see the ripples in the water or hear the moving water.  Even a simple bird bath can be made a bird magnet with the addition of a mister or dripper.  There are not many bird species that can resist the sound or looks of moving water so if more birds of more species is your goal, moving water is the solution.

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