Wild birds make remarkable journeys, sometimes between continents, or they endure the weather extremes as year-round residents. That they do so in various colors and sizes, and with ingenious adaptive survival skills, is remarkable.
The annual Wings over Weston festival will celebrate birds and watching them from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Saturday, May 12, at Weston Bend State Park, 16600 Highway 45 North in Platte County. Art, games, crafts, live bird exhibits, bird banding, educational programs and bluegrass music will be among the activities.
Weston Bend State Park, near the community of Weston, includes woodlands in the bluffs overlooking the Missouri River. Across the river at Fort Leavenworth is one of the largest intact bottomland forests in the river valley. Woodlands survive on private lands in the area, too. Together they provide critical habitat for migrating and resident woodland birds. Conservation groups have designated the corridor as an Important Bird Area.
The free festival offers a chance to learn about birds and nature with family-friendly activities that accommodate children. There will be 22 stations for visitors to peruse and each offers an interactive way to learn about birds and their habitats.
Burroughs Audubon Society and various non-profit groups and public agencies are sponsoring the event, including the Missouri Department of Conservation (MDC) and the Missouri Department of Nature Resources. For more information, contact the park at 816-640-5443.
— Bill Graham, MDC news release

Flicker and American robin

Birds are important to a garden’s ecosystem. Birds are natural predators, eating bugs and returning nutrients to the soil. When updating my garden, I include bird baths, bird houses and bird feeders to encourage a wide range of birds.

“When thousands of people all tell us what they’re seeing, we can detect changes in birds’ numbers and locations from year to year,” said Janis Dickinson, director of Citizen Science at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology. “An isolated event such as the dead birds in Arkansas may be within the range of normal ups and downs for an abundant species like the Red-winged Blackbird. But the count can serve as an early warning system for worrisome declines in bird populations that result from more widespread problems.”

Once ranked among the top 4 or 5 most frequently reported species, crows are still among the top 10 birds reported in the Great Backyard Bird Count but they have dropped in ranking since 2003. This “signal” is consistent with data from the more intensive Breeding Bird Survey, as well as studies demonstrating declines of 50-75% in crow populations in some states after outbreaks of West Nile virus.

Maps from the count have also captured the paths of migrating Sandhill Cranes and recorded the dramatic spread of Eurasian Collared-Doves. Introduced to the Bahamas in the 1970s, the species was reported in just 8 states during the 1999 Great Backyard Bird Count. A decade later, it was reported in 39 states and Canadian provinces.

For more information, including bird-ID tips, instructions, and past results, visit www.birdcount.org.   The count includes a photo contest and a prize drawing for participants who enter their bird checklists online.

Can you guess which bird species is the one people spot the most in their back yards?

Whooping cranes are endangered, with fewer than 500 left in the wild. They also are spectacular, with wingspans exceeding 7 feet, white bodies and striking red-black-and-white heads. In addition to being a hunter, Richards apparently is a naturalist, too. He knew immediately what he was seeing and called the Missouri Department of Conservation (MDC) office in Neosho with the news.

Whooping cranes - courtesy US FWS file photo by Laura Erickson

Jeff Cantrell, a conservation education consultant for the Missouri Department of Conservation (MDC) hurried to the site and was stunned to find an adult crane and a juvenile fitted with a leg band and a radio transmitter. The two birds were feeding contentedly in a crop field amid Canada geese and crows.

“I got to watch them for an hour or so and share the observations with some avid and budding birders in the area,” said Cantrell. “What a wonderful opportunity for everyone. We witnessed lots of fascinating parental behavior, foraging, and some hopping/dancing almost. When they flew off in the mid-morning they finally called for us. It was truly a heart-stirring moment.”

Whooping crane sightings have been a rarity in Missouri for more than a century. MDC has records of two separate sightings of a single bird at Mingo National Wildlife Refuge in 1958, a pair in Jackson County in 1970 and another single bird at Stockton Lake in 1996. The most recent sighting was of a group of four to eight whooping cranes mixed in with a flock of sandhill cranes in Bates County in October 2010.

MDC asks that anyone who sees a whooping crane report it to the nearest MDC office.

(Jo note: I’ve been to the Aransas National Wildlife Refuge, (Port Aransas, TX, near Corpus Christi) where these huge birds hang out. Even if you’re not a birder, they are very impressive. Take one of the boat tours if you are ever down there.)

The bird, a Laysan albatross named Wisdom, was spotted a few weeks ago with a chick by John Klavitter, a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service biologist and the deputy manager of the Midway Atoll National Wildlife Refuge.

The bird has worn out 5 bird bands since she was first banded by U.S. Geological Survey scientist Chandler Robbins in 1956 as she incubated an egg. Chandler rediscovered Wisdom in 2001. In 1956, he estimated Wisdom to be at least 5 years old then since this is the earliest age at which these birds breed, though they more typically breed at 8 or 9. This means Wisdom is likely to be in her early sixties.

“She looks great,” said Bruce Peterjohn, the chief of the North American Bird Banding Program at the USGS Patuxent Wildlife Research Center in Laurel, Md. “And she is now the oldest wild bird documented in the 90-year history of our USGS-FWS and Canadian bird banding program,” he added. “To know that she can still successfully raise young at age 60-plus, that is beyond words. While the process of banding a bird has not changed greatly during the past century, the information provided by birds marked with a simple numbered metal band has transformed our knowledge of birds.”

Wisdom has likely raised at least 30 to 35 chicks during her breeding life, though the number may well be higher because experienced parents tend to be better parents than younger breeders. Albatross lay only one egg a year, and it takes about that long to incubate and raise the chick. After years in which they have successfully raised and fledged a chick, the parents may take the occasional next year off from parenting. Klavitter said that Wisdom also nested in 2006, 2008, 2009 and 2010.

Since adult albatross mate for life, with both parents raising the young, it makes one wonder if Wisdom has had the same partner all these years or not.

Almost as amazing as being a parent at 60 is the number of miles this bird has likely logged – about 50,000 miles a year as an adult – which means that Wisdom has flown at least 2 to 3 million miles since she was first banded. Or, to put it another way, that’s 4 to 6 trips from the Earth to the Moon and back again with plenty of miles to spare.

———

Owl Prowl at Alley Spring March 19

Ranger Bill O’Donnell asked Jo to announce his first Owl Prowl after recent knee surgery, on March 19, 7 p.m. leaving from Alley Mill, 6 miles west of Eminence on Hwy. 106, in Ozark National Scenic Riverways.

Screech Owl at Night

This Owl Prowl is open to the public. Wear warm clothes (this early in the season, temperatures drop rapidly) and bring a working flashlight with new batteries. A lot of the time will be spent in the dark, but you may need the light for walking. Bill assured Jo that nearly anyone can keep up with him on this hike as he takes his healed knee for a night time trial on woods trails. For further information, call 573-323-4236 or 573-858-3297, ext 23.

A school bus rumbled past a few days later and the noise sent the owls flying back and forth over their snow-covered lane southwest of Warrensburg in Johnson County.

These short-eared owls made an unusual visit to a farm in Johnson County, Mo. Photos courtesy of Amy Prewitt.

“The bus driver had to stop a couple of times coming down the lane because he was afraid he was going to hit them,” Matt Owsley said.  “It was spectacular.”

Short-eared owls are open-country, grassland birds.  They are somewhat unusual in the state, said Brad Jacobs, ornithologist for the Missouri Department of Conservation. A few pairs may nest in Missouri each spring. But short-eared owls are usually mostly seen in winter as migrants from northern states, Canada or the Arctic.

“They’ve been there at our place the last three years,” Owsley said, “but never in these numbers.”

He estimates they often saw 10 to 15 owls roosting in their trees, maybe more than 20 during the peak when deep snow and bitter cold embraced the countryside. One day he drove down the lane and there was an owl sitting on almost every fence post.

Short-eared owls become communal in winter and roost together for protection and warmth, Jacobs said. For example, the Hi Lonesome Prairie Conservation Area near Cole Camp, in some winters attracts about 40 short-eared owls to a roost site.

The owls can roost on the ground. But after heavy snows they will roost in trees. The trees in the Owsley yard are near cattle pastures and a large Conservation Reserve Program field with native prairie grasses.

Unlike other owls, short-ears prefer open country over woods, and they do not hunt at night but prefer to hunt in the early morning or late afternoon. Their mainly eat rodents such as mice and rats found in fields and meadows.

“The last two winters have been incredible for seeing Short-eared owls,” Jacobs said. “That’s because we’ve had a peak cycle in rodents. They move around to wherever the peak numbers are.”

Two short-eared owls each claim a fence post at the Owsley farm near Chilhowee, Mo.

Short-eared owls are graceful in flight, he said, with a wing spans three feet or more. They are a medium-sized owl standing 13 to 17 inches tall and weighing about a pound. The owl’s name comes from two tufts of feathers that sometimes stand up on the head, but those are not ears and not connected with hearing.

As snow melted away this week, the owls dispersed somewhat at the Owsley farm. But on Wednesday, six to eight Short-ears could be seen gliding low over the ground in search or prey or simply resting on the grass in a pasture.

Often when they owls visit Missouri in winter they stay in brush or cedar trees out of sight, Jacobs said.
   “Most people never see them,” he said.

But the Owsley family has enjoyed an owl show they’ll long remember, with souvenirs, as the ground under the cedar trees is littered with gray “pellets” of undigested mice hair and bones. Sometimes the short-eared owls from the Arctic show little fear of humans, Jacobs said, thus the family’s close-up view.

“I pulled up in the driveway near the trees sometimes and just sat there,” Deanna Owsley said, “me looking at them and them looking at me.”

— Bill Graham
Bill Graham is media specialist for the Missouri
Department of Conservation at the
Gorman Discovery Center in Kansas City

Photo copyright C. Wiggins. Used with permission.

Nature note: when the eastern bluebirds start looking for nest sites, spring cannot be far behind. Please hurry, Spring. We’re about wintered out around here! – Jo

Ruffed grouse are native to Missouri, located at the southwestern edge of the species’ historic range. Habitat destruction and unregulated market hunting largely eliminated them from Missouri forests by the 1930s. This is the first time in more than 25 years there will be no ruffed grouse hunting season. However, the Missouri Department of Conservation says that does not necessarily mean ruffed grouse hunting is gone forever.

The Conservation Department launched a successful ruffed grouse restoration program in 1959, and Missouri had its first modern hunting season in 1983. Grouse numbers remain low in spite of repeated attempts to reintroduce grouse in areas with suitable habitat as late as 1994. The Conservation Department and the Ruffed Grouse Society are seeking a source of grouse to resume reintroduction work.

“It didn’t make sense to have people hunting grouse if we were going to be bringing them in from other states to try to build the population,” said Wildlife Division Chief DeeCee Darrow. “Our grouse numbers are so low right now that very few hunters pursue them, and very few are taken each year. This is probably a good time to pause and regroup.”
(MDC news release. Grouse photo by Jim Rathert.)

In a ruling late last week, the Environmental Protection agency said it did not have the jurisdiction to ban lead ammunition under the Toxic Substances Control Act of 1976. Subchapter IV, Lead Exposure Reduction is the general legislation under which lead hazard and lead abatement rules and regulations resulted in the phaseout of leaded gasoline, and lead paint for interior use.

A portion of the petition which would also ban lead fishing sinkers, and other lead-weighted fishing tackle is still under consideration as of Sept. 2.

EPA had been requested by The Center of Biological Diversity, the Association of Avian Veterinarians, Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, Project Gutpile and the American Bird Conservancy to enact such a ban. Lead shot is already controlled in waterfowl hunting. These groups petitioned for a general ban contending that “the lead components of bullets, shotgun pellets, fishing weights and lures pose an unreasonable risk of injury to human and wildlife health and the environment.”

The petition was filed on August 3, according to an AP story filed August 28.

Opinion on both sides of this ruling seems more heated than usual on the Net. What do Traveler readers think?

—

Jim Rathert

Nature photographer Jim Rathert will headline the Missouri Bluebird Conference Sept 24-25 in the Cedar City Room at the North Jefferson City Multipurpose Building in Jefferson City. Anyone interested in Missouri’s colorful state bird is welcome to attend.

Rathert is the retired wildlife photographer for the Missouri Conservationist magazine. He is a founding Board Member for the Missouri Bluebird Society and an esteemed birder.

Other Conference Programs & Highlights:

• Nest box styles and designs for a variety of cavity-nesting birds.
  

  Bluebird pair. Jim Rathert photo

• Feeding and growing  mealworms for  bluebirds.
• A “Bluebird Blog.”
• Bird Walk on the nearby Katy Trail , led by the River Bluffs Audubon Society
• Field Trip led by Jim Rathert to “The Bubbler,” the focal point of the Memorial Park Wild Bird Garden in Jefferson City.
• Complimentary Program entitled “Bluebirding for Everyone” presented at 6 p.m., Friday , Sept. 24, by Steve Garr, president of the Missouri Bluebird Society and former president of the North American Bluebird Society. There is no charge to attend this program, held in the same location as the conference on Saturday.

The conference fee includes admittance to all events for the day, and also includes lunch and a free bluebird information packet created by the Missouri Bluebird Society.

Go to www.birds-i-view.biz for directions, details, and to print out a conference registration form.  Registration is required for attendance at the Saturday, Sept. 25 conference and events.

Call 573-634-6482 for directions only.  Call Steve or Regina Garr at 573-638-2473 with questions

EPA sued over Missouri streams.

The Coalition for the Environment, a St. Louis based environmental activist group, had been working with EPA and Missouri Dept. of Natural Resources to enact water quality standards for 150,000 miles of Missouri streams for five years. It seems their patience has given out.

It was just a short mental slide to the efforts to put or prevent a new casino at the Missouri-Mississippi confluence…an area which agencies, sportsmen and environmentalists have worked long and hard to retain in a natural state for fishing, birding and other outdoor recreation. www.savetheconfluence.org

Save the Confluence is a coalition of outdoors organizations from duck hunters to bird watchers, from the Conservation Federation of Missouri to the Sierra Club and local churches, one group being for preservation and recreational use of natural resources, and the other being primarily against the expansion of gambling in Missouri.

Natural resource issues sometimes make strange bedfellows between groups you wouldn’t think had anything in common, and adversaries of groups you think had natural like-minded interests. Too often, emotional appeals are used on issues which actually need clear-minded thought, since few things in this world are entirely good or bad, black or white, or sometimes entirely clear, even to us. Actions on other issues, however well thought out and totally rational, often die for lack of any emotional force powering them.

Traveler tries to steer a middle ground, keeping the best interests of the resources and the people in mind. Feel free to tell us how you think we are doing.