10,000 Birds

JUNE 6, 2017

The Peterson Field Guide to Bird Sounds of Eastern North America by Nathan Pieplow is innovative, fascinating, and challenging. The Peterson Field Guide to Bird Sounds of Eastern North America is divided into three main sections: Introduction, Species Accounts, and Index to Bird Sounds (also called the Visual Index). Chandler S.

North America 178

North America America Birds New York 178

10,000 Birds

JUNE 3, 2020

And then there are those startling bright red eyes, which distinguish them from all other blackbirds in my region, and make them look quite capable of peering into your soul and taking over your will. I’m not particularly proud of these photos. A cool, slightly spooky blackbird versus a muddy-looking blackbird?

Birds 157

Birds Blackbirds Mexico Cattle 157

10,000 Birds

APRIL 10, 2021

Birds are arriving in North America, flying from places far to the south. Many come from Central America, a good number fly much further. How about 500 and then 300 and then another 500 and so on, moving constantly past like some odd version of a winter finch irruption or spring blackbird migration.

Costa Rica 264

Costa Rica Nicaragua Ohio Honduras 264

10,000 Birds

JUNE 12, 2019

Just from the two roads (one toll, one free) that cross the lake, and a small part of its total shore, on a good day in December or January you can count on seeing thousands of Northern Shovelers , Northern Pintails , and Yellow-headed Blackbirds. Which can also be said for the Yellow-headed Blackbirds.

Ducks 116

Ducks Blackbirds United States Pelicans 116

10,000 Birds

SEPTEMBER 15, 2018

Yellow-headed Blackbird. ACTION ITEM: “America’s top program for protecting parks ends soon.” (The Wilderness Society). As the first U.S. national park (1872), birding records date back to its establishment. There are 258 species documented; half of which nest in the park. Canada Goose family. Photo by © Robin Edwards.

Canada 157

Canada 2018 Birds Protection 157

10,000 Birds

JANUARY 20, 2013

For those of us in the Americas, nine-primaried oscines are among our most familiar and beloved birds: finches; sparrows, juncos, and towhees; warblers; blackbirds, meadowlarks, and orioles; cardinals and grosbeaks; and tanagers. Icteridae : New World blackbirds, orioles, meadowlarks, etc. Or blackbirds and warblers?

Family 184

Family Blackbirds Groups Sparrows 184

10,000 Birds

SEPTEMBER 8, 2023

The first is that the illustrations by Dale Dyer are based, and largely seem to be the same, as the illustrations for his previous guide Birds of Central America: Belize, Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama (co-authored with Andrew Vallely, PUP, 2018). Doing this work takes time!

Costa Rica 227

Costa Rica Belize El Salvador Birds 227

10,000 Birds

MARCH 30, 2024

While enjoying my farewell Portuguese coffee and pastel de nata at the Lisbon airport and studying up on identification I considered the planning of my two-week trip to the Americas. We checked out the shrubs for songbirds while returning to the car and were rewarded with a displaying Red-winged Blackbird.

Ducks 162

Ducks Emotional Cattle Owls 162

10,000 Birds

FEBRUARY 5, 2012

So, to cut things short, there is sickness all around me, and I have thus decided to have my February post whistle to that tune as well and give an update to the mysterious die-off amongst our Eurasian Blackbirds that occurred around my home turf in Heidelberg last summer – blogged about here. Significantly reduced flight distance.

Germany 161

Germany Blackbirds 2006 Denmark 161

10,000 Birds

MARCH 19, 2013

The banner blackbird of most of Mesoamerica as well as much of the southwestern United States is the Great-tailed Grackle. If you’ve ever traveled the temperate or tropical parts of the Americas, you’ve met the grackle. The grackle is the ultimate American bird, adaptable, intrepid, and obstreperous.

Coyotes 229

Coyotes United States Blackbirds 2009 229

10,000 Birds

JUNE 19, 2015

By far the most popular bird we saw was the Red-winged Blackbird. Red-winged Blackbird is easy to understand and easy to remember. In North America best known as the name of a hawk that comes in different color morphs, but it also applies to the Ferruginous Duck , which is notably rusty only in the male’s plumage.

Blackbirds 162

Blackbirds Owls Sparrows Ducks 162

10,000 Birds

AUGUST 19, 2020

A Pinnated Bittern gets escorted to another hiding place by a squadron of Yellow-hooded Blackbirds. Pectoral Sandpipers pass through en route to southern South America, some going as far as Tierra del Fuego. Well, apart from the fact that there was no resplendent sunrise with a full spectrum of heavenly color. Greater Yellowlegs.

Trinidad 190

Trinidad South America Blackbirds Industry 190

10,000 Birds

MARCH 25, 2015

Blue-winged Teal breed over a large portion of North America but occur irregularly or at low densities in many portions of their range. You can also hear Red-winged Blackbirds, Western Meadowlark and more Marsh Wrens singing. References: 1 Birds of North America Online. This is the female Blue-winged Teal. v=V0_Yi28mT0o.

Sacramento 152

Sacramento Wildlife North America Ducks 152

10,000 Birds

APRIL 27, 2012

In polygyny, females will often nest on territories held by a male, with multiple females nesting on a single male’s territory, as in Red-winged Blackbirds (Yasukawa and Searcy 1995). Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology , 43(3) 181-190 Briskie, JV (2009) Smith’s Longspur ( Calcarius pictus ), The Birds of North America Online (A.

2002 170

2002 North America 2000 2009 170

10,000 Birds

JANUARY 29, 2013

Red-winged Blackbirds , within arms-reach, glisten in the morning sun and puff out their red shoulder epaulettes like proud military generals. Nearly every species of heron and egret in North America forage only feet away, some of them in their dazzling breeding displays.

North America 233

North America Factory Alligators Trafficking 233

10,000 Birds

JULY 20, 2019

Split from birds in northern Central America (the White-faced Ground-Sparrow ), the Cabanis’s becomes a very special bird. Red-breasted Blackbird is a meadowlark. Split from the Three-striped Warbler of South America, yet another species is added to the list of birds only found in the mountains of Costa Rica and Panama.

Costa Rica 202

Costa Rica Birds Owls South America 202

10,000 Birds

JULY 4, 2022

When juvenile Chinese Blackbirds want to get an alcoholic drink at a bar, they usually blacken their yellow gape flanges in order to look older. Birdwatchers may be familiar with the related phenomenon that sometimes it is easier to approach a single bird than a huge flock. This one was on its own and thus allowed me to get relatively close.

Birds 197

Birds Sparrows Protection Humane 197

10,000 Birds

NOVEMBER 15, 2013

So, winter is very nearly upon us, and no, I never did find a Yellow-headed Blackbird. In most of North America, winter is finch time. It’s time, if the time is ever, to get serious about this Gray-crowned Rosy-finch mission.

Badgers 180

Badgers Montana North America Abandon 180

10,000 Birds

MAY 12, 2017

Species #75 for Socrates Sculpture Park is Red-winged Blackbird. Thomas Gilbert Pearson, in his Birds of America, mentions multiple introductions including one in Hoboken in 1878 and J. And I’m getting close! For example I added two new species just this morning. Why an asterisk?

New York 106

New York New York City Illinois Wisconsin 106

10,000 Birds

SEPTEMBER 20, 2019

I haven’t yet been birding in Europe but whenever I occasionally skim a field guide about the birds on the other side of the Atlantic, I’m always encouraged to find that I’m already familiar with many species found over there, even though most of my birding experience has been limited to eastern North America.

2017 118

2017 Portugal Rabbits Europe 118

10,000 Birds

OCTOBER 2, 2018

Brewer’s Blackbirds often joined the hordes of Red-winged Blackbirds flitting in and out of the taller grasses and few shrubs. Birds of North America , the Cornell Lab of O data base, cites many studies on this topic and they don’t all agree on results and best practices.

North Dakota 147

North Dakota Birds Sparrows Blackbirds 147

10,000 Birds

OCTOBER 11, 2019

Even the names we give to some birds reflect their dependence on the cultivated landscape – we have Barn Owls ( Tyto alba ) and Barn Swallows ( Hirundo rustica ) over much of the world, and Orchard Orioles ( Icterus spurius ) in the Americas really do have a fondness for fruit groves.

Vermont 121

Vermont Belgium Farming Europe 121

10,000 Birds

FEBRUARY 27, 2016

Leeds Castle’s most showy “blackbird” is the Jackdaw , Corvus monedula. A Ringed Teal (more likely to be seen in South America than Kent) caused a stir when it followed the river downstream and showed up in Mote Park. Corvids are often associated with English castles.

Collecting 100

Collecting South America Blackbirds Adoptable 100

10,000 Birds

APRIL 26, 2013

One of the perks about living in Miami is that plane tickets to the bird-rich Caribbean, Central, and South America are often cheaper than going to places like Arizona, Colorado, or California. Like magic, a dark bird flew into a tall tree right beside the road. I fumbled for my camera and began taking shots of it before it flew off.

Jamaica 182

Jamaica Puerto Rico 2013 Birds 182

10,000 Birds

APRIL 30, 2013

Icterus is a wide-ranging neotropical genus consisting of the technicolor blackbirds we call orioles. In North America, at least in the eastern part of it, we celebrate the return of the Baltimore Oriole to parks and farms this time of year. The two dozen species are, nearly to an individual, long bodied and bicolored.

Baltimore 182

Baltimore Broker North America Raised 182

10,000 Birds

AUGUST 2, 2019

From the earliest days of European colonization in the Americas, attempts to make wine with native grapes proved unsuccessful; compared to the imported Vitis vinifera used for thousands of years of Old World winemaking, native grapes were fairly tart but lacking in sugars.

Ohio 138

Ohio Philadelphia Fox Blackbirds 138

10,000 Birds

NOVEMBER 24, 2012

Driving to the eastern extremity of New York State with the hope of seeing a bird, rare for North America, is an odd and entertaining way to spend the predawn hours. They are a European species of plover that rarely, when the winds are right, make their way to North America, usually putting down in the first place that they see land.

North America 137

North America Hungary New York America 137

10,000 Birds

SEPTEMBER 21, 2016

A professional hawkwatcher for many seasons, his passion and knowledge saw him invited to join the board of the Hawk Migration Association of North America in 2013. Newly surrounded by wildlife, he found his love of birds reignited. His blog is still intermittently updated at www.underclearskies.com.

Bald Eagle 246

Bald Eagle Los Angeles Connecticut Eagles 246

10,000 Birds

JULY 6, 2011

The boat trip also offered some good looks at the Yellow-headed Blackbirds nesting along the shores. v=v1XAFo_uVgk References: 1 Audubon California ; 2 Birds of North America Online a. But the real reason I went to the festival was to see the Clark’s and Western Grebes exhibiting their mating rituals. www.youtube.com/watch?v=v1XAFo_uVgk

California 231

California Eagles North America Breeding 231

10,000 Birds

JUNE 6, 2023

His decision to use his new celebrity (he was probably at one point the most well-known birder in North America) to speak for and participate in the issues in which he believes brings him to a place he’s avoided his whole life, the deep South. The final chapter gives some insight into Chris’s life post-Central-Park-incident.

Emotional 228

Emotional Birds Minneapolis Nepal 228

10,000 Birds

JULY 23, 2014

The Eurasian Blackbird was not found in new Zealand before man, but it is now. California Quail are familiar birds to West Coast birders of North America, and Kiwis too now. To Victorian eyes the fauna and flora of New Zealand was strange, both in appearance and in its apparent paucity.

New Zealand 162

New Zealand Possums Rabbits Ferrets 162

10,000 Birds

JULY 27, 2011

Apart from some Red-winged Blackbirds, I don’t think any of the other species had a successful go at this territory, was the pesticides? Last week, a Merlin flew in, dove at some blackbird and kept going. Each week a new species tried to test the patch for nesting territory. The first week it was a Sedge Wren. Too little food?

Birds 162

Birds Cattle Blackbirds North America 162

10,000 Birds

JULY 7, 2012

Last but not least were not one but TWO new species of blackbird for me, both Yellow-hooded and Red-breasted ! Another was a small pod of adorable Green-rumped Parrotlets , which I’ve been itching to see every since Nick Sly first wrote about Forpus passerinus on this blog.

Trinidad 183

Trinidad Birds Fast Food Cattle 183

10,000 Birds

MAY 18, 2013

By 7:30 am we made our first stop with just enough light to take photos and picked up our first three new birds for the trip, Chilean Mockingbird, Austral Blackbird, and Long-tailed Meadowlark. To be continued… Trips Argentina Santiago de Chile South America' Chilean Mockingbird.

Chile 162

Chile Argentina Nevada South America 162

10,000 Birds

SEPTEMBER 14, 2019

High overhead, swallows are going over and in the fields, blackbirds move in undulating flocks. However, even now, the ancient movements of birds between summer breeding grounds and tropical wintering places have been taking place in Costa Rica.

Costa Rica 158

Costa Rica South America Tennessee 2019 158

10,000 Birds

SEPTEMBER 11, 2012

And by their fourth and adult cycles, most Western Gulls display the pale greenish-white eyes that they are known for (refer to Steve Howell and Jon Dunn’s book Gulls of the Americas for great info on gull ID). A brightly colored iris in a bird could signify various things.

Birds 265

Birds Humane Breeding Pelicans 265

10,000 Birds

APRIL 9, 2011

Many of his works include references to avifauna, specifically blackbirds and thrushes. As passionate about ending slavery in America as he was about nature, Whittier found birds highly symbolic of freedom and grace. His poems rhapsodize about woods, water, and pastoral settings. He was also enamored of birds.

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Battery Birds Legislation Alaska 147