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Acorn Woodpeckers: The Clowns of the Avian World

10,000 Birds

Both the male and female of the species have a bright red crown. Most Acorn Woodpeckers are cooperative breeders and live in family groups of up to a dozen or more individuals. Within a group, 1–7 male co-breeders compete for matings with 1–3 joint-nesting females who lay their eggs in the same nest cavity.

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Flock to Marion

10,000 Birds

Finally in 1799, the first visitors on this volcanic land were a group of French seal hunters who were after the fur seals that can be found hauled out on the beaches for fur and oil, which almost wiped out the local population of the species. Marion has a fascinating history with invasive species. Just get rid of the mice.

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Birding Nonggang, Guangxi, China – part 2

10,000 Birds

In China, wherever there is one real tourist attraction (like the Great Wall), the local strategy seems to be to add some fake attractions – replicas of palaces or tombs, amusement parks, shopping centers – in order to maximize the income from tourists. But the starting point has to be a real attraction, not a fake one.

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Big Day Birding in Costa Rica- Strategies and Constraints

10,000 Birds

In the northern hemisphere, the combination of migrants, resident species, and higher frequency of bird song makes it much easier to identify more birds, compared to say, August, so if you want to get really crazy and go for a Big Day record, spring is the time to go for it. They got all three potoo species in Costa Rica.

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A Strategic Arms Race Among Birds

10,000 Birds

The vast majority of the 10,000+ living species of birds are passerines, and the vast majority of those have a similar system of breeding: Mom and dad bird make a nest and share parental responsibilities roughly equally, if not identically. It turns out that the two strategies may be related.

Breeders 192
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The Fate of the Florida Anis

10,000 Birds

It is one of three species of ani ( Groove-billed and Greater Anis are the other two) and together form a unique branch in the cuckoo family. In addition to having a communal nesting strategy, anis also spend a significant amount of time allopreening, huddling together, and sunning themselves together on exposed branches.

Florida 180
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Rails: The Once and Future Kings of the Pacific

10,000 Birds

One of the less well remembered awful things that happened in the Second World War (a six year period of history filled with an uncountable number of awful things) is that war’s direct role in the extinction of two species of rail. The loss of these two species was, in fact, no aberration, except in how late the extinctions were.

Hawaii 194