Birding News and Features

Winter Open Country Highlights

Each winter, birders have target birds that mark the winter season.  Species you just don’t get outside of the cold months.  The list of winter specialties is fairly short compared to the turning seasons.  Many of these are visitors from the frozen north.  The obvious candidates are birds with “snowy” or “northern” in their monikers.  Sure, the Snowy Owl phenomenon is exciting, but what about Northern Shrikes, other open field raptors, Snow Buntings, Lapland Longspurs?  These would be highlights of any Pennsylvania winter birding trip.  Each of these species shows a different pattern of migration and occurrence every year, variations on a theme.  They also offer enticing photographic opportunities because they often sit in prominent locations with uncluttered background.  Charismatic winter birds abound in Pennsylvania.

Snowy Owls Visit from the North

Snowy Owls are in the news, birding and otherwise. They already had lots of charisma, but the Harry Potter phenomenon has given them an extra boost. This certainly has been a big winter for Snowy Owls in the United States. It started early with Snowy Owls reported in Pennsylvania as early as November. The good news for birders is that they are still coming. Although this may be welcomed news for birders, it may not be for the owls. They are coming here because they are hungry. This past summer was apparently a very big year for Snowy Owls on the tundra, because of the abundance of their favorite prey, the lemming. We lack lemmings, but have plenty of meadow voles and other rodents for owls to eat. Unlike other owls, Snowy Owls are no shirkers. Snowy Owls are denizens of the tundra, so they are comfortable sitting out in the open. They are not shy because where they come from arctic foxes and polar bears are more commonly seen than people. That big ball of white on top of a hillock or a building out in the open might be a Snowy Owl. They are most likely to be found along shores of lakes and rivers or in wide open spaces like open fields, airports, strip mines, fairgrounds, and highways. The unique features of eBird with its mapping and tracking allow others to find owls and for researchers to learn more about this irruption event. It is great to follow the news to a known owl, but it is even better to find new ones. Individuals have been found in Erie, Somerset, Cumberland, Chester, Delaware, and Philadelphia counties this winter and rumored elsewhere. Considering the blank spaces between these sightings and all the open habitat, there may be others out there!

CBC Builds Birding Momentum

The Christmas Bird Count (CBC) is an annual birding event that is the longest running citizen science bird project in the country.  It attracts thousands of birders of all kinds into the field in some of the worst weather to collect data on our winter birds. The CBC is an event not only of science but also of the social side of birding.  We love to get out and find birds and then get together to share our findings. It is part of the holiday tradition and a great way to start the New Year. CBC data are valuable for tracking bird population trends and range changes. Each count circle is divided into sections and these sections are probably small enough to be regarded as locations applicable to eBird as long as the party hours can apply. The CBC data can be entered into eBird  and supplemented by return trips to a count section. The interesting birds you found may persist. Are they still there?  How many? The birds you missed on the CBC day might show up later in winter. Why not try again? The winter bird invasion hoped for may have just been delayed. Go out and look, and then record your results! Bring along a birding friend, especially a beginner, and add to the fun.  

Olive-sided Flycatcher: Peregrine of the Flycatchers

Called the “Peregrine of the flycatchers,” the Olive-sided Flycatcher migrates through Pennsylvania and formerly nested in the state’s mountains. This large flycatcher is well-known for its loud whistled call often rendered as “Quick, three beers!” that is given from high on a snag or limb at the forest edge. The large boreal pewee has the longest migration of any North American flycatcher with some traveling as far south as Bolivia to spend the winter. It is listed as a Watch List species by IUCN as Near-Threatened because of its declining population.  Olive-sided Flycatchers are now migrating through the state on their way south. This species was just featured as an American Bird Conservancy Bird of the Week. It is one of the high elevation nesting species of the Appalachian Mountains that are in decline.

Good Spruce Cone Crop – A Crossbill Year?

It looks like there is a good spruce cone crop this summer.  Where there is a good cone crop, it could attract crossbills to areas in Pennsylvania they have not been reported recently. Crossbills can respond to such cone crops -- notoriously irruptive and opportunistic. These invasions can occur in late-summer and fall, well into August and September.  Red Crossbill is an occasional rare nesting bird in our state but may be under-reported due to its habitat of nesting at odd times. In the recent second Pennsylvania Breeding Bird Atlas, there were only four nesting confirmations perhaps because birders did not look for crossbills at this time of year. So, please include some spruce areas in your late summer and early fall field trips. It is worth targeting higher elevation forests and wetlands where red spruce can be found and Norway spruce plantings that can be found almost anywhere but especially in state forests, game lands, cemeteries, and old civil conservation corps camps. Many of our conifer forest specialists nest in remote locations where birders seldom visit especially this late in summer. Let’s see if they are out there now!

Cerulean Warbler – Our Forest Gem

Wearing the sky on its back, the Cerulean Warbler is one of the flagship birds for American forest songbird conservation. Pennsylvania’s forests are home to many Cerulean Warblers. The Pennsylvania Society for Ornithology shined the light on the Cerulean Warbler at its May meeting.  Not only did the meeting feature two presentations on Ceruleans by Scott Stoleson of Allegheny National Forest and Kim Van Fleet of Audubon Pennsylvania, but the field trip to Blue Knob State Park seemed to be a visit to “Cerulean Warblers Central” on the Allegheny Front. The organized field trip located several singing males along park trails.  Even a “newbie” to the park like myself could find a dozen males in a morning.  Where else can this declining songbird be found in the state?  It is now past nesting season, but your recent records could be helpful for us to better understand where this forest gem can be found.  

Barn owls: A rose by any other name…

Who can forget a barn owl?  They are known by many names which demonstrate their novel appearance and appeal:  monkey-faced owl, silver owl, delicate owl, golden owl, and white owl.   Considering that barn owls have one of the world’s widest distributions for any bird, a striking appearance, nocturnal, predatory habits, and a vocal repertoire that lends itself readily to the haunted house industry, it is little wonder that there is a wealth of colloquial names that colorfully describe people’s perceptions of this owl. If you watched them closely though, you would name them the number one mouse-hunter.  Each pair dispatches dozens of rodents each night!   They seem so obvious when you see their ghostly flight or hear their sharp screams, but this is one of the state’s more elusive birds.  Often they nest on private property so they are less available for observation to the casual watcher than most birds.  But, they are worth the effort and often occur in higher quality farmland with grassy habitats. 

New Data Entry System Released!

After months of design and countless hours of testing, eBird's new data entry system is now online.  The effort to redesign the data entry pages was geared toward making eBird easier to use, checklist entry faster, more responsive and customizable, and the experience more fun. We encourage you to enter a few checklists, get used to the new pages, and explore the new functionality and customization options now available to you. Although the eBird team tested this new process for months, it is possible that a few bugs may still exist. If you find a problem, use the "Contact" link at the top of the checklist entry pages , or email Cornell Lab at ebird@cornell.edu.Since Pennsylvania’s Breeding Bird Atlas was the premier American on-line data entry Atlas project through Cornell Lab, if you participated, you were a part of a historic effort, a marvelous technological achievement in birding.  The new data entry system has great potential to make your bird data even more valuable and interesting.  This eBird data entry allows Pennsylvania birders to make a next step after the successful Breeding Bird Atlas to document their important records. 

Focus on Golden-winged Warblers

The Golden-winged Warbler is one of the breeding birds of greatest interest in Pennsylvania.  It seems to be disappearing rapidly from areas where it was found only a few years ago.   It has been on the state and national Watch List as a Red Listed species.  This beautiful songbird is in dramatic decline in our state as the recent Breeding Bird Atlas demonstrated.   However, Golden-winged Warblers respond to various disturbances so its range and occurrences are constantly changing.  It is a constantly moving target.   We invite all Pennsylvania birders to go out and check places for Golden-winged Warblers and share recent sightings on eBird.  Check out the places where you located them during the recent Atlas, or on any past birding outing, or places you have heard about Golden-wings or think they might occur where nobody has checked.   We are always interested in new places and whether the old Golden-wing places are still occupied. 

2011 PSO Meeting at Bedford: May 20-22

The heights of the Allegheny Front will provide the backdrop for the annual Pennsylvania Society for Ornithology (PSO) meeting in Bedford County.  The meeting will take place on May 20 – 22, a good time for passage migrants and for breeding species.  There will be several outings that target a wide variety of habitats. The Front itself includes forested and bog habitat that provide habitat for wood warblers and thrushes. The Bedford Valley below will provide forest edge, thicket, wetland and grassland habitats  There is a big reservoir at Shawnee State Park and the Juniata River in Bedford.  It will be a great weekend for a high species count. Come to this meeting for no other reason than Dunning’s Creek Wetlands. Check out the PSO website for more information.  See: www.pabirdsorg  

Bald Eagle Nesting Season 2011

Bald Eagles are well into their 2011 nesting season.  Many already have eaglets in the nest.  The 2010 Bald Eagle nesting season was a record success with 197 recorded active territorial nesting pairs that produced a record number of eaglets, an unbelievable 293.  There are 49 counties that can be counted as hosting eagle nests, but that list is growing in 2011.  There now are so many eagle nests that it is challenging our resources to monitor all nests.  It is relatively easy to find a nest and keep an eye on it in winter and early spring, but much harder once the leaves come out and hide nests from view.   It is difficult to imagine a stick nest the size of a compact car can be hard to see, but this is true in many cases.   How can birders help?  Please let us know if you find any new eagle nests.  And use eBird to document other birds you find there.

Timberdoodle Time!

Eyes too high, bill too long, legs too far to his rear . . . a woodcock seems a cumbersome clown, an assemblage of spare parts. But watch this clown in his own element - a wet thicket in springtime - and you’ll see one of the greatest wildlife shows in Penn’s Woods. Subject of art, festivals, and odes penned by the great masters of wildlife management . . . the “Sky Dance” of the humble woodcock will entertain anyone who ventures into its soggy haunts this spring.

Aldo Leopold, Father of modern wildlife management, was truly enamored with this spectacle and devoted a section of his April entry in “A Sand County Almanac” to this description of the Sky Dance: “Suddenly the peenting ceases and the bird flutters skyward in a series of wide spirals, emitting a musical twitter. Up and up he goes, the spirals steeper and smaller, the twittering louder and louder, until the performer is only a speck in the sky. Then, without warning, he tumbles like a crippled plane, giving voice in a soft liquid warble that a March bluebird might envy. At a few feet from the ground he levels off and returns to his peenting ground, usually to the exact spot where the performance began, and there resumes his peenting.”

Third Rusty Blackbird Blitz Is On!

Are Rusty Blackbirds wintering in Pennsylvania? How many and where? We don’t really know. Join a national effort to learn more about this elusive species during the third annual Rusty Blackbird Hotspot Blitz that will be held January 29 through February 13. Last year during the blitz, there were only three reports of Rusty Blackbirds from Pennsylvania, but many more from New York, Ohio, New Jersey and Delaware. We know they’re here, although hard to find. Unlike other “blackbirds” this species is strongly associated with wetlands, not farmlands. Let’s get more Pennsylvania sites on the map this time around! This is our last chance, at least under the current methodology. There may be future citizen science efforts on ‘Rusties,’ but at this point we don’t know what form they will take.

Additional information on identification, habitat preferences, etc., will be posted on the Smithsonian Migratory Bird Center's Rusty Blackbird website: http://nationalzoo.si.edu/ConservationAndScience/MigratoryBirds/Research/Rusty_Blackbird/

Christmas Bird Count – A Celebration of the Season

Pennsylvania birders and feeder watchers are invited to participate in the 111th Annual Christmas Bird Count (CBC), which takes place December 14th through January 5th.  This is a fun way to contribute to bird conservation and also get some fresh air.  Each holiday season, tens of thousands of volunteers nationwide take part in an adventure that has become a family tradition among generations. Families and students, birders and scientists, armed with binoculars, bird guides and checklists go out on an annual mission - often getting out before dawn. All CBC participants who brave the snow, wind, or rain, to take part in annual survey make an enormous contribution to conservation. Bird conservation organizations use data collected in this longest-running wildlife census to assess the health of bird populations - and to help guide conservation action.  From feeder-watchers and field observers to count compilers and regional editors, everyone who takes part in the Christmas Bird Count does it for love of birds and the excitement of friendly competition -- and with the knowledge that their efforts are making a difference for science and bird conservation.

Information  can be obtained from Audubon Society’s Christmas Bird Count website (www.audubon.org/Bird/cbc/), the Pennsylvania Society for Ornithology’s website (www.pabirds.org), or the PGC’s  website (www.pgc.state.pa.us) where you click on “Wildlife” in menu bar at the top of the homepage, choose the “Christmas Bird Count” under “Wild Birds and Birding.”

Winter Finches Here and More Coming

Pennsylvania is a great place to find finches and other irruptive winter songbirds, at least in some years.  The winter finch invasion has already begun in earnest.  Across the state, birders are finding Evening Grosbeaks, Pine Siskins, and White-winged Crossbills at backyard feeders and at natural feeding spots.  More are sure to follow, given the early stage of these sightings for the winter season.  Artificial feeding stations tend to attract these seed-eating songbirds, but so also do natural seed and fruit sources.  Many finches will feast on birch catkins, sumac berries, grape arbors, hackberry drupes, mountain-ash berries, and a wide variety of cones.  Finding finches is as easy as filling your feeder, but can be even more rewarding with a walk in the woods.  See the story from the general eBird website that follows which includes Ron Pittaway’s Winter Finch Forecast.   In our own state, we have native populations of red and black spruce as well as plantings of Norway, Colorado blue, and white spruces.  The blue “berries” of the native eastern juniper, called red-cedar around here, also attracts a lot of winter invaders.  The following story takes a continental view, but Pennsylvania also has its hot-spots of conifers including the Poconos, North Mountain, Cook Forest, and the many planted conifer groves in towns and parks.  The cone-birds are coming to a place near you.   Some may linger to breed in the spring.  

Pennsylvania Sees Raptor Migration Milestones

The long history of raptor migration studies and conservation in American starts with Pennsylvania. Hawk Mountain Sanctuary on the Kittatinny Ridge is known world-wide for its leadership in raptor migration monitoring, research, and conservation. In this migration season, the staff recorded its best day for Bald Eagles in the post-DDT era. This is a milestone not only for Hawk Mountain but also for anyone interested in the return of our national symbol. 

With the spine of the Appalachian Mountains bisecting the state, there also are several other important hawk watch sites in Pennsylvania. For the autumn season migration, October and November are good months to visit a hawk migration site and enjoy the spectacle. Not only raptors, but many other bird species can be viewed from mountain tops and vistas. Early mornings can provide warbler and other migrant songbird   fall-outs.  Waterfowl flocks can be seen streaming over the ridges from “hawk watches.” And, this time of year, you also can enjoy monarch butterflies and darner dragonflies there, too.  

New Information on State Endangered Birds

The Pennsylvania Game Commission has published a new “Endangered and Threatened Species” section on its website to help educators, students, contractors, environmental planners, conservationists, birders, and any interested residents learn more about these species of greatest conservation need.  Each of the listed species gets its own page and there are additional pages concerning related subjects.   You can get involved with Endangered bird protection, conservation, monitoring.  The website shows you how.  

To access the new Endangered and Threatened Species Section of the Game Commission’s website – www.pgc.state.pa.us, click on “Endangered Species” under “Quick Clicks” in the right-hand column.

Scrub Barrens Are Great for Birds

Scrub barrens are probably the most underappreciated and disrespected bird habitat in the state. They certainly are not barren of birds!  Barrens suffer from their misnaming and misconceptions about what they are and what birds they support.  What are barrens?  They are areas that support a mix of vegetation including shrubs --- often heaths, small trees, and areas where grasses or forbs dominate. The natural vegetation succession has been inhibited by poor soil or a history of fires.  Although the habitat name would not give you this impression, the result is a rich mosaic of wildlife habitat often valuable to birds and other kinds of wildlife.  Conversion of barrens to farmland and residential areas, invasive exotic plants, and fire suppression are the main enemies of barrens ecosystems.  They need disturbance to be rejuvenated.  Many birds in decline that are found in thickets and that elusive category of “early succession habitat” are found here, sometimes in abundance. Looking for Prairie Warblers or Brown Thrashers?  Check out the barrens!   Some barrens also are home to the increasingly rare Golden-winged Warbler.  

Own Own Holly Mercker Is eBirder of the Month

New State-wide Osprey Nest Survey

The Osprey is one of the most recognizable and popular raptors.  Like the Bald Eagle, it a charismatic bird of conservation concern.  Yet it often is found near humans.  Unique in appearance, it is truly the “people’s fish hawk.”  The Pennsylvania Game Commission is embarking on a 2010 statewide Osprey Nest Survey.  It could use your help.   Specifically, the wildlife diversity group would like to find how many nests are active this year, where they are located, how many chicks fledge, what type of water body they favor (e.g. rivers vs. reservoirs), and on what type of structures they are building their nests.  Of course, where you can find Ospreys are often good birding spots worth eBirding. 

For more information about the project and a form that can be used to report nests, please visit the new Osprey project webpage at http://www.portal.state.pa.us/portal/server.pt?open=514&objID=721226&mode=2