We have bluebirds in our little box on a tree in the front yard. I’ve tried peeking in and haven’t had any luck seeing the baby birds. This may be my answer for next year!
Wordless Wednesday: Who
Friday Fun Video: Bird Jamming to Bluegrass
Gosh who wouldn’t just love this bluegrass music? Go to a minute and a half in… the bird definitely loves it!
Wordless Wednesday: British Bird
Toxic Algae Cause “The Birds”
Forget Bambi. Forget It’ a Wonderful Life. One of the earliest movies I remember watching as a child was “The Birds.” Scared by beejeezus out of me, it did! Watching the birds go after people as they hid in cars and phone booths … well that certainly got my adrenalin pumping.
And now – possibly – we know why the birds originally attacked, which was the inspiration for the movie. According to CNN,
In a study published in the journal Nature Geoscience, Bargu argues that “toxin-making algae were present in 79 percent of the plankton” the birds ate. The toxins contained “a nerve-damaging acid, which causes confusion, seizures and death in birds.”
That’s some scary stuff!
Poor Dead Birds
One of the most traumatic things that happened to me as a child was seeing our mean old outdoor cat climb a tree and one by one kill every baby bird in a nest. I climbed the tree and knocked the cat down, heartbroken over the lifeless little bird bodies at the foot of the tree. I’m a bit more stoic about deaths in nature now, but I still hate seeing birds killed by cats.
But it does happen. And it’s nature.
After I tried reasoning with Geoffrey to bring it back outside, and garnered no results, I locked him in the bathroom and proceeded to remove the bird from the house and vacuum up stray feathers. Then I looked up what kind of bird it was in my guide. I think it was some kind of sparrow.
Is it gruesome that I look up the birds’ species after I’ve buried them?
Poor birds. But it is nature.
Turkeys Should Be in Hiding
A little town in Staten Island is being overrun by wild turkeys – a seeming bad move by the gobblers just weeks ahead of Thanksgiving! What started as a release of nine turkeys in 1999 has escalated into a takeover of the the Ocean Breeze community. From wpix.com,
Wild turkeys fill the streets year after year, causing trouble for local residents.
People who live in the Ocean Breeze section say on some days, they can’t drive through the streets or let their kids play in the yard because there are so many turkeys all over the place.
About 100 of what might have been the national bird may be on the chopping block soon if residents get their wish! Look out turkeys!! Time to go into hiding!
A Spectacle in Birds
I had never heard of “murmuration” until reading this post.
… shows off an amazing spectacle of thousands of starlings flying in formation to avoid becoming prey. In the phenomenon called ‘murmuration’, each bird mimics the one beside it in an attempt to get towards the center of the pack, which results in a fantastic visual display.
Go watch the video via the link back to The Christmas Owl!
Hey Squawk, Meet Peep
My best onomatopoeia for birds naming their chicks bird sounds are – apparently – squawk and peep! Those names are better than some names I’ve heard for regular humans, but hey… who am I to judge what people name their babies?
Meanwhile, parrots do name their offspring as proven by Venezuelan scientists. According to PopFi,
Thanks to video cameras pointed at the nests of green-rumped parrots in Venezuela, researchers from Cornell University discovered that parent parrots vocalize a specific chirp at each chick beginning soon after birth. Those specific name chirps are applied to that individual throughout its life. Like a human teen going from Edward to Ed, the chirp may be altered a bit later in the bird’s lifespan. The scientists believe the names allow the social birds to keep up with who is who within their flock.
That’s just kind of magical!
