Hawks

Deep snow increases the number of small birds and mammals visiting the feeder beside the house.  All of this activity attracts the attention of larger winged predators like this Red-tailed Hawk.

I found a rabbit that had been hit on the road and moved it to a safe location behind the house.  The township used a grader to clear the deep snow from the road, leaving two foot high vertical walls of ice on each side.  This makes it difficult for small animals to get clear of traffic.  Scavengers are then at risk when they sit on the road to feast.

The hawk was quick to begin work on the rabbit.

It wasn’t long before the hawk’s meal was disturbed.  A crow landed between the hawk and the camera and began inching its way towards the rabbit.

Two more crows joined the first.  The hawk arched its wings over its meal, but the crows continued to move in.

In its attempt to relocate to a more secure location, the hawk dropped its meal just a few feet from its previous location. I headed out to see what shape the rabbit was in.   A large portion had been consumed in the short amount of time the hawk had to feed. 

My arrival to examine the rabbit caused the crows to leave the scene.  The hawk waited in a nearby tree.  A few minutes after my return to the house, the hawk swooped in, grabbed the remains of its meal and headed off.

For the past couple of years, a pair of Red-shouldered Hawks have been regular visitors to the yard.  They seem most interested in pursuing mice and chipmunks around the bird feeders, but I’ve also seen them chasing squirrels and young rabbits in the yard.

They also benefit by what I call the crow feeding station, where I deposit kitchen scraps and other edibles, such as road kills, for foraging birds and small mammals.

On this day, I hadn’t put anything out that I thought would satisfy a hawk, but the hawk seemed interested in something.    

Then it swallowed down a piece of overdone grilled cheese sandwich.  I knew that offering would be welcomed by the crows, but not by this guy.

The hawk finished off the rest of the sandwich before departing.  I got the feeling that its final look in my direction was trying to convey the message that I had better offer something more meaty next time.

Return of Heavy Snow

The latest winter storm began dropping snow on Blue Jay Barrens early Wednesday evening.  Snow fell steadily through the night and continued until late Thursday morning.  The total snowfall was eight inches. That wasn’t close to being a record, but an eight inch snow is considered to be a major event in this area.  Temperatures are predicted to warm rapidly over the next week which should melt this snow fairly soon.  Of course, thick snow cover has a way of keeping temperatures colder than predicted, so I expect to be seeing this snow for a while.

Unlike our last snow event, this snow began with a couple inches of large wet flakes that stuck to whatever they touched.  This formed a base of snow on tree branches that caught much of the dry snow that followed.  Cedar branches developed a noticeable droop.  Some cedars lost their cone shape altogether and took on the appearance of sprawling shrubs.  Most will recover their shapes once the snow melts, but there are always a few left with a permanent disfigurement.

The Indian Grass managed to remain upright through this snow.  A few stalks developed a strong lean, primarily due to becoming saturated with water during a heavy rain event preceding the snow.

This winter storm officially began as rain on Tuesday afternoon.  Temperatures reached 50^oF and almost two inches of rain fell during the next 24 hours.  By the time the rain changed over to snow, most of the snow from the prior storm had melted.

The rain was more than enough to fill the pond.  Cloudy water made it impossible to make a visual check for any new salamander activity.  Frozen slush now covers the pond’s surface, so I’ll have to wait for the melt to see what may be occurring in the water.  A few Spring Peepers began calling late Wednesday afternoon, but they grew silent when the temperature and the heavy snow began to fall.

During that brief period between one snow cover and the next, I noticed that voles had left the tall grass fields and extended their foraging tunnels into the lawn.  Voles forage in areas that provide a thick grass canopy capable of shielding their activities from predators.  Deep snow offers a temporary canopy cover that allows foraging in normally inaccessible areas.

Voles are plant eaters that feed on a variety of leaves, stems, bulbs and roots.  As they progress through an area, eating whatever they find suitable, they develop runways that are then used as travel lanes to quickly escape predators, move to and from temporary nests, or to access new foraging areas.  The floor of the runway is generally bare ground and the sides are lined with plant material unsuited to consumption.  Extensive systems are often developed.

I’m impressed by the amount of work the voles were able to accomplish in the short time the yard was covered by snow.  It’s a more impressive accomplishment when you consider that the vole was eating its way along.  Fortunately, I have no desire to make the lawn a manicured landscape of introduced grasses, so am not disturbed by the activities of a few hungry voles.

Heavy Snow - Round One

The first half of winter 2015 was rather unremarkable at Blue Jay Barrens.  We had some cold weather and a few light snowfalls, but overall it seemed that we were headed for a nice winter.  That seemed only fair since I didn’t feel fully recovered from the trials of the previous winter’s persistent cold and snow.  Then really cold weather arrived and I began to wonder what that would do to exposed plants.  When a light snow was forecast for Presidents Day, I felt that a couple of inches of snow cover over the plants would be a good thing.  I hadn’t counted on three storms in a row leaving us with over a foot of snow.  I guess that snow was valuable as an insulating blanket against the several mornings of below zero temperatures that followed.  Three mornings were in the minus teens and the coldest morning temperature bottomed out at -23^oF.

A bit of freezing rain managed to put a nice crust atop the snow layer.  Sunny days caused a bit of snow melt, but the wet surface froze even more solid each night.  The resulting crust was strong enough to allow medium sized mammals to walk across the snow without breaking through.  These conditions make it tough for most birds to forage for seed on the ground.

Fortunately, most of the snow fell as dry powder and did not stick to plant stalks.  Seed heads remained well above the snow line.  Stout stalks like those of the Orange Coneflower were common across the prairies, but I wondered if they still contained any seed.

I checked a few seed heads and found some seed in each one.  I also found seed on stalks of Monarda, Goldenrod and various grasses.  The curious thing was the absence of any evidence that the birds were utilizing this food source.  If birds had been feeding on these seed heads, debris from the disturbed head would litter the snow. 

Dried Sumac fruit hung in full clusters, untouched by any feathered foragers.

Snow beneath the Sumacs didn’t show any signs of debris falling from above.

The Sumac fruit itself looked just as did three months ago.  I guess the birds weren’t being as stressed by the weather as I had imagined.

Some birds are not stopped by a little bit of crusted snow.  Wild Turkeys can claw through the snow and forage in the leaf litter below. 

Exposed areas like this also provide feeding opportunities for small bird and mammal species.

Cedar branches managed to catch and hold a significant amount of the snowfall.  The dark cedar needles allowed sunlight to warm the branches and melt the snow.  Sunlight angling in from the south was then able to melt the shallow layer of snow beneath the tree.  These grass islands beneath the cedars provide additional snowfree areas in which the birds can forage.

This is where the snow halted my cedar maintenance activities a couple of weeks ago.  I’m hoping the snow disappears within the next couple weeks so I can get in here and complete work in this field.  I hate to leave things half done.

The foot bridge is looking like railroad tracks.  The bridge supports held the cold and slowed snow melt on the deck above.  The center of the bridge was exposed to air from beneath and experienced accelerated melting as a result of circulation of sun warmed air along with heat rising from the creek water.

Deer took advantage of every patch of open creek water.  Deer consistently broke through the snow crust and provided about the only tracks to be found in the woods.

Several inches of snow still cover the barrens.  I keep wondering how the Leavenworthias and Drabas are doing beneath this winter cover.

The Indian Grass has managed to stay upright through every storm.  This is the grass species that is most likely to hold up under adverse weather conditions.  Many bird species spend the cold nights tucked down into the tall grass.

The golden colored grass absorbs heat from the sun and melts the snow around its base.  The tall grass patches are the first to become snow free.

Most of the snow has disappeared from the standing Indian Grass on the left side of the trail.  To the right, in the mowed field, six inches of snow still covers the ground.

A warm rain brings up clouds of water vapor from the remaining snow.  March 3 saw 50^oF temperatures and heavy rain moving through in advance of a major winter storm due in tomorrow night.  Snow totals tomorrow are predicted to reach 10+ inches followed by another dip into the subzero temperatures before conditions become more seasonal next week.  Winter weather often has a significant impact on plant growth the following summer, so I keep records of winter conditions just in case I’m looking for an explanation of strange plant behavior later on.

Cardinals - The Evening Birds

The composition of species at the bird feeder progressively changes through the course of a day.  I think of Blue Jays as the morning birds, because they make their most concentrated visits shortly after sunrise.  At the other end of the day are the Cardinals, the last birds to leave the feeders in the evening gloaming.  With an intensified twilight appearance at the feeders, Cardinals are definitely the evening birds.

The Cardinals are as difficult to count as the Blue Jays.  There is a constant coming and going from the seed scattered beneath the Apple tree.

The tree itself is packed with resting Cardinals.  The blue of the morning Blue Jays is now replaced with the red of the evening Cardinals.

Cardinals usually fill the feeder to capacity.  A Tree Sparrow, trying hard to maintain its place at the feeder, is about to be displaced by a Cardinal.

Fallen sunflower seed in the vicinity of the feeder is quickly cleaned up by the Cardinals.  Rarely do they forage alone.

A mob typifies their more normal foraging behavior.  Many of these birds, in the company of their parents, made their first journey to the feeder this past summer.  Each year, I find a few Cardinal nests tucked away among thick cedar branches.

The glare of the setting sun sometimes makes it difficult to view the birds, but it also makes the Cardinals shine that much brighter.  I haven’t seen many unusual birds at the feeder this year, but the residents have been here in strong numbers.

Blue Jays

I think a Blue Jay may have been the first bird to visit my bird feeder when I moved to this property 30 years ago.  It was certainly the most commonly encountered species during that first summer.  I could not step out of the house or walk anywhere on the property without seeing or hearing Blue Jays.  It’s not hard to understand why I chose to name my property Blue Jay Barrens.

Since that first day, the number of Blue Jays at Blue Jay Barrens has grown.  It’s now rare to encounter a lone bird.  If a Blue Jay scolds me as I wander around the property, there are always several more ready to back him up.

The perch on the feeder is not nearly wide enough to accommodate the daily throng of Blue Jays that come in to feed.  Many of these are from this summer’s crop of youngsters.  A swarm of young birds join the flock each summer, but I have yet to find a Blue Jay nest.

Tree roots exposed by the digging actions of deer and turkey act as perches on which the Blue Jays can open their sunflower seeds.  After eating their fill, the birds usually take a few seeds off to cache for later.  I’ll find many of these caches in early summer when clumps of sunflower seedlings sprout from all sorts of unlikely places.

Counting the total number of Blue Jays visiting the feeder is just about an impossible task.  Those on the ground are constantly leaving to perch in the trees while others come in to take their place.

There are a couple of doves in the tree, but the majority of perching birds are Blue Jays.  This photo shows about a third of the tree area and the rest of the tree is just as crowded.  Add to that the Blue Jays in two other nearby trees, those spread over a considerable ground area, those perched out of view on the house gutter and those in the trees lining the field behind that house.  Now put them all in constant motion and you get an idea of how frustrating an attempt at counting can be.

I’ve added three Blue Jay videos to my YouTube channel.  Click on the links to view.

Video 1 – A short clip showing a very active concentration of feeding Blue Jays.  There is some camera shaking from my trying to untangle my sweatshirt sleeve caught in the gear that raises the camera on the tripod.  To view click HERE.

Video 2 – A two minute clip highlighting the comings and goings from a concentrated Blue Jay group.  I particularly like the Blue Jay that refuses to share the water.  To view click HERE.

Video 3 – A two minute clip showing the feeder, water and surrounding ground area.  A great coming and going of birds, with Blue Jays playing a major role.  To view click HERE.