Yearly Archives: 2010

Summer Beauty: Culver’s Root

Phenology, Plants & Fungi

Culver's Root (photo by Dianne Machesney)
Here’s a stunning flower that blooms in western Pennsylvania from June to September.  I notice it on my travels in late summer.

Culver’s Root (Veronicastrum virginicum) is tall and showy – two to five feet tall with five or six densely packed spikes of small white flowers.  The flowers turn brown quickly so it won’t always look as perfect as this. 

The most curious thing to me about Culver’s Root is that it’s native to both eastern North America and to Asia.  I wonder how that happened…  Did birds carry its seeds?

If you’d like to see it in western Pennsylvania, visit Jennings Prairie in July.

(photo by Dianne Machesney)

Anatomy: Feathers wear out

Bird Anatomy
Recently molted remiges of Black-legged Kittiwake (photo from Wikimedia Commons)


After nesting is over, what’s the next big item on a bird’s agenda?  

Molting.

Birds lose their old feathers and grow new ones because their feathers wear out. 

Shown here are four primary feathers (remiges) molted by a black-legged kittiwake.  It’s easy to see that these feathers are no longer in good shape for flight.  Their edges are not smooth.

Notice how eroded the white barbs are compared to the black ones.  That’s because pigment adds strength to the feather.  The darker the pigment, the stronger the feather.  For this reason many sea birds have black tips on their white flight feathers and some birds have completely black primary or secondary feathers. Here are three examples of black-tipped wings on …

Lesser black-backed gull (photo by Chuck Tague)
American white pelican (photo from Wikimedia Commons)
One of a pair of snow geese at Martin's Creek PP&L, June 2014 (photo by Jon Mularczyk)
Snow goose at Martin’s Creek PP&L, June 2014 (photo by Jon Mularczyk)

For more information on feather wear and how it affects the appearance of shorebirds, see this very helpful blog (written from Malaysia).

(photo from Wikimedia Commons.  Click on the caption to see the original)

Green Boy, Rest in Peace

Peregrines


Exhuberant, active and always curious, Green Boy was found dead today in the chimney at Webster Hall.

His body was found because his sister, Yellow, was stuck in the chimney too.  Though dehydrated, she was still alive and screaming for food. 

Dorothy and E2 knew their youngsters were stuck but could do nothing about it except try to entice them out with food.  Just this afternoon I saw Dorothy deliver food to the Webster Hall roof but I didn’t know the real reason she stayed there.  I could not hear her daughter’s voice.

Fortunately Yellow’s noise prompted rooftop workmen to call the Game Commission.  The workmen said they couldn’t get on the roof because they were attacked by an adult peregrine.  

Beth Fife came to the rescue, then called to let me know what happened.  Yellow is getting medical attention and will likely be back to normal soon.

Not so for Green Boy.  Help came too late. 

He didn’t know the Webster Hall chimney was a trap.  The chimney is tall, narrow and made of white metal.  It’s big enough that a young peregrine can misstep on its rim and fall in, but too narrow and slippery to climb or fly out.  One of Pitt’s 2009 juvenile peregrines was found dead inside it last October but no one knew why.  Now Green Boy has died and Yellow is lucky to survive. 

Beth Fife has mandated that Webster Hall cover the chimney immediately.  I’m sure they will gladly do so.  They love these birds too.

Poor Green Boy.  I’ll miss his antics.  He held such promise.

(photo of Green Boy on the Cathedral of Learning 25th Floor roof in a moment of curiosity, by Kimberly Thomas)

p.s. Update on Yellow, June 25, 9:20am: News from Beth Fife is that Yellow hadn’t eaten for two days but after rehydration and a little meat is doing very well.  Yellow will stay a bit at the rehabber to make sure she’s in top condition.  (No other news since this date/time.)

p.s. Update on the chimney, July 1, 9:00am:  Today I was in the Cathderal of Learning where I could see the chimney from above.  It is indeed covered quite well.  It was covered the day after the accident and that’s why it looks so different from the ground.

And the answer is… Here

Peregrines


Most of the Gulf Tower peregrine fledglings are flying now and increasingly hard to find so yesterday I asked “Where are they now?” 

I shouldn’t have tempted The Fates. 

Last night a fledgling answered my question with, “Here!” and caused quite a stir.

Around 6:00pm Tuesday evening, email was abuzz with news from the webcam watchers.  Jennie had heard from a friend that a peregrine was on the ground near the Federal Reserve Bank on Grant Street. 

Jennie wasn’t downtown but she knew to call Game Commission Dispatch (724-238-9523).  The dispatcher knew all about the bird.  Yes, an officer answered that call and reported the bird DOA. 

Dead???  Oh no!

By the time I got into email at 8:00pm everyone was grieving but no one was sure what had happened.  Neither was I, so I left a message for WCO Beth Fife who was out of town.  Beth gathered the information and called me back.  What really happened was…

During rush hour pedestrians on Grant Street noticed a very beautiful young peregrine perched on a railing near the Federal Reserve Bank.  Many stopped to take pictures.  One of them called the Game Commission.  The bird did not move. 

When the Game Commission officer arrived to rescue the bird she wouldn’t let him near her.  Instead she flew away past the Federal Building and landed on top of the bus station — proving she can fly and land six stories up.  Nothing wrong with her!

The officer reported her “GOA” (Gone On Arrival), which sounds a heckuva lot like DOA, and that’s how we all got confused.

Here she is perched on the railing last night in a photo by Jim Altier.  Jim is from Youngstown and just started working in the Gulf Tower on Monday.  He happened to walk by while she was posing for everyone.  (She has blue tape on her right leg band; she’s one of the two female chicks.)

What luck for Jim to see a peregrine so close on his second day in town!  Welcome to Pittsburgh, Jim, and thanks for the photo.

(photo by Jim Altier)

.

p.s.  Thurs, June 24, 2:30pm:  Check the comments for more news on these fledglings.  The other female (white tape) was on the ground midday today with a wing problem & is on her way to rehab.

p.s.  Fri, June 25, 9:20am:  White-tape (Gulf Tower female) has a head injury.  She will be in rehab for quite a while.

Stellar Steller’s

Beyond Bounds, Songbirds
Steller’s Jay (photo by Michelline Halliday)

This western bird is “stellar” but that’s not how he got his name.

In July 1741 the German naturalist Georg Wilhelm Steller was given a single day to study North American species.  Fortunately it was a long day with more than 20 hours of available light.

Steller’s opportunity came at Kayak Island, Alaska while on Vitus Bering‘s ill-fated last voyage.  The expedition anchored for one day to take on water so Steller quickly went ashore to catalog new species.  They headed home for Siberia the next day but became marooned on Bering Island where many expedition members perished.  Steller’s specimen of the jay was lost but his description of it was not.  The jay was later named for him.

Steller’s Jay (Cyanocitta stelleri) ranges west of the Rockies from Alaska to Nicaragua.  It’s similar to the blue jay but its color varies from dark in the north to paler in the south.  Inland birds have white flecks on their crests, coastal birds have blue. 

I hadn’t realized they varied so much until peregrine fan Michelline Halliday sent me this photo of the male jay who claims her Seattle backyard.  He and his mate raised their family nearby and are quite bold when Michelline comes near. 

But that’s partly their nature. 

Steller’s jays are highly social and hang out in groups which are dominated by a mated pair.  The birds in charge are those whose nesting territory the group is visiting at the time.  This means the dominant pair changes within the group as the group moves around.

I like to think of it as a progressive dinner party.  As the diners move from house to house, the birds in charge are those who are hosting that portion of the meal.  When everyone moves to a new location the new hosts take over. 

And they sure are dressed in beautiful “clothes.”  No wonder I get confused about the spelling of their name.  Steller’s.

(photo by Michelline Halliday)

Where are they now?

Peregrines
Peregrine fledgling on Koppers Building roof (photo by Sharon Leadbitter)

It’s getting hard to keep track of the Gulf Tower peregrine chicks even though two were still at the nest as of this morning. 

Anne Marie Bosnyak and Sharon Leadbitter have been doing their best to find the fledglings but it’s a challenge. The youngsters are always on the move.

On Monday, Sharon got lucky.  She watches from inside the US Steel Tower so she can see the birds at their own level.  When they fly near Gulf and Koppers they come within her view.

Pictured here is a peregrine fledgling Sharon saw on the roof of the 34-story Koppers Building.  (I added the red arrow.)

Who knew the building had posts atop its copper roof?  I didn’t until a peregrine chose to land there.

(photo by Sharon Leadbitter)

p.s. June 22, 3:00pm: I was lucky to see three peregrines at Pitt this afternoon.  Dorothy was roosting in her favorite nook on 32East and one of the juveniles was eating on the ledge at 10East.  A second juvie showed up and tried to take the meal from his sister.  No dice!  She mantled over it.

WHAT is he doing?

Insects

Canadian blowing up a fish (photo by Chris Colaianni)
Captain Ray with a fish (photo by Chris Colaianni)

June 22, 2010

Chris Colaianni told me a story last week that involved a fish, this man and a bird.  It was the most astonishing thing he saw on his vacation.

In early June Chris went fishing at Lake Minnewanka in Banff, Canada with Captain Ray as the guide.  The group was doing catch-and-release so when they caught a big fish they Oooo’d and Aahhhh’d and let it go.   Then someone caught this small fish and Captain Ray said “Watch this!”

He put the fish’s head in his mouth and blew air into it.  After he’d blown into it a while he tossed the fish into the lake and it floated.  So… what kind of trick is this?

“Watch the fish.”

Until this point no one had been paying attention to birds.  Suddenly a bald eagle came out of nowhere, grabbed the floating fish and took it to its nearby nest.  Captain Ray was very proud of his bird trick.  “See, he gets the fish because it’s floating.”

Chris and his friends were grossed out by the fish-in-mouth technique but they wanted to see the eagle again so when they caught another small fish they killed it and threw it into the lake.

It floated.  The eagle came back again and grabbed the dead fish.

“That’s how Americans do it.”

It was a Canadian-American cross-cultural experience.

It reminds me of the Red Green show.

(photo by Chris Colaianni)

Just checking

Peregrines

21 June 2010

Traci Darin noticed activity at the Gulf Tower peregrine nest around midnight Saturday and sent me this photo.

She wrote,  “I’m up late getting ready for a yard sale tomorrow and heard the (peregrine) kids yammering – it’s around 11:30pm and fireworks are going off.  I captured this shot, I believe of Dori.  She popped into the nest box, then jumped to the pillar to the left foreground, then disappeared.  The remaining kids in the nest went back to sleep.  Very similar to what I’ve done with my son when a storm or loud noise has woken him…rather amazing.”

How cool to see peregrine mothers react the same way human mothers do.

When there’s a loud noise, check on the kids!

(photo from the National Aviary webcam at the Gulf Tower, captured by Traci Darin)

Columbo

Plants & Fungi


Yes, Columbo, but I’m not referring to the disheveled detective played by Peter Falk. 

Last weekend I traveled to a secret meadow to find this enormous plant in bloom. 

American Columbo (Frasera caroliniensis) is a member of the Gentian family and endangered in Pennsylvania.  Some people call it Monument Plant, an obvious name when you consider my bright green walking stick in this photo is 3.5 feet tall.  The plant is huge!   (See better photos here.)

American Columbo has an unusual reproductive strategy.  It’s a monocarpic perennial that grows as a rosette of basal leaves for many years without flowering.  Then in response to an unknown trigger it shoots up a stalk 10 feet high, blooms and dies.  

When it will bloom is a mystery no one can predict by its size or age but botanists think individual plants may bloom synchronously with other Columbos nearby.  A solo plant transplanted by a botanist did not flower in 15 years of watching.  Was it lonely?

Do all the Columbos in a meadow bloom at once?  No.  The meadow has plants of different ages because Columbo seeds are fussy.  They won’t germinate until they’ve soaked up water when the temperature is about 40o F (5o C).  Seeds that remained in the old seed head must wait for the right conditions to occur when they reach the ground so they won’t germinate for another year or more. 

My visit to this mysterious plant ended in a bumbling detective adventure.  As I bushwhacked out of the meadow I dropped my bifocal sunglasses but didn’t discover my loss until I’d hiked another half hour.  I returned to the meadow to find them but I my path was obscured.  I couldn’t be sure I was retracing my steps. 

After a long search I found my sunglasses.  Broken.  Someone had stepped on them.  Who?  

Did I?  Yes, the sunglasses fell under my feet and I stepped on them just after they fell. 

Mystery solved.  Thanks, Columbo.

(photo by Kate St. John)

Peregrine updates: Pitt and Gulf Tower

Peregrines


At the University of Pittsburgh:
For the past week Pitt’s young peregrines have been shuttling back and forth between St. Paul’s Cathedral and Heinz Chapel — if they’re on campus at all.  The “kids” are now at the stage when one or more go off on their own to explore the area, returning only to chase their parents and whine for food.  

Three is the highest number of juveniles I find at any one time and only if their parents are nearby.  This morning two juvies chased Dorothy when she tried to capture a pigeon near the Community of Reconcilation tower.  The pigeon escaped because it heard them coming — Dorothy with two whining kids in tow.  Karen and Coleen tell me they were doing this at lunchtime, too.

Sometimes the adults get a break.  Pictured above is one of the adult peregrines perched on the west face of the Cathedral of Learning in a quiet moment, as seen on the Tour Pitt camera.
.


At the Gulf Tower:
The youngsters here are about to fly but we won’t be able to see it on camera — the view is just too narrow. 

Last night before sunset all five were in the nest box, beginning to settle down for the night.  Today most of them were off camera but probably in the vicinity of the ledge. 

Some of you said you’ll be heading to the Gulf Tower to watch this weekend.  Let us know what you see by posting comments below.

(first photo from the Tour Pitt camera captured by Jennie Barker;  second photo from the National Aviary webcam captured by Traci Darin)

p.s.  See news in the comments.  One of the youngsters has flown at Gulf Tower as of tonight at 8:46pm!