Yearly Archives: 2019

Watch Songbird Migration Online

Migration
BirdCast on 3 Sep 2019, 4:50a (screenshot from Live BirdCast map)

5 September 2019

Songbird migration is underway across the continent but we can’t see it happening outdoors because the birds travel at night. However, we can watch them online.

Radar can see birds in flight so Cornell Lab of Ornithology’s BirdCast uses national radar data to plot where, when and what direction the birds are moving. Click the BirdCast link to see the most recent video. Watch sunset (red bar) sweep across the continent and the birds start to move, then sunrise (yellow bar) sweep across and migration stops for the day. The date above the map is a pulldown menu for selecting prior nights.

The BirdCast screenshot above was taken on Tuesday 3 September on a night when many birds left Pittsburgh on their way to the Gulf coast. At 4:50am you can see them lighting up the BirdCast map from southwestern Pennsylvania to Mississippi.

Before BirdCast existed, I watched weather radar for a snapshot of current bird activity. BirdCast filters the weather map so you see only the birds. The Weather Service does not so you’ll want to check out this vintage article — Watch Migration On Radar — for a quick tutorial on how to read the map.

The screenshot below was taken from Great Lakes weather radar on the same date and time as the BirdCast snapshot at top. Notice the differences!

Great Lakes weather radar, 3 Sep 2019, 4:50a (screenshot from the National Weather Service)

Wisconsin and Lake Michigan are brightly colored on the weather map because of heavy rain. That same area is a dark spot on BirdCast because birds don’t migrate in a storm. BirdCast also shows no birds moving in Florida; Hurricane Dorian was there.

Last night, Sep 4-5, the wind was from the north and skies were clear west of the Appalachians. BirdCast and weather radar both show birds on the move from Pennsylvania and Illinois to the Tennessee and Mississippi Valleys.

BirdCast and Great Lakes radar, 5 Sep 2019, 4:10am (from BirdCast and NWS)

It’s a good day to go birding.

(screenshot maps from BirdCast and the National Weather Service Great Lakes)

Not A UFO

Weather & Sky
Lenticular Cloud over Harold’s Cross Dublin Ireland, June 2015 (photo from Wikimedia Commons)

Strange as it looks, this fluffy white object is not a UFO (Unidentified Flying Object), it’s a special cloud.

Lenticular clouds form when the wind blows horizontally toward a fixed object that forces the air to rise and fall in a wave. If the air is moist it condenses at the crest of the wave and forms lenticular clouds at the top. The diagram below shows the wind flowing over a mountain, forming two mountain-shaped waves and lenticular clouds at peaks A and B.

Lee waves and windows (image from Wikimedia Commons)

Despite their calm appearance, the air around these clouds is very turbulent. Glider pilots ride the updrafts on the windward side but the downdrafts are deadly for everyone. This Weather Channel video explains more.

Because we don’t have mountains, lenticular clouds are rare in Pittsburgh. You have to travel to see a mountain wearing a hat.

Low lenticular clouds near Cook Inlet south of Homer, Alaska (photo from Wikimedia Commons)

(photos from Wikimedia Commons; click on the captions to see the originals)

Heads Up Pittsburgh Beekeepers: Foulbrood Alert!

Insects
Evidence of American foulbrood in a beehive (photo from Wikimedia Commons)

3 September 2023

If you keep honeybees in the Pittsburgh area, you’ll want to be sure your hives have not caught a highly contagious and deadly disease — American foulbrood (AFB).

This summer a beekeeper in the city of Pittsburgh suspected there was something wrong with his hives so he called for help from PA Department of Agriculture’s Apiary Inspectors, Bonnie Hall and Ken Hoover. On 5 July 2019 they found that six of his colonies had American foulbrood (AFB), the most widespread and deadly of bee brood diseases. Because AFB is so contagious, the inspectors checked all the registered hives within a 2.5 mile radius of the incident. They found more AFB in Pittsburgh and expanded the alert zone.

American foulbrood is caused by a spore-forming bacteria, Paenibacillus larvae, that kills honeybee larvae without harming the adults. As the larvae die off, AFB weakens the colony and can quickly lead to its death in only three weeks.

Adult bees unwittingly carry foulbrood spores into the hive and feed infected food to their young. When the larvae die the bacteria generates millions of spores that are spread easily by bees and beekeepers. The spores remain viable for up to 80 years even when exposed to extreme weather, antibiotics and disinfectants. Burning the hives and irradiating your equipment is the only way to kill the spores.

The only way to stop the disease is to burn the hive (photo from Wikimedia Commons)

As of 29 August 2019, all or part of the following Pittsburgh neighborhoods are within the American foulbrood alert: Bloomfield, Garfield, Central Lawrenceville, Stanton Heights, Friendship, Shadyside, East Liberty, Larimer, Point Breeze North, Point Breeze, Squirrel Hill North, North Oakland, Squirrel Hill South, Hazelwood, Glen Hazel, Greenfield, South Oakland, Spring Garden, Spring Hill (City View, Northside), Fineview, Perry South, Northview Heights, East Allegheny, and Troy Hill.

I have colored a neighborhood map of the city with red to give you an idea of the scope. Note that my map is not as accurate as the list of neighborhood names.

Foulbrood alert in these Pittsburgh neighborhoods (colored red), August 2019 (map from Wikimedia Commons, colored by Kate St. John)

Help stop this deadly honeybee disease!

If your bees are in the alert zone, make sure your hives are inspected for AFB. Contact State Apiarist Karen Roccasecca (717-346-9567 kroccasecc@pa.gov ) or local inspector Bonnie Hall (717-956-8175) to schedule an inspection.

If your bees are outside the zone, be extra aware when checking and inspecting your bees. “If something does not look right/healthy make a note of it and take some pictures.” Contact Karen Roccasecca (717-346-9567 kroccasecc@pa.gov ) or Bonnie Hall (717-956-8175).

For more information:

No need to worry about the honey. Karen Roccasecca says: “Please note that American foulbrood does not affect humans and the honey is safe for human consumption.”

Note: Direct quotes, where origin not is stated in the text, are linked to the source material.

(photos and map from Wikimedia Commons; click on the captions to see the originals)

Sheltering From The Storm

Bird Behavior, Weather & Sky
Immature Cooper’s hawk sheltering in a garage in Boca Raton, 2 Sep 2019, 3:44pm (photo by Natalie Mitchell)

As Hurricane Dorian approached Florida on Labor Day afternoon and a storm band dowsed the area with wind and rain, my sister-in-law went into her garage in Boca Raton and found a bird, 15-18″ tall, perched high near the ceiling. She texted me a photo. “What is it?”

This immature Cooper’s hawk is too young to have seen a hurricane before, but he knows that the weather is bad and he can feel it’s going to get worse. If he’s a skillful hunter he’s already eaten a lot in anticipation of the storm and just needs a safe place to wait out the weather, so he picked the best available option. He came indoors.

Cooper’s hawks don’t breed in South Florida but they spend the winter there (see range map). This youngster arrived recently and is improvising in bad weather. So far so good.

Cooper’s hawk range map from Wikimedia Commons (orange=breeding, purple = all year, blue=winter)

The bird may have to wait in the garage for a while. Hurricane Dorian could take 24 hours to move out of the area.

When the storm is over this bird will be glad to leave.

UPDATE, 3 Sep 2019, 8a: The storm isn’t bad in Boca Raton. The hawk left.

(photo by Natalie Mitchell, range map from Wikimedia Commons)

Guineafowl At Work

Bird Behavior
Guineafowl at Aqualand Farm, Australia (photo from Wikimedia Commons)

On Labor Day let’s talk about working birds.

Guineafowl (Numididae) were domesticated for food but they work for us in other ways as well: They eat ticks and they’re great watchdogs, though a little over-eager.

When it comes to ticks, guineafowl perform a valuable service by reducing our exposure to Lyme disease. In the video below, a small flock is on tick patrol at Suffolk County Community College on Long Island, New York.

Their watchdog skills are important too, especially if a fox tries to get into the hen house. Guineafowl are quick to raise the alarm. They’re loud and they’re not shy about it.

But sometimes their idea of danger is not the same as ours. See the video below.

Guineafowl are so loud that it’s best to keep them where people don’t mind the noise.

(photo from Wikimedia Commons)

Monarchs On The Move

Insects, Migration
Monarch butterfly flying away in Iowa, Sept 2018 (photo from Wikimedia Commons)

In the past week I’ve noticed many monarch butterflies in flight and they’ve all been heading south.

When you see a monarch, pay attention to the direction it’s heading. Right now is the peak period for them to pass through Pittsburgh on their way to Mexico.

Monarch butterflies are on the move!

(photo from Wikimedia Commons; click on the caption to see the original)

Mountain Deathcamas

Plants & Fungi
Mountain deathcamas, Cedar Bog, Ohio (photo by Dianne Machesney)

Any flower with the word “death” in its name is probably poisonous and deceptively beautiful. This one fits the bill.

Mountain deathcamas or alkali grass (Anticlea elegans) is a threatened native plant found in limy sandy soil, in fens, wet meadows, beaches, on hillsides and canyons in the Great Lakes area and western North America. A member of the trillium family (Melanthiaceae) it blooms in June through August so today, August 31, is probably too late to see it.

Dianne and Bob Machesney visited Cedar Bog, Ohio in July to catch up with the plant in bloom. (Dianne’s photo above.) Here’s another look at it from Wikimedia Commons, photographed at Manitoulin Island, Ontario, Canada.

Mountain deathcamas, Cedar Bog (photo from Wikimedia Commons)

Enjoy the plant’s beauty but never eat it! The entire plant contains a deadly alkaloid. Ingestion causes coma and death. Yikes! It earned its name.

(photo at top by Dianne Machesney. Second photo from Wikimedia Commons; click on the caption to see the original)

Dodder

Plants & Fungi
Dodder at Jennings Prairie, 4 August 2018 (photo by Kate St. John)

This yellow vine — called dodder (Cuscuta sp.) — wraps itself around other plants, inserts its “teeth” into a host, and sucks out water and nutrients. Yes, dodder is a parasite but it doesn’t kill its host. It might even be performing a service.

Learn how dodder finds a host, benefits from fungi, and may help the hosts protect themselves in this 13 minute video by Adam Haritan at Learn Your Land.

(photo by Kate St. John, video by Adam Haritan at Learn Your Land)

Seen at 62nd Street Bridge

Peregrines
Banded female peregrine 48/N seen near Hulton Bridge, 4 Jan 2019 (photo by Gina Gilmore)

On Monday 26 August 2019 I received a text message from Dan Yagusic while he was looking at a peregrine perched on the 62nd Street Bridge. The bird was banded: Black/Blue 48/N.

I replied, “I think I know that bird. Will look her up and text you back.”

Sure enough, she’s the peregrine falcon who spent part of last winter near the Hulton Bridge on the bald eagle side(*) of the Allegheny River. Gina Gilmore took many photos of her and was able to read her bands. 48/N is a female who hatched on the Tower Building in South Bend, Indiana in 2016.

Dan said, “I was at the bridge for five minutes when she flew in with a pigeon and gave me a great look at her band while she ate breakfast.”

So now we’ve seen three peregrines at or near the 62nd Street Bridge in just two months.

It’s beginning to look like there was a peregrine family at the 62nd Street Bridge this year. Maybe they used the nestbox. Dan says it’s in good condition.

Read more about 48/N and see more of Gina’s photos in this post from last January.

(*) The “bald eagle side” is on the north side of the Allegheny River. It’s where photographers stand to take pictures of the Harmar eagles.

(photo by Gina Gilmore)

In The Doldrums

Water and Shore, Weather & Sky
The doldrums appear as a band of clouds near the thermal equator (satellite image from Wikimedia Commons)

When we say we’re “in the doldrums” we feel depressed, dull and listless. Those with Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD) — a type of depression related to the change of seasons — may be in the doldrums already though it’s only late August. They’re aware that Pittsburgh has lost an hour and 48 minutes of daylight since the June 21 solstice.

The real doldrums, whose fancy name is the Intertropical Convergence Zone (ITCZ), is dull and listless too. The ITCZ or “itch” is a band of monotonous calm where the north and south trade winds converge. As the winds meet each other they travel straight up, causing windlessness on the surface and clouds above. The calm is a real hazard for sailors who depend on wind to power their ships.

The lack of wind doesn’t mean the weather is beautiful. Rising heat and moisture lead to stacks of clouds, frequent thunderstorms and heavy rainfall. Some of the storms spin away from the doldrums as tropical depressions that become hurricanes.

You can see the ITCZ from satellite as a band of clouds near the thermal equator (photo at top). At this time of year there may be a dense circle in the line of clouds, a newly forming tropical depression.

The ITCZ moves north in the summer especially over land (which is warmer) and south in the winter, causing rainy and dry seasons in the tropics. The map below shows where the ITCZ usually goes; its path in the Pacific is affected by El Nino.

Seasonal variation of the ITCZ or doldrums (map from Wikimedia Commons)

Though the doldrums are deadly calm they can generate too much excitement (storms). Read more about them from the sailor’s point of view at: Seven things you need to know about the Doldrums.

(images from Wikimedia Commons; click on the captions to see the original)