Only as big as a European starling, this accipiter native to Central and South America is aptly named the tiny hawk (Microspizias superciliosus).
Why is he so little? Because he eats the smallest birds.
Like all accipiters, the tiny hawk feeds primarily on birds. It hunts hummingbirds and small songbirds, by darting out from a place of concealment to snatch them as they pass by, but also ambushing them when the smaller birds are perched. There is some evidence that it learns the regular perches of some hummingbirds and hunts for them there. Some individuals also hunt rodents and bats.
At first I misread the word as “supercilious” meaning arrogant or haughty. There’s a connection between the two words. Arrogant or haughty people sometimes raise one eyebrow to show their attitude toward others.
We didn’t see the tiny hawk during our Ecuador birding trip because we were in Mindo & the northwest highlands while he lives in the lowlands and foothills.
(photo from Wikimedia Commons; click on the caption to see the original)
Cloud forest near Alambi Reserve, Pichincha, Ecuador (photo by Kate St. John)
12 February 2023
While listening to birdsong in the cloud forest near Mindo, Ecuador I heard two songs that reminded me of home. Neither bird is colorful. Their songs are beautiful.
As soon as I heard the Andean solitaire (Myadestes ralloides) his voice reminded me of the wood thrush (Hylocichla mustelina). The solitaire’s syrinx allows him to harmonize with himself just like a wood thrush and his cadence is similar though his voice is higher. In my field notes I dubbed him “The Wood Thrush of the Andes.” Listen to him below and see what you think.
For comparison, here’s a wood thrush in Schenley Park last spring.
Wood thrush in Schenley Park, 13 May 2022 (video by Kate St. John)
The Ecuadorian thrush (Turdus maculirostris) looks like a large dull-colored American robin (Turdus migratorius) while his song is similar but better. It’s no wonder they are similar, they’re in the same genus. Listen to the Ecuadorian thrush below and see if you agree that he’s the “Robin of the Andes.”
Ecuadorian thrush singing in the rain:
Ecuadorian thrush morning chorus:
For comparison, here’s the spring song of an American robin during the morning chorus.
(photos from Wikimedia Commons, audio from Xeno Canto; click on the captions to see the originals)
Evidence of flowerpiercer on a passionflower (Passiflora sp.), Yanacocha, 30 Jan 2023 (photo by Kate St. John)
11 February 2023
On our first day in Ecuador, 30 Jan 2023, we traveled to Yanacocha Biological Reserve 11,500 feet up on the Pichincha Volcano. We were wowed by the huge passionflowers (Passiflora sp.) dangling from vines along the trail but on close examination found a hole in this flower tube. It was made by a bird.
Passionflowers hanging from the vine, Yanacocha, 30 Jan 2023 (photo by Kate St. John)The face of the same passionflower pictured at top, Yanacocha, 30 Jan 2023 (photo by Kate St. John)
These passionflowers evolved long tubes in an arms race against hummingbirds who developed ever-longer beaks to reach the nectar. However members of the Tanager family eat nectar, too, even though that have short beaks and cannot hover at the flower opening. Flowerpiercers (Diglossa sp.) land on the flower and bypass the flower’s defenses by poking a hole in the tube.
Masked flowerpiercer, Yanacocha, 30 Jan 2023 (photo by Mary Eyman)
Masked flowerpiercers (Diglossa cyanea) and glossy flowerpiercers (Diglossa lafresnayii) were abundant at Yanacocha. We could hear them chattering in the forest …
… and see them at the nectar dishes. (The glossy flowerpiercer is black with a white shoulder at left below.)
Glossy (black at left) and masked flowerpiercers (blue), Yanacocha, 30 Jan 2023 (photo by Kate St. John)
Flowerpiercers are specially equipped for piercing flowers with a hook at the tip of their beaks. This photo from Wikimedia Commons shows the hooked tip.
In Pennsylvania it’s the hummingbirds that eat nectar and insects that make holes in flowers. It’s amazing to think there is so much nectar in Ecuador that birds bother to pierce the flowers.
(photos by Kate St. John, Mary Eyman and Wikimedia Commons)
First a big thank you to WINGS Birding Tours, our superb group leader Jon Feenstra, skilled driver Edwin (who was also a great bird finder), and fellow participants Bob, Mary, Peter, Gail, Jeff, David and Kay. We all had a great time and became friends. It was hard to leave.
Even though I’d seen some of Ecuador’s birds in Costa Rica and Panama I came away with 206 Life Birds!
I was hard to pick only a few Best Birds.
Best Hummingbird: I saw 31 species of hummingbirds on the trip so it was hard to choose a Best one, however … The crowned woodnymphs (Thalurania colombica) I’d seen in Panama had purple crowns but in the Mindo area they are quite impressive with emerald green hoods and purple chests, shown at top. You have to see this bird move its body to appreciate that it usually looks dull and dark, then catches the light to reveal its stunning green head and brilliant purple chest. The best views were at Alambi Reserve where this video was filmed in 2018.
Best Tanager: Of the 40 species of tanagers I saw in Ecuador, my Best one was a three-way tie: Black-capped (Tangara heinei) and beryl spangled tanagers (Tangara nigroviridis) are similar but different …
Best Big Birds were the swallow-tailed kites (Elanoides forficatus) that live in Ecuador year round. Though not a Life Bird they were exhilarating to watch and there were lots of them. This image is a plate from the Crossley ID Guide.
Unexpected Lifer: Water birds are few and far between in the Andes but Jon knew where to find them. On the way back to Puembo Birding Garden we stopped by the side of the road near Quito Airport and scoped the drainage pond. Ta dah! The gull of the mountains: Andean gull (Chroicocephalus serranus).
p.s. A surprising discovery: There are no crows in Ecuador but there are many free-ranging dogs. Dogs lounged in the middle of village streets and on the pavement of quiet streets in Quito. Without scavenger crows, free ranging dogs were the ones to break into garbage bags on garbage day. To prevent this people in the countryside placed their garbage bags on waist high platforms and in Quito on the median of busy streets but the dogs crossed in front of traffic to get at the garbage. Dogs partially filled the crow niche.
Perhaps dogs make it a dangerous place for cats. In 8 days we saw only two cats.
p.s. Looking back at the hummingbirds I’d say the velvet-purple coronet (Boissonneaua jardini) is a contender for first place.
In physics the Coriolis force (also called the Coriolis effect) is …
an effect whereby a mass moving in a rotating system experiences a force (the Coriolis force ) acting perpendicular to the direction of motion and to the axis of rotation. On the earth, the effect tends to deflect moving objects to the right in the northern hemisphere and to the left in the southern and is important in the formation of cyclonic weather systems.
We see this in North American hurricanes, nor’easters and low pressure systems, all of which spin counter clockwise. Because of this, the first winds to hit the Atlantic coast come from the northeast, hence the name nor’easter. Satellite images look like the storm pictured at left below.
Conversely, tropical cyclones in Australia spin clockwise like the one at right. (Cyclone is another name for hurricane.)
I’d heard that the Coriolis force spins water down the drain just like the cyclones so my journey in Ecuador provided an opportunity to find out how water drains at the equator. Does it spin or does it go straight down?
With many opportunities to make on-the-spot observations my results were inconclusive. Sometimes the water spun as it drained. Sometimes it went straight down.
It turns out that the Coriolis force is infinitesimal on draining water. The shape of the basin causes the water to spin! At home in Pittsburgh I have a sink that drains straight down and one that spins clockwise like cyclones in Australia.
Today I’m on a “red eye” flight from Quito to the U.S. If all goes well I’ll be home tonight after 15 hours of pre-flight waiting, flying, layovers, and ground transportation.
It will take a lot longer for the Blackburnian warblers we saw in Ecuador to reach their breeding grounds in North America.
Blackburnian warbler (photo by Steve Gosser taken in Pennsylvania)
I wonder when they’ll start flying north.
(photos from Wikimedia Commons and by Steve Gosser)
5 February 2023, WINGS in Ecuador: Day 8, last full day, birding on our way to Puembo
Today we leave Séptimo Paraíso Lodge, birding on our way to Puembo and the airport. Tonight I leave Ecuador on a red-eye flight for home.
Refugio Paz de las Aves was one of the highlights of our trip. Their video below is a good summary of the wonders saw in Mindo and the Northwest Andes.
4 February 2023, WINGS in Ecuador: Day 7, birding in Mindo and the NW Andes
Antbirds — antshrikes, antwrens, antvireos, etc. — keep track of army ants who flush tasty insects as they march through the forest. Army ants do the work, the antbirds get an easy insect meal.
Seven years ago when the old Greenfield Bridge was missing over the Parkway East I learned that army ants can build bridges and they seem to be quick about it. It took two years to build the new Greenfield Bridge. The ants would have been faster (but unable to carry traffic).
Find out how ants build bridges. Check out the video at:
p.s. The Anderson Bridge that carries the Boulevard of the Allies into Schenley Park closed this week for at least four months because inspection revealed a “weak member” — i.e. unsafe to drive on! We need those army ants again.
(photo from Wikimedia Commons; click on the caption to see the original)
3 February 2023, WINGS in Ecuador: Day 6, birding in Mindo and the NW Andes
I used to think hummingbirds (Trochilidae) were the most numerous bird family on our WINGS trip in Ecuador until I looked at the tanagers.
Tanagers (Thraupidae) are the second largest family of birds(*) and a Neotropical specialty. Nearly 40% of Thraupidae species live in Ecuador; 20% of the family is on our tour checklist.
Thraupidae membership is constantly in flux as DNA tests move birds in and out of the family every year. Some species names no longer match their family(**). There’s a tanager called a “cardinal” and members of the Cardinal family Cardinalidae called “tanagers.” To make matters worse some members of the family aren’t called “tanagers” at all, including honeycreepers, conebills, flowerpiercers and saltators.
To bring some order out of the chaos I looked at colorful Thraupidae on our tour checklist whose names include “tanager” and picked 17 of the best for the slideshow. Here they are in order with links to their eBird descriptions and [photo] on Wikimedia Commons.
2 February 2023, WINGS in Ecuador: Day 5, birding in Mindo and the NW Andes
Male animals have many different ways of courting females, from individual solicitation to showing off as a group. Their rituals are closely tied to the females’ preferences. For Andean cock-of-the-rock, the females want to see all the guys in one place — in a lek — displaying and competing with each other. Witnessing an Andean cock-of-the-cock lek is one of the highlights of our trip.
As a member of the Cotinga family, the Andean cock-of-the-rock (Rupicola peruviana) is very sexually dimorphic. The males are stunning red, black and white with a large red crest from crown to beak.
The males throw a loud and boisterous party at the lek, hoping that the much less colorful females will show up. While we humans focus our attention on the beauty and behavior of the males, a lot is happening behind the scenes.
p.s. Today is Groundhog Day back home in Pennsylvania where the northern hemisphere has reached the celestial midpoint between winter and spring. On the equator, days and nights are the same length all year long. The winter and summer solstices have no meaning in Ecuador.
Day and night lengths vary a lot from the Arctic to the Equator, illustrated below by yearlong day/night lengths for three locations: Utqiagvik (formerly Barrow) Alaska, Pittsburgh and Mindo, Ecuador. These Day/Night graphs are screenshots from timeanddate.com.
(photos from Wikimedia Commons; click on the captions to see the originals. Day/night graphs from timeanddate.com; video from William Shaughnessy and American Bird Conservancy on YouTube)
