Merlin! When I found this exuberant photo by Eric Ellingson I had to find a merlin.
Two days ago, just before sunset, I went looking for them at Schenley Park golf course where they usually hang out in winter. I spent 40 minutes waiting and watching from the highest lookout and walking past all their favorite haunts.
Nothing.
So I went back to my car and there was a merlin perched high in the tree above it. I told the bird “Don’t go anywhere!” as I ran to get my scope.
Merlin at Schenley Park, 30 Dec 2024 (photo by Kate St. John)
Soon a second merlin came in with an evening snack. Slight tussle between them and the newcomer claimed the perch and ate its meal.
Merlin eating its evening meal at Schenley Park, 30 Dec 2024 (photo by Kate St. John)
Then it turned to watch the waning light and left in a streak, flying low over the golf course to its roost.
Christmas tree Before and After — decorated and discarded (photos from Wikimedia Commons)
31 December 2024
It’s just about time to take down the Christmas tree. If you have a backyard, and especially if you have bird feeders, save your old tree for the birds.
Backyards without vegetation near the bird feeders have no safe place to hide. The feeders attract bird predators but the birds can’t fly fast enough to reach distant safety.
And if you don’t have a backyard or a bird feeder, there are useful ways to dispose of your Christmas tree in the City of Pittsburgh and surrounding areas.
How long did it take to become a Christmas tree? According to the National Christmas Tree Association, “it can take as many as 15 years to grow a Christmas tree of typical height (6 – 7 feet) or as little as 4 years, but the average growing time is 7 years.”
From seed to sapling here’s what it might have looked like during its first two years.
The time lapse shows a stone pine (Pinus pinea) which is unlikely to become a Christmas tree. Native to the Mediterranean, they have been planted around the world.
I probably saw them in Spain without knowing their significance. I imagine they are the trees in the background of my photo of the “Shade Horse” at Parque Natural de Los Alcornocales, Spain last September.
The Shade Horse and his sheep companion at Parque Natural de Los Alcornocales, Spain, 13 Sept 2024 (photo by Kate St. John)
Crows flying to the roost in Oakland, Oct 2019 (photo by Kate St. John)
29 December 2024
We tried but it was daunting. Last evening Carol Steytler, Claire Staples, Lisa Kaufman and I counted crows coming into the roost near the VA Hospital in Oakland for the Pittsburgh Christmas Bird Count. 15,000 crows. More or less. Probably more.
For an accurate count we needed all these conditions to be met simultaneously and all of them are under the crows’ control. Last night the crows beat us with blobs and darkness.
Know where the roost is.
Know the flight paths they use to reach the roost.
Know the size in the sky of a blob of 100 or 1,000 crows and be able to see the blobs.
Darkness: Here’s what I mean. You can’t see the crow until I alter the photo (from Wikimedia Commons). Nor could we.
Crow in the dark, perched on a branch
Crow in the dark -- photo adjusted so that you can see the crow
Details of the count:
The crows used the same roost site (sort of) that we found on Friday: the VA Hospital roof + nearby buildings. Miraculously they didn’t change the roost. However, the roof itself is too high to see so we used flight-path counting from the OC Lot parking deck. I’m sure some were hidden by buildings as they came in and weren’t counted.
Flight paths change day to day but Saturday’s was better than Friday’s from their pre-roost staging site in the west, backlit by the glow of sunset as shown at top. Very soon it was too dark to see black birds in a black sky. And the crows were frequently diverted by Stat MedEvac helicopters flying back and forth from UPMC Presbyterian.
Crow flock flight density — the blobs — changed all the time of course. We saw 100 crows in long strings, in very tight balls, and everything in between. Hard to count.
I’ve been counting crows for the CBC since 2018. It is always a challenge.
p.s. Lisa and I are thinking of practicing the blob-count next month while the crows are still in town. If you have a suggestion for counting you must first count with us this winter. (I’m not kidding!)
If you’re an experienced crow counter no need to join us; we welcome your tips.
Bird diversity is lower in winter but the birds are still beautiful as you can see in these portraits by Pittsburgh bird photographer Zachary Vaughan.
Page through the series to see my favorites: a robin holding a crabapple, an eastern screech owl and a starling with a two-tone beak. You’ll also see the red-bellied woodpecker’s red belly.
Fingers crossed about the crows. Last night we could tell they were sleeping on rooftops at/near the VA Hospital in Oakland. Exactly where we cannot see to count them. Erf!
White-fronted nunbirds (Monasa morphoeus) are at their most interesting when they sing in “group choruses of loud gobbling, barking notes, sustained for up to 20 minutes at a time, chiefly at the beginning and end of day.” — quoted from Birds of the World.
Crows roosting near Thackeray Hall a year ago, in 2023 (photo by Kate St. John)
26 December 2024
Two days from now, on 28 December, we’ll try to count all of Pittsburgh’s winter crows for the annual Christmas Bird Count. Unfortunately our efforts to find them have fallen quite short of the number we expect.
I believe there are 10,000 to 20,000 crows in the area but we’ve found only 2,000 to 5,000 in Oakland this week, even though I saw about 8,000 the week before. It is likely that the crows split the roost.
In prior years in Lawrence, Massachusetts their crow roost used to be in one place but this winter their crows have split into three locations. Lawrence Crow Patrol has found them all, as shown in this 14 December video. I wish we could say the same.
Have you seen crows crowded at the tops of trees at night? Have you found lots of crow poop in the morning — a sure sign that they were sleeping there the night before?
Let me know where the crows are sleeping by leaving a comment below.
It seems that Pittsburgh missed waterfowl migration this fall with only a handful of the expected migrants landing on our rivers and lakes. Except for long distance migrants, waterfowl haven’t come at all.
Some ducks, geese and gulls only move south when ice overtakes their location. If they’re hanging out at Lake Erie near Presque Isle, the map of yesterday’s water temperature indicates they have no reason to leave. The water there is more than 40°F and the only ice is in small bays (black color on the map).
There are a few rare geese, though, photographed and posted to eBird and embedded below.
There’s currently a Ross’s goose (Anser rossii) at North Park, noticeably small than the Canada geese it’s hanging out with.
Yesterday there was a brant (Branta bernicla) at Duck Hollow without any Canada geese to keep it company. So it hung out with ring-billed gulls.
And a flock of 16 greater white-fronted geese (Anser albifrons) who normally migrate west of the Mississippi and winter in Louisiana, southern Texas and Mexico have been hanging out with Canada geese in Butler County since 1 December.
These geese are called “white-fronted” because their foreheads are white.
Wondering why the ducks aren’t here? This 2021 vintage article explains why.
