nature

Good Birds and Bad Birds

Lynn E. BarberLeave a comment

As mentioned in my last blog post, most bird lovers have their favorites. But birders’ preferences often are broader than just defining their personal favorites. We often seem to judge the value of a bird or bird species as separate from whether we personally like them. Most of us can sometimes be heard to call a particular bird species “good” or “bad.” Such terms most often are synonymous with rarity. A good bird is thus quite often a bird that is hard to find or that a particular birder has had a hard time finding. At the beginning of a calendar year or when a birder travels to a new place, a good bird is often a bird that hasn’t yet been seen that year or in that place.

Even though I am not currently attempting to do a big year of birding, I still am keeping track of which birds that I have seen so far this year. A couple of weeks ago, I heard another Wisconsin birder telling of a huge flock of Brown-headed Cowbirds that he had just seen in the southern part of the state. Cowbirds normally do not winter in Wisconsin. Male Brown-headed Cowbirds are glossy black with brown heads, which gives them part of their name, and the females are a plain brownish-gray. They follow cows around gleaning insects that the cows stir up, which gives them the rest of their name. I had not seen a cowbird in 2024 when I talked to this birder, nor had I until an hour or so ago. Thus, when I spotted a male cowbird under my feeders earlier this morning, it became a “good” bird to me. The odd thing is that today’s good bird for me is actually a bad bird to most birders and to most little birds. Cowbirds do not make their own nests but lay their eggs in the nests of warblers and other birds that typically are smaller than cowbirds, resulting in the fast-growing cowbird baby outcompeting the littler bird’s youngsters, often shoving them out of the nest entirely. Over its lifetime, today’s male cowbird will probably cause more than one colorful little warbler to die. So, while it was temporarily a good bird for me this morning, most birders would call it a bad bird (except I guess it is a good bird to other cowbirds).

Do You Have a Favorite Bird?

Lynn E. Barber1 Comment

Most of us who appear to be even remotely interested in birds have at least once been asked what our favorite bird is. It can happen at the end of a group field trip when the leader might ask the group to tell their favorite bird of the trip. Or it might happen when people first meet each other at a bird club or when out birding. It is a good conversation starter.

I never know what to say when I am asked. I usually just blurt out the most memorable bird that I have most recently seen. Probably a colorful or cute or funny bird. If I am allowed more than one bird and better yet, can generalize to groups of birds, it is much more easy for me to answer. I can at least say that my favorite birds are hummingbirds, cranes, and owls. The smallest, the biggest, and one in between in size. Hummingbirds have yet to arrive in Wisconsin for the year, and owls, while always around, are usually not that easy to find. But Sandhill Cranes have arrived. There are usually at least two cranes, and sometimes small flocks, in many of the fields around where I live, and probably all across the state. Their scrawky calls delight me as I drive along with my windows open, or hear them overhead.

Nowadays owls are on my mind the most though. I am mostly through the process of writing the text for a book about owls and have painted over 40 of the 50 owl paintings that my publisher is allowing me to have in the book. I am to submit my manuscript and paintings by the end of June to Texas A&M University Press, which published my three other books. Although this process is very time-consuming, I have been enjoying putting this all together. If all goes as planned and I don’t have more than a zillion rewrites, it may actually become a real book by early 2025.

Much needed snow

Lynn E. BarberLeave a comment

We have had a very dry, snowless winter so almost all the people are happy about today’s snow. The birds are busily scrambling to eat my new deliveries of birdseed before everything is again covered with snow. We are expecting a couple of inches yet today and more tomorrow apparently. We all will be busy.

Over the winter the American Goldfinches and Pine Siskins have regularly gone from being omnipresent to disappearing and back again. With this snow the goldfinches are up to over 50, but there are only a few Pine Siskins around our yard. Every now and then there is a small flock of American Robins in the yard, but mostly just one or two right now. The Mourning Doves are down to a few pairs from being a huge flock during the winter.

American Goldfinch
Pine Siskin
American Robin

While there are at least two Northern Cardinals around, they do not come down to our feeders as often as the goldfnches, robins and doves. Today, however, there was a pair. The female was briefly at the feeders, but the male sat up high in the trees, first in a deciduous tree across the street, and then hiding toward the top of our front yard spruce.

The snow just keeps coming down. An unphotographed Tufted Titmouse called to me a little while ago as I was typing and then was quiet. For now all the birds have disappeared, probably hiding in the trees to get out of the wet, never-ending snow. I expect they do not admire the beauty of it as much as I do (or maybe not at all).