Diario de aneu

On March 3, 2020 from 12:30pm to 2:00pm, I walked a friend's dog around the edge of their property in Shelburne. When I first went outside, the sun was out and shining, and it was about ~34 degrees with little wind. Throughout my time birdwatching, the sun slowly began to go away and the sky was very overcast. The property consists of the house, driveway, yard, and a piece of farm land that I am guessing is used for corn in the summer months. Altogether, the property is probably about 2 acres big. The edge of the driveway and the yard is lined with different trees, including pine trees, tall and bare trees, and trees with berries on them.

At 12:30, I saw four American Robins hopping around on trees around the house. They were on trees that had little red berries hanging off of them. Eating berries on these trees is a winter adaptation for these birds, because the ground is too hard for the robins to look for worms in the grass/dirt. When the ground softens up in the coming months, I think the robins will transition from the berries to the worms. The robins were splitting their time between resting and foraging for berries. I also think that since all the berry trees are surrounding the house (and these types of trees are typically found around developments), that the robins are using the houses and the landscaping as shelter to sleep at night. The houses provide good protection against wind, and the bushes and trees that are planted for landscaping also provide protection against weather and predators.

I also got really lucky when I was looking for birds in the trees around the house... I heard a knocking and I looked up to find a hairy woodpecker up in a branch. It was very high up, but the beak looked longer than the head, so I guessed that it was a hairy woodpecker over a downy woodpecker. It also seemed small to me, which is why I didn't think it was a pileated woodpecker. I also did not see any red on the head, which led me to believe that it is a female. I am also not sure what kind of tree the woodpecker was in, but it looked like she was looking for food. I know that insects often lay their larvae in trees, so maybe the woodpecker was drilling for larva and pupa to feed on? This also seems like a winter adaptation because there are no insects out and about in the winter in VT, so the woodpeckers must adjust their diet and go for larvae that is alive and protected in the winter. After doing some research post-bird watching, I found that hairy woodpeckers prefer to eat beetles in the warmer temperature. So perhaps in the winter, they feed on beetle larvae rather than the adults to sustain themselves. This tree also had many holes in it, some of which seemed large enough for a bird to fit in. It could be that this woodpecker was foraging for larvae on the tree and also uses the bigger cavities to sleep in during the cold winter nights. The tree cavities could also serve as a sleeping quarter for other species of birds, although when I tapped on the tree no other birds seemed to be in the cavity. I watched the woodpecker for about 15 minutes, and it seemed like the woodpecker was solely using its time to forage/drill the tree. The weather was very nice at this point, so maybe the woodpecker was taking advantage and using this time to find food.

I ended up walking around for a while before seeing any birds. I think part of the reason for this was because I had a dog with me, who was off leash and may have deterred birds from flying in. Also, the large field may have also deterred birds since there is no shelter or hiding spaces. The next bird sighting occurred around 1:50, in which two American Crows were flying East after a hawk. I think the hawk was a red-tailed hawk, but it was somewhat difficult to see the red tail as there was a lot of movement in the sky. The crows were almost teaming up on the hawk, and it seemed like they were trying to chase it away. The hawk ended up flying further East and I lost sight of it, but the two crows remained in the sky. I think this territorial/aggressive behavior is definitely an unwanted expenditure of energy in the cold winter months, but perhaps the crows were chasing the hawk away from a food source? In that case, it makes sense that this was a necessary use of energy so that they could obtain food that is most likely scarce. I was also expecting to see a hawk since the property had a large field on it, and hawks would probably be able to search for rodents in the big open area. This would make hunting easier in the winter, since rodents are hard to scout out in denser areas and they are scarce to begin with in the winter.

On March 8, 2020 from 9:30am to 11:00 am, I walked a loop with my grandfather in Naples, Florida that led us along the beach and then back on a paved trail near mangroves. The loop was approximately 2 miles long, and it took us almost exactly an hour and a half due to all the stops we made to observe the wildlife. The sun was out and there were some clouds in the sky, but the sky got more overcast as our walk proceeded.

The first bird we saw while walking on the beach was a white Ibis. I had never seen an Ibis before, and I had only recently discovered them via a picture I was sent by a friend who lives in Houston, Texas. This bird was alone on the shore, and was sticking its long pink beak into the sand to search for (assumingely) crabs or something of the sort. The legs of the bird were also a dark pink/red, and the body was all white. I think the white body offers an evolutionary advantage because it provides the bird with some cryptic coloration/camouflage against the sand. The bright color of the bill may also be advantageous for males to drive off other males and attract females? The wings also have black on the tips, which I'm assuming is to add strength to the flight feathers. The white ibis was also foraging at around 9:45am. Since Naples, FL is very southern and warm year-round, I assume this routine does not change much for the bird as the environmental conditions are relatively consistent. It does indicate though that the bird is diurnal rather than nocturnal, and there is no need to forage at a very specific time of day because it is digging its beak into the sand to find food anyway.

At around 10:05, we saw a large group of black skimmers on the beach right in front of the water. I found this to be quite strange because the beach was populated by people who were sitting no more than 10 ft away from the birds. However, the birds and the people really were not interacting at all. Most of the birds were either facing towards the water or away from the water. I figured that the birds facing towards the water were trying to face the wind so that they could retain their body heat. The sun was in the other direction though, so maybe the other birds were facing the sun so as to warm up? They seemed to be resting and drying/warming up after searching for fish in the ocean. These birds are also very funky looking- it doesn't look like they have eyes! The top of their head and their back is black, and there is a white ring around the beak that extends to the bird's stomach. The coloration of these birds seems to follow countershading, in which the white underneath has no pigment in it and reflects the surroundings. This would help the bird avoid predators via cryptic coloration, just without the energetic investment of producing melanin or other pigments. The beaks are red at the base and black at the tip, and the white strip of feather seems to accentuate the beak. These birds were also make lots of sounds, but it really just seemed like they were telling each other to give them their personal space. Whenever one of the birds was trying to move or walk through the pack, the others squawked at it.

At 10:30, we came across a human-made nesting pole for osprey. There was an adult in the nest along with two chicks. The chicks seems to be of decent size as we could see them while standing about 30 feet away. The pole was about 12 ft high, and the nest was perched perfectly on top of it. As we watched the family of osprey, the adult left the nest and flew around the mangroves in circles. It looked like it was searching for food, although I never actually saw it pick up/catch anything. This foraging behavior lines up with its cirannual rhythm because since the adult is raising chicks, it needs to provide for both itself and them. I am not familiar with the breeding season of osprey or most other birds in warmer climates, so I was kind of surprised to see a nest with chicks in the middle of March. Osprey have very interesting coloration... when their wings are folded in, they are just brown with white on their heads and undersides. This countershading seems important for osprey to blend in with their surroundings to avoid predators like owls and eagles. When they fly though, the undersides of their wings are striped. The chicks were also making little calls while the adult circled the nest, and it definitely seemed like these calls were meant to signify that they were hungry.

Around 10:50, we were back on a paved path walking towards the parking lot where we parked. One each side of the path, there are little stagnant rivers. This is where we saw alligators! Walking across the path was a very strange looking bird, which I identified to be an Anhinga. I had never seen a bird like this before, and when getting closer to it I thought it was injured because it was walking in such a strange and unbothered way. The bird started to move faster as we got closer, and then it scurried away to the edge of the water. The bird had a very long beak and fuzzy hairs around its head. The next was also very long, and after looking up the bird I learned that they are often referred to as snakebirds for this reason.