lydianapell13's Journal

Today I went out behind the golf course to observe birds. There's a pond by the Redstone Lofts where I've seen lots of different species before so I decided to do my bird watching there. I started at 9:30 and went to 10:30. The weather was warm, probably about 40 degrees, but cloudy. It wasn't windy though so overall it was a good day to go. Today I saw quite a few gulls, but I couldn't identify them because they were flying by too fast. I also saw 3 Rock Pigeons on top of one of the buildings. There were a few different small flocks of birds that flew by- I think they were blackbirds but again, they were moving too fast to identify. There were also 2 Canada Geese and a male and female Mallard.

Thinking back to why some species stay through the winter, I would assume that it's because while it's hard to survive a winter in Vermont, it's also extremely hard to migrate- it takes a lot of energy. I think it would be too hard for something the size of a Black-capped Chickadee to migrate hundreds of miles. Because their bodies are so small and their metabolism is high, I think it would be too hard for them to fly for extended periods of time. In the case of the Black-capped Chickadee though, they are pretty well adapted to a winter in Vermont. They are generalist feeders, so they have more resources as options, and they can behaviorally prepare for a very cold they. They can go into facilitated hypothermia, where they allow their body temperature to decrease substantially in order to preserve energy.

Migrating birds try to avoid those cold days by just leaving the area entirely. The Mallards were coming from the southern parts of the US, and probably were travelling to find a suitable place to build a nest for the breeding season. I'm assuming the change in temperature helped facilitate their decision to travel back up, but it also has to do with their internal annual clock. Mallards are obligate migrators, but they may be a little surprised by the mid-April weather in VT. I think that their annual clock just tells them what time to leave where the wintered and to come up to wherever they're breeding, but I think if the climate is changing they can't exactly count on that, their temporal clock is depending on past conditions, so they definitely could be surprised by the cold days we've been having. There's an advantage to leaving earlier, as they get the first choice on territory, but the disadvantage is that it's still cold and they have to wait for females to arrive before they get to mate.

I looked at where Mallards are migrating to and from, and it looks like it's a distance similar to from Kentucky to Montreal. That's about 950 miles. If they were in VT, and it's 100 miles from Burlington to Montreal, that means they had already traveled up to 850 miles!

This week, because we were focused on nesting/mating, I decided to revisit the spot I went to last week to look at the Canada Geese again. Last week I walked by a small pond on Redstone Campus and saw what looked like a female building her nest at the edge of the water. After watching the geese this week I continued to walk along the edge of the golf course onto South Prospect. There is a skinny strip of trees that while suburban, is much quieter than some places in Burlington. I started at 10:30am and went until 11:30am. It was a beautiful day, very sunny and warm. There was a little wind, but not too much.

Last week there was a goose sitting on what looked like a nest at the pond on Redstone campus. She appeared to be still sitting there on Saturday so she must be on a nest. I've also seen the male around the pond, but last week I didn't see him at all so he must have left the pond to either forage for nest building materials or food. They were both there today, with one on the nest and the other swimming in the pond. They pond is completely fenced off, so it's a good place for them to be as there aren't any humans that can get too close, and predators would definitely have a hard time getting in there as well. I don't know if they're able to tell that no predators can get in when they arrived, but as far as territory selection goes, it seems like a really good spot to be. Because the pond is so small, they're also the only birds in that area, so it's easy to defend because it's not too big.

As far as nesting/mating/territory defense in the other species, I didn't see any nests or any indication of mating, other than the Pileated Woodpecker pecking on wood, but that may have just been for food and not as a mating attraction (it was really far up, I couldn't see it very well).

Nesting habitats definitely differ among the different species that I've seen. The geese are on the shore of a pond, the woodpecker is in a tree, and pigeons often have nests that are underneath the ledge of a building. These are super different in terms of human interaction too. Pigeons are definitely interacting with humans a lot more than geese or woodpeckers.

While I was outside, I heard almost exclusively American Robins singing, however I also heard the Canada Geese, the Pileated woodpecker, some Song Sparrows and maybe a Yellow Warbler (but I wasn't sure).