Hellebore of some type

Well the weather has been cooler than i would prefer it to be. I have nothing in the ground yet (not even my potatoes). The birds dont seem to mind the cool spring. There have been alot of Blue Birds in the yard this year. One is very confused and prefers its reflection in windows to other actual Blue Birds. There have been a good amount of Gold Finches chasing eachother about. And also a group of  Yellow Rumped warblers. Ive seen a few osprey flying over the marsh. Yesterday afternoon an Osprey was flying low over the marsh and would stop every so often to hover and kick its legs mid air (i assum scanning the water for fish/frogs etc). It was kind of entertaining to watch.  Unfortunatly I have not seen or heard the Belted Kingfisher in about a week.

So here is a picture of one of the perennial non-native plants in the yard. Its some kind of Hellebore (the tag is missing so cant give the exact name).

Belted Kingfisher

The other day I spotted a Belted Kingfisher roaming around the marsh. So yesterday I spent the entire afternoon waiting a listening for its rattle. I took alot of bad pictures. The Belted Kingfisher only got close late in the evning when it was getting dark. I think its a female because it has some brown on its belly.

Here'a picture of an Eastern Phoebe

And this might be an osprey... not sure, its a terrible picture.

 And this Canadian Goose is sitting on her clutch of eggs. (at least i think its the female). She hasent moved since yesterday and her mate has been no where to be seen since yesterday morning as well.

Swans and other visitors

A day or so ago i was out on the deck haveing a cup of coffee enjoying the morning when i heard a trumpet like noise. And guess who decided to stop by the marsh. A pair of swans. I guess they are tundra swans if i am correct. Cant remember exactly what kind of swan has been known to nest over in the lake on Lexington.

 

 

Today I was out on the deck having some coffee paging through a birdwatchers book and looked up to see this Racoon in the yard. 

he had been grooming himself in a tree but when i went in for my camera he dicded to relocate to my neighbors yard. 

Only got a few somewhat decent shots of him. The wind picked up for a second and blew the shed door open making alot of noise. So i went to close it and he climbed into the hole of the tree. 

Went down to the marsh edge and got a closer photo of a Great White Egret. 

 The other day I went to the North end of Snail Lake looking for the pair of Turkeys. The Tom turkey made alot of noise but didnt give me a chance to get his picture. I was afraid to follow him around after gobbling at me. 
Luckily before I left a pair of Red Tail Hawks gave me a chance to get some decent photos.

And here is a really bad photo of a Common Flicker

Spring Time pictures and a video!

So its spring.  Its been fun to watch the animals pair up and fight over nesting spots.

We have had 10 Great White Egrets in the Marsh this year.

 

Here is a photo of just one of them. The interesting thing that I noticed is that Egrets do not like Bald Eagles. I have noticed that everytime a Bald Eagle flys over all the Egrets in the Marsh will take to the air until the Eagle has left the area. One afternoon the Eagle landed in a tree overlooking the marsh and the Egrets circled for about 10 mins before finding a corner out of the Eagles line of sight. 

Here is a Mallard. 

 

And a group of 3 males 

 What I find interesting about the Mallards is how far a Male Mallard will chase another male or another pair away from his female and nesting site. I watched the same male chase off another pair of Mallards and fly over 5 mins in the air around the marsh before returning to his female.

Here is a picture of the first Earthworm of the year.

First Crocus

and his friends a day later

A Muskrat from before the snow and ice was all gone.

here is a video i took just yesterday at sun set. Its a really big Muskrat... or a Beaver, probably a muskrat.

A pair of Northern Shovelers

And a really bad photo of what I am fairley certain is an American Coot

Wood Ducks in a tree

 

The Red Squirrel

The Chipmunk who lives under the deck and who i feed peanuts to

I went for a walk over on the north end of Snail Lake. Found a pair of Turkeys but couldnt get a clear shot. I am afraid to get too close and have a big tom Turkey charge me.

A dead frog.

Great Blue Heron

And lastly I saw this Canadian Goose the other day.  He's tagged. But i cant read the numbers.

The tag could say 3QL50.

Opossum and Pileated Woodpecker

The other afternoon, just when the sun was setting an opossum was out looking for food in my yard. Didnt really notice me up on the deck taking pictures.

 

 

 

A while back one of the Pileated Woodpeckers let me take some pictures

 

 

 

A Chickadee taking a bath on one of those "warmer" days we had

January is cold

Ive heard people ask, or ask me directly "is it cold outside?" and my general response is "its January in Minnesota.... duh its cold." 

This morning (Jan 21 2011) I woke up around 8:45, looked out my window at the big thermometer we have hanging on the shed and it was somewhere around -19F. All i could say was "Holly *$%&". Granted last night (around 11PM) went i left work the digital time/thermometer screen at the place next door said it was -13 (when i got near my house the shorview community center sign said -9) so -19 wasent a huge change. But yeah. Its cold. 3 or so ft on the ground has made it difficult to go out and take walks, animals havent been roaming as much, and the cold makes it difficult to take the digital camera out and about as well. Plus been busy working.

Sso i'll just end there with my excuses for not posting more. I have some pictures (i hope they arent all blurry/out of focus) on the cam but havent taken the time to upload them.


Sorry? *shrugs* I just hope that I will even have time to garden this summer or i mean even get a tan. 


Also I heard either today or yesterday that Lily the Blackbear is persumably with cub(s) should give today. And as i write this and googled/checked the website gave birth to 2 cubs today! so thats pretty neat!

http://www.bear.org/livecams/lily-hope-cam.html

Continued thoughts on recent Red-wing Blackbird deaths

I have been thinking more about the recent deaths of Red-Wing Blackbirds in Arkansas and Lousiana, and possibly more found in Kentucky.

The news of the day has focused on fireworks celebrations causeing the birds to become frightened, take flight in the dark and due to their bad eyesight collide mid air into eachother during the panic. This is also a hard to believe explanation considering the amount of firework celebrations that occur around the world every year. If fireworks were enough to cause a flock of birds to wake up and go into a panic mass deaths of birds would be more common. Granted it could be that somehow reports of events were never reported in the past.

I decided to look into what ways blackbird flocks have been known to be controlled and something stands out to me. The use of a chemical called Avitrol. On their website its explained its a chemical frightening agent added to bait grains.

"The active ingredient in Avitrol baits, 4-aminopyridine, is an acute oral toxicant which acts on the central nervous system and the motor nervous system. Its action on the motor nervous system usually causes behaviors characteristic of those seen in an epileptic seizure. Birds eating the treated bait will be affected in a manner that, varying by species, will artificially cause them to emit distress and alarm cries and visual displays used by their species when they are frightened or injured. This may include flying erratically, vocalizing, trembling, dilation of the pupils and other symptoms indicative of loss of motor control. This will frighten the flock and cause it to leave the site. In laboratory testing, if the dose is lethal, death will usually occur within an hour following administration. If the dose is sub-lethal, there will be a recovery period which may be as short as 4 to 5 hours. Surviving birds have no lasting effects from 4-aminopyridine. "

"By limiting the amount of bait available to relatively few birds, the remainder of the flock can be frightened away from most sites with a minimum of mortality."

 SOURCE: http://www.avitrol.com/about.php


So what if the cause of the Red-wing blackbird deaths in arkansas was a large scale use of the Avitrol baits? It seems like a more plausible explanation for the huge number of birds in a small area. I am unsure of any exact laws on hwo many blackbirds can be intentionally killed using the chemical or any other flock control measures at any given time. But if there are restrictions then coinciding an intentional mass kill with something like fireworks, strong storms and the like would at least throw some uncertainity about what the actual cause could have been.

There are also other methods for frightening the birds:

"Devices need to be employed especially in the early morning and in late afternoon when the birds are most actively feeding. Crops such as sweet corn, which are vulnerable to blackbirds for only a few days before harvest, may not be too difficult to protect; however, the task becomes more formidable for crops such as sunflower and sorghum, which may be vulnerable for up to six weeks. Propane exploders (some with timers that automatically turn them on and off each day) are the most popular frightening devices. In general, use at least one exploder for every 10 acres (4 ha) of crop to be protected. Elevate exploders on a barrel, stand, or truck bed to “shoot” over the crop, and move them around the field every few days."

 "A variety of other bird-frightening devices, including electronic noise systems, helium-filled balloons tethered in fields, radio-controlled model planes, reflecting tapes made of mylar (Fig. 5), tape-recorded distress calls for birds, and various types of scarecrows, are also occasionally used to rid fields of blackbirds. The effectiveness of these devices is highly variable, depending on the persistence of the operator, the skill used in employing a device, the attractiveness of the crop, the number of birds, and the availability of alternate feeding sites. As mentioned with regard to propane exploders, birds tend to adjust or adapt to frightening devices. It is usually best to use two or more devices than to rely on a single device."

http://icwdm.org/handbook/birds/Blackbirds.asp

 (the same info seems to be located at http://www.npwrc.usgs.gov/resource/birds/blkbird/control.htm )

So quite possibly it could have been a combination of techniques, coinciding with fireworks and luckily strong storms to aid to the confusion.

Some birds have been taken to Madison, WI for testing and we wont have an answer for a few days or so.

I am not trying to reinforce the idea of some mass government cover up. I think it is more likely a small scale local cover up of the excessive use of control measures for a flock of birds.

I haven't had time to figure out any connection to the fish kill that was also in Beebe in the last week. It may be a coincidence or something more troubling.

Recent mass deaths of Red-Winged Black Birds

There has been some interest in what may have caused the death of thousands of Red-Winged Black Birds near Beebe Arkansas on New Years Eve. Most articles point to death by lightening or hail which seemed plausible since there were strong storms in the area that day.

What I find most interesting is that the first or close to first comment posts on many of the articles * feature people claiming that the congregation of Red-Winged Black Birds is unusual. And some claim to have degrees in a related field to give them some credibility.

My main source of North American bird info comes from my copy of The Audubon Society Field Guide to North American Birds Eastern Region, published in 1977.
pg 442 , continued description for Red-Winged Black Bird " Although primarily a marsh bird, the Red-wing will nest near virtually any body of water and occasionally breeds in upland pastures. Each Pair raises two or three broods a season, building a new nest for each clutch. After breeding season, the birds gather with other blackbirds in flocks sometimes numbering in the hundreds of thousands or millions and have come to be viewed as a health hazard. Attempts have been made to reduce such flocks by spraying and other methods." 

and as is stated at the Cornell All About Birds Lab website

• Behavior

  Male Red-winged Blackbirds do everything they can to get noticed, sitting on high perches and belting out their conk-la-ree! song all day long. Females stay lower, skulking through vegetation for food and quietly weaving together their remarkable nests. In winter Red-winged Blackbirds gather in huge flocks to eat grains with other blackbird species and starlings.
  

http://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Red-winged_Blackbird/id


The birds congregating is quite normal.

So the real question remains what caused this?

So far the only some what plausible answer is on the Capital Weather Gang blog at the Washington Post.

 post at the 7:30pm update

"The director of Cornell University's ornithology lab in Ithaca, N.Y., said the most likely suspect is violent weather. It's probable that thousands of birds were asleep, roosting in a single tree, when a "washing machine-type thunderstorm" sucked them up into the air, disoriented them, and even fatally soaked and chilled them."

and then the
9:30 p.m. update: The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) is reporting (h/t commenter JerryFloyd) the birds likely died as a result of booming noise, perhaps fireworks, in central Arkansas Friday. The noise may have incited a bird frenzy causing them to fly into houses and trees. The WSJ story states storms weren't in the area when the birds died. On the other hand, the radar shows storms departing the region between 9 and 10 p.m. central time. The birds reportedly started falling from the sky around 11 p.m.

source: http://voices.washingtonpost.com/capitalweathergang/2011/01/did_lightning_cause_mass_bird.html


So I would agree some sort of updraft/down draft would be an acceptable answer. It is just troubling that most news agencies are not reporting this and it makes room for some kind of giant conspiracy at hand.

I cant rule out some sort of conspiracy, whether it being intentionally killing of the birds via some sort of man made contraption using focused waves thus causing the loud noise accompanied with the incident, or just shooting them but covering it up.

The point is, don't trust all that is read on-line, especially when it comes down to so called "credible sources" making public comments on the news article.

I hope we find out what really caused this. And I hope that it is in fact some bizarre case of weather.

But it seems coincidental  that there was another case of Red-Wing Black Bird deaths in Labarre, Louisiana.

So maybe it was all caused by the rogue zombie satellite that just so happen to come back to life in the past week after a few weeks back interfering with NOAA's weather satellite. seems a little too coincidental...... *wink wink*

*http://www.cnn.com/2011/US/01/03/arkansas.falling.birds/index.html?hpt=T2


UPDATE: I was also just informed about a massive fish kill that occurred near Beebe Arkansas as well. seems too coincidental.

http://www.cnn.com/2011/US/01/02/arkansas.fish.kill/index.html?hpt=T2

snow at 1 am

Its now December 11, 2010. I think it started snowing here around 10:30.

Just went outside a few mins ago and took  a quick measurement of 2inches of snow on the deck.
Cant wait to wake up in the morning and see how much we will have.

snowstorm? and XKCD gets weather radar

the weather folks are saying we might get a huge snow storm starting tonight and lasting into tomorrow evening. possibly dropping 1inch of snow per hour. And then possibly up to 40 mph gusts of wind.

Now the kid in me is excited. Then the "mature" adult in me is like.... this could be crappy.

I guess ill just wait and see what happens.

Ive been watching the radar, watching the beginings of some storm on the radar.

Anyone else who is like me and spends their time watching the weather radar should appreciate this comic from xkcd.com

TCAAP possible site for new Vikings Stadium

This evening when i was work a coworker of mine asked me if i had heard that the TCAAP or the Twin Cities Army Ammunitions Plant in Arden Hills was being looked at as a possible site for building a new Vikings stadium.

I had not. And I immediately had the need to make this possibility stop being one.

I have a few objections to the use of that site, not just for the Vikings stadium. but also for development of any kind.

1. The land should be kept as open as it can be for a place that our local wildlife can utilize. It would be nice if the abandoned buildings were torn down and the land was cleaned up. It is a designated Superfund Site. The land should be kept as wild as possible.

2. the 430 acres that is up for sale is along I35-W, but I know that I would still see it from my backyard. And it might not the be stadium itself i see, but I would be affected by light pollution and noise pollution. Which would also affect the wildlife in the area. I do not want my air to be polluted by anymore noise and light than it is already affected by.

3. We dont need a new stadium. It is unfortunate that sports teams seem to need entire new facilities to make them play better. We dont need to take anymore land and pour concrete over it.  Since the Vikings have been thinking about taking the fight for a new stadium out into the suburbs i have been against it. If they so badly need a new stadium, tear down the Metrodome, and rebuild on the existing site. Do not take more land to make a new stadium just to leave a massive empty building. Yes the Metrodome will continued to be used for local events (high school state tournaments and concerts etc.) But it will be used even less than it is being used now.

I understand this would "create" new jobs and bring in money to the local businesses in the area. I currently work at a restaurant that would gain from the building of the stadium at that location. But I can not say that economic growth for the area is greater than habitat growth for the area.

We need to really look at how we as a culture are utilizing space. We do not own this planet. We dont even rent this planet. We share this planet with trillions upon trillion of other organisms who are not subservient to us. Our "needs" do not supersede the needs of the other living things of this earth.

I am angry that I am not a resident of Arden Hills and that makes me feel that my voice will not be heard or taken into account because I live, literally, on the wrong side of the street.

Minnesota is a state that has always encouraged keeping wild areas wild. Yes the TCAAP is not "wild" but once it is cleaned up it could be returned to being a wild open space without paved trails and abandoned buildings.


I sincerely hope this does not happen. And if the Vikings leave Minnesota because we dont build them a new stadium, then so be it.

I will continue to stay on top of this situation. And I am willing to do as much as possible to stop the use of this land for something as pointless as a sports stadium.

Dec 1: Great Horned Owls

I was afraid that if i finally got around to posting today it would be focused on the lack of anything to post. But just in the last 10 mins, i stepped outside and immediately heard 2 owls hooting. I am fairly certain it was the hooting of Great Horned Owls. It only last for a min or two but its better then nothing. I had been waiting to hear owls at night since mid october.

There is still the problem of lack of updates. the usual suspects have been seen around. Nuthatches, Downy Woodpeckers, Hairy Woodpeckers, Chickadees, Blue Jays and Crows. The Grey Squirrels are always around, and at least 1 bunny around. There are two sets of tracks i havent been able to ID, i will upload photos later.
I am wondering what happened to our Red Squirrels. I haven't seen them in weeks, and haven't heard their agitated chirps in the area either. I guess they found someplace nicer to live.

Obviously its the work of aliens.

Its November, its cold. The marsh has freezed up then melted refreezed partially etc. The ice is not thick enough for anything bigger than a gull to be standing on it without breaking.

I just was outside and noticed a weird pattern of ice melting.

Sorry for quality i took them on an iphone. But the pattern looks similar to when someone shovels snow on ice. They are pretty straight lines. To my knowledge there are no pipes in the marsh in that area. My second thought is muskrat underwater tunnels. These were not there yesterday. The big area when the ice is melted was more open yesterday as well. It seems to have partially frozen over night.  And the far side of the marsh was completely open water yesterday and has frozen over night. My parents tell me that the marsh or "lake Martha" is fed by springs so that could be a cause for this as well.
Any better explanation would be welcomed.

First Snowfall

Well it has finally snowed. Saturday-sunday morning i guess we got around 9 inches or so. The weather is funny, the Wednesday prior it had been in the 60's. Tomorrow we are going to try to put the roses tobed since we had put it off last week due to the warm weather. Hopefully we will be able to save them. I would be surprised if they die from fungus/mold however.

Things have been quite around here. I spent 4 hours outside last night and I saw a bunny and a big fat opossum.
Friday I went for a walk in the area and saw a Great Horned Owl. I was walking along and wanted to go look at this big oak that had fallen over when i noticed a lot of white bird pooh on the ground and so i looked up and there was an owl, staring down at me with its big yellow eyes.  Ive been hoping to hear the owls hooting at night but so far i haven't heard anything. 

I took a walk in the same area i saw the owl just before sunset today, didnt see much of anything. Found turkey and deer tracks and fox tracks as well.


The camera is still giving me issues. so no pictures. Unless i decide to upload blurry pictures of the yard. Which i still might do.

November

Well its too bad i only had one post in October and November isnt looking so good for posts either. I am having issues with my camera. It isnt focusing very well at all. Its also been unusally quiet in the yard. Beyond squirrels and some birds i havent seen much of anything out there at all. Its been slow cleaning up the yard and now that its getting colder i am almost at the point where I just would rather wait to do clean up in the spring.
Hopefully I will get my act together and get this camera working more reliably.
Random fact about me, I really don't like it to be cold outside , ( anything below 60F) but I love snow, so I am looking forward to our first snowfall.