Nature’s World by Al Batt

My neighbor Crandall stops by.

“How are you doing?” I ask.

“Everything is nearly copacetic. I ate so much over the holidays that I’m no longer sure where the recliner ends and I begin. Watching the kids play made me miss the good old days when we used Rock ‘Em Sock ‘Em Robots to solve all of our disagreements. I checked the Lutheran Social Registry, the obituary notices in the newspaper, to make sure I’m still here. I was relieved when my doctor told me that chest pains are normal for a man my age that eats piping hot pizza while taking a bath. I depend upon my dog for weather reports. I let him out and I let him in. If his tail is dry, it’s fair. If it’s wet, it’s raining. If it’s frosty, it’s cold. If it’s gone, cyclone. I have a lot to be thankful for. I still have no trouble forgetting names, but I’m not as appreciative of winter as I once was. The age of shovelry has lost its appeal. I’m thinking of strapping a snow shovel to the top of my car and driving south until somebody asks me what the shovel is for. That’s where I’ll spend the winter.”

 

Nature by the yard

It was cold. I could tell because the rabbits were wearing earmuffs.

It wasn’t far past a day so warm that water droplets of melting snow had hung from tree branches. They had become sturdy icicles.

I’m an old farm boy. I pay attention to the weather. There’s no avoiding it without moving. I pay particular attention to real weather and none to the televised kind.

From the warmth and comfort of my home, I watched squirrels networking. I noticed that the multi-colored lady beetles and cluster flies that had been enjoying, once more with feelers, the sun coming through the window, were nowhere to be seen.

I’ve heard duet hooting by great horned owls. They don’t migrate. A pair stays close and hoots. Their young don’t fly well until they are 9 to 10 weeks old. The owlets disperse in the fall.

The most loyal visitor to my sunflower feeders continues to be a white-throated sparrow. I wish the bird good luck.

The snow continued to fall. One of the great things about living in a place that gets snow is that cars become stuck in it. When that happens, something wonderful occurs. People help one another.

 

Q&A

“Do birds learn to avoid wind turbines?” I don’t know. I hope so. PacifiCorp Energy will pay $2.5 million in fines for the deaths of 38 golden eagles and 336 other protected birds at its wind farms from 2009 to 2014. In related news, researchers at the University of Northern British Columbia observed golden eagle fall migration for three years at a new wind farm. The eagles seemed to avoid the blades. In general, the eagles flew high enough to clear the blade-sweep when wind conditions were significant, demonstrating a degree of detection and avoidance of turbine blades during migration.

“Last year, I forgot to take my Christmas wreath down. House finches nested in it. Is that normal behavior?” The house finch utilizes a variety of nesting sites. These include tree branches, rock or building ledges, vents, outdoor lamps, ivy, abandoned nests, hanging planters, nest boxes (rarely) and hanging wreaths.

“Do blue jays migrate?” Blue jay migration is a mystery. Some individual birds may migrate south one year and remain here the next. It’s unclear what factors determine whether a blue jay winters in the north or south. I’d think food supplies would be a factor.

“Where are my feeder birds?” Birds seek natural foods and will eat them when they are available. Most wild birds prefer to forage rather than patronize feeders

“Do bald eagles reuse nests?” If an eagle’s nest was successful, they will likely reuse the nest. The pair adds new nesting materials to an old nest. Both bring materials to the nest, but the female is the architect. They use sticks, filling the cracks with grass, cornstalks, etc. The nest is lined with lichen, green sprigs and downy feathers.

“What are owl pellets?” Owls often eat their prey whole. The undigested parts of their meals (bones, teeth, bills, feathers, or fur) are compressed into a pellet and regurgitated. The larger the owl, the larger the pellet.

“How do birds find feeders?” By sight. They either see the feeder, the food or other birds feeding.

 

Nature lessons

If all the water in the Great Lakes was spread evenly over the continental U.S., the 48 states would be flooded under more than nine feet of water.

Most birds lack bladders to store urine. Rather than producing liquid urine, they produce a white, pasty substance.

Researchers studying the ability of birds to sense incoming storms discovered that golden-winged warblers flew over 900 miles to avoid the incoming super cell a full two days before the storm hit. An ecologist at UC Berkeley explains that birds can hear extremely low frequencies called infrasound. The birds had left the area before other cues like atmospheric pressure were detectable.

When European starlings molt in the fall, the new feathers have white tips, like tiny stars. These tips wear off and starlings become a uniform brown or black. The bird also has a seasonal change in bill color — yellow in the spring and black in the fall. Young starlings look like a different species. They are grayish-brown until getting their adult feathers before winter. Another interesting thing about a starling is that the length of its intestinal tract is shorter in the summer when it’s eating protein-rich insects and longer in winter when it’s mainly eating seeds rich in carbohydrates.

 

Thanks for stopping by

“The fact that I can plant a seed and it becomes a flower, share a bit of knowledge and it becomes another’s, smile at someone and receive a smile in return, are to me continual spiritual exercises.” — Leo Buscaglia

“One touch of nature makes the whole world kin.” — William Shakespeare

 

Do good.

 

Al Batt of Hartland is a member of the Albert Lea Audubon Society. Email him at SnoEowl@aol.com.