The Networked Bird Observatory Blog

One of the neat things about CONE Welder is that we have the floodlights at night, and a lot more mammals to look at. I confess I’m not as interested in them as I am in birds, but that’s just personal prejudice, mostly. I’m all about combatting prejudice, so here are some of the more-interesting mammal shots taken lately.

Vanilla got this shot that shows both species of Welder’s wild pigs at the same time: I believe that’s a Javelina on the left, and a Feral Hog on the right:

Here’s a shot that achadamaia got of a Nine-banded Armadillo:

Here are two shots from a larger series taken by vanilla last night showing why it’s important that the feeders are suspended on wires — and why it doesn’t always matter:

Finally, here are a couple of shots I took this morning. It really looks to me like this White-tail doe is pregnant. How fun would it be to see a new fawn taking its first steps into the meadow? (Cue the Bambi music.)

From Craig Newmark’s personal blog, here’s an image that will look familiar:

While we wait for CONE Welder, here’s a stroll down memory lane: Craig posted a YouTube video of Roscoe recently, so we can actually hear what our favorite squirrel sounds like. Check it out:

I think that’s right under the birdbath, but the video never goes high enough to show it.

*Sniff* I miss Craig’s deck.

Update: Oops. No, according to Craig it’s the lefthand corner of the deck.

The CONE Welder birdcam isn’t live yet, but it’s never to soon to start obsessing, right? Here are some interesting items I’ve come across lately:

• Birds’ patterns changing in face of global warming - This is a really interesting article from MySanAntonio.com that profiles the work of research scientist John Rappole. Rappole has wondered if certain bird species have been shifting their breeding ranges north in southern Texas in response to climate change. As the CONE Welder info page explains, the new birdcam is intended to help answer that question.
• Cimate change hits home - A short video that follows John Rappole as he observes birds at the Welder Wildlife Refuge.
• Out of bounds - Click the “birds” link on this page for a multimedia feature from MySanAntonio.com that shows eight different bird species suspected of shifting their breeding ranges northward: Great Kiskadee, Green Jay, Cave Swallow, Buff-bellied Hummingbird, Couch’s Kingbird, Audubon’s Oriole, and White-tipped Dove. If you hover your mouse over the bird images, or click on them, you can play audio clips of the birds’ vocalizations. You probably won’t be surprised to know that the first thing this made me think was: Oh please, let there be a microphone included with the new installation. (Hey, a guy can dream, right?)
• Tailoring Rangelands to Enhance Wildlife Habitat: The Welder Wildlife Refuge Experience - An article from 1997 describing the history of brush management at Welder.
• Welder Wildlife Foundation Celebrates 50th Anniversary - A 2004 article from Texas Parks and Wildlife describing the history of the refuge itself.
• Welder Wildlife Foundation - The refuge’s official web site.
• Effects of Landscape Pattern on the Distribution of Feral Honey Bee Colonies in South Texas - A study of wild honeybee colonies’ distribution at Welder. (I said I was obsessing.)
• Google Maps aerial view of Welder - I’m pretty sure this shows the main complex at Welder, which I’m guessing (without any real evidence) might be near where the birdcam is being set up.

Okay. I’m ready. I’m more than ready.

I got a little choked up reading all the nice comments people were leaving at this photo taken today by robin54. (And check out the ghostly image of “Casper” left of the T-bar.)

I’m planning to post some retrospective items over the next few days, and I’m certainly planning on reviving posting when the camera goes back up in Texas in March. In the meantime, thanks to everyone for making the CONE Sutro Forest birdcam so much fun.

(Apologies to user vanilla, from whom I stole the idea for the title.)

So, with the fall migration in full swing, things have really been hopping on the birdcam. After a long summer with only the usual suspects to look at, new species are popping up seemingly every day.

Back on October 22 we got the Townsend’s Warbler, and then, on the evening of Saturday, October 27 at 5:02 p.m., avatar99 and annelizabeth combined for three more great shots of it. Here’s my favorite, by annelizabeth:

That would have been exciting enough, but just 10 minutes prior to that, birdbrain and achadamaia snapped a total of six shots of what I’m inclined to think are two Yellow-rumped Warblers. So far all the shots are in disputed status, with none of them particularly close to an ID, but take a look at these three (which I think are the clearest of the bunch), and see what you think:

These images make me think about an interesting aspect of bird-watching via the birdcam, versus doing it in real life. If this were real life, it would be easy to just watch these birds for a few minutes, waiting to see the telltale flash of that yellow rump, or to hear the characteristic Yellow-rumped “chip!” But with the birdcam, all we’ve got is what’s in the shot. Which is actually a good thing, some ways; I’ve definitely honed my ability to ID a House Finch based on an out-of-focus image of just its back, for example, with that characteristic pale edging on the feathers. But it can make things challenging in a situation like this. Like the Orange-crowned Warbler from October 26, we may just have to content ourselves with leaving these birds in “disputed.”

Continuing the theme of birds that are achingly close to being a new species, check out these three disputed shots by kryptonkay and avatar99 (there was also a fourth one by achadamaia, but I’m leaving it out because it’s pretty much identical to kryptonkay’s, only a bit fuzzier). The first shot is from 4:26 p.m. on October 28; the other two are from 4:06 p.m. on October 29:

I think what we’re looking at here is an immature White-crowned Sparrow. The pinkish/yellowish beak is what gives it away; the Golden-crowned’s beak is grayer. I’ve got a ton of these guys at my feeder in the backyard these days, and they sure look like this.

An interesting development is that some goats have been penned on the hillside behind Craig’s house; apparently they’re being used to clear out some of the underbrush in the Interior Greenbelt. Here’s a nice shot taken by none other than cnewmark himself:

Update: More details on Craig’s blog: My pet goats.

Finally, I have to include this shot taken by spurdin. As vanilla pointed out in the comments, “perfect for Halloween!”

I came across a link to Julie’s Magic Light Show, and wanted to share. If you like CONE Sutro Forest, you’ll probably like her site. Enjoy!

Update: Of particular interest to recent birdcamming, check out this page on her site: Downy or Hairy?

I’d been meaning to mention this, and paging back through the last weeks’ worth of images reminded me of it.

We’ve lost the sock feeder.

It disappeared sometime around noon, or shortly thereafter, on Saturday, June 2. The last shot we have that shows it still there was this one, taken by tedr at 11:58 a.m.:

Sometime between that shot and this one, taken by kiddo at 1:28 p.m., it disappeared:

Suspicion, as usual, falls immediately on Roscoe. Earlier that morning he was seen making use of the sock to reach the sunflower seeds; check out this shot taken at 8:31 by woodsong:

And this acrobatic maneuver at 9:31, captured by glenlivet18:

True, Roscoe isn’t actually touching the sock in that shot, but he clearly was spending a lot of time climbing on and around it on the morning in question.

A few months ago I had one of these sock feeders fall off the corner of my house where I’d hung it; my investigation in that case showed that the problem was the knot, which had basically untied itself under the weight and jostling of an endless progression of Lesser Goldfinches and House Finches. The CONE SF sock feeder hasn’t had the same level of finch attention, but it wouldn’t surprise me if a single active squirrel could do as much to tug a knot loose as any number of finches.

Focusing on the knot, we have a close-up from the day the sock vanished, taken by niskiel at 8:13 a.m.:

Unfortunately, it’s somewhat out of focus, making it hard to see much about the state of the knot. Interestingly, though, the following shot taken a couple of weeks earlier by berkteach, at 6:18 p.m. on May 15, shows what looks to me like an extra bit of “tail”, a little extra loose line above the knot, that was no longer there on the day the sock disappeared:

Here’s a zoomed-in comparison, magnified 5X, of that May 15 image by berkteach, and the one from the day the sock disappeared where Roscoe had his guilty paw on the sock. The two shots are roughly comparable in terms of the camera’s orientation and zoom, though one should bear in mind that the lighting is different, given the different time of day when the two shots were taken:

It’s hard to say exactly what’s going on with the knot in those two photos, but it looks to me like the second one shows less “tail” than the first. Could it be that with the help of Roscoe’s tugging it finally gave way?

If that’s true, then it seems possible that the sock has spent the last week lying on the ground at the base of the pole, down at ground level under Craig’s bottlebrush. That is, unless a certain nefarious rodent, having tugged it free of its moorings, has since made off with it.

Craig apparently has been in New York this past week (see this item from blogger Donna Bogatin, for example: Craigslist’s Craig Newmark: ‘My life is a sitcom’), which could explain why the sock hasn’t been restored. Hopefully someone can take a look around for it soon, though. As you all know, I have a real soft spot for it.

One of the reasons I love the Sutro Birdcam is because a lot of the birds that go to the feeders are ones I never get to see (since I live on the East Coast). Western Scrub Jay, Steller’s Jay, Pygmy Nuthatch, Chestnut-backed Chickadee, Black-headed Grosbeak, Allen’s Hummingbird, Anna’s Hummingbird, Hooded Oriole, Golden-crowned Sparrow and Lesser Goldfinch are ones that I never get to see. But with the cam, I feel like I know them as well as the birds at my feeders.

Anyway, I thought I’d share some of my photos of the birds that come to my feeders. I’m not going to tell you what they are - isn’t part of the fun of bird watching trying to identify birds?

One of the things I find interesting about the CONE SF system is that I spend all this time looking at Craig’s backyard from a very specific point of view. If I could see that location from a different angle, would I be surprised?

I got the opportunity to test that, because on Monday Craig posted a photograph taken at ground level to his personal blog. Here’s the photo:

I was admiring the plant (a Pride of Madeira), when I noticed something in the upper lefthand corner: Hey, is that the T-bar?

Yup. Here’s a magnified view of that part of the image:

Pretty cool, eh? It’s hard to tell with the cloud in the background, but I can’t see the sock feeder. If it’s not there, it would mean the photo was taken some time prior to 10:50 a.m. last Friday.

Note that you can see the top of that Pride of Madeira from the birdcam; here’s a photo I took of it this morning:

And here’s a photo of the bottlebrush that also figures prominently in Craig’s picture:

I have a theory about that bottlebrush. In my neck of the woods, the Selasphorus hummingbirds really love those bushes. Even before I got those shots the other day of the Selasphorus hummer dipping itself in the birdbath, I suspected the bottlebrush was a good place to look for them; now I’m sure of it. So if you notice someone repeatedly guiding the camera to peak through the railing at that bush, it’s probably me, and that’s what I’m doing: looking for an Allen’s Hummingbird.