March 29, 2012

Spring Bird Song Crash Course day three – Northern Cardinal


Listen for the “laser beam” song in the morning. “Zooo-Zooo-Zooo-Ze-Ze-Ze-Ze-Ze” or a popping “uhh-weit, uhh weit, uhh weit”. Very loud and piercing, possible confusion with the Carolina wren. 

March 28, 2012

Spring Bird Song Crash Course day two – Tufted titmouse


Similar to the chickadee the Tufted titmouse sings a sweet, loud multi-noted spring song that sounds like a declarative “peter-peter-peter.” The titmouse will  often sing a rising or falling song and can even change up the tempo mid song. 

Similar too chickadee, Carolina wren, or Northern Cardinal


March 27, 2012

Spring Bird Song Crash Course day one – Chickadee


The Black-capped chickadee gives has a spring song, a sweet two-noted “one-two” or “see-sew”. It has the brightness of a Tufted titmouse or a even a Northern cardinal so listen for the persistent two note structure, the first note higher the second lower.  Chickadees also are capable of a quarrelsome, husky “pee-chaw  

March 21, 2012

The Importance of Education


I recently had the pleasure of presenting at the 2012 Massachusetts Environmental Education (EE) Society conference at the college of the Holy Cross in Worcester, MA. The focus of my talk titled, “The Digital Bird Watcher” was an overview of online resources and ways teachers can connect students to bird watching through real science data. These days the EE movement is largely focused on getting kids unplugged, outside, and undoing the effects of “ecophobia” (D. Sobel) and “nature deficit disorder” (R. Louv). I’m fully in favor of this anti-microchip bend that EE advocates for, so I was conscious that the word “digital” could be the cause of some rancor. To reassure the participants of my beliefs I prefaced my talk with the question, “what do we mean by digital?” and subsequently defined the role of digital technology as:
an aid, not a replacement for being outside in the field
- connecting learning around local and global issues of conservation and migration through accessible data
- personalizing the experience of bird watching through searchable maps, lists, and shared information

Further more I defined the very goals of bird watching education as:
 Providing an exciting and accessible entryway into the world of biodiversity
- Developing topophilia, a personal even magical connection to place
- Educating about local and global conservation issues through the story of migration

I was mindful not to make my lecture an Itunes store full of bird watching apps (though there are many good ones) nor was I going to showcase gimmicky, gadgets like binoculars with built in cameras or GPS sound recorders. The purpose of my talk was to share with teachers the incredible wealth of accessible data that lives on the web, free of charge, up to date, multimodal, and pertinent. While there are many good sites dedicated to K-12 curriculum ideas about bird education I was more interested in sharing with teachers the citizen science projects, breeding bird studies, and migratory tracking data that is being used by biologists and bird watchers across the globe. In preparing for this talk I assembled many of the resources I've been using and at the request of session participants I wanted to make these available online.

I’m please to announce that I will now host a page titled “Bird Watching Resources for Teachers and Educators” on my website the Daily Bird New England (look for the picture of the teacher studying the skeleton). I hope that these resources find their way into the hands of informal educators and classroom teachers alike and help ensure that we are getting kids engrossed in the natural world through the study of birds.

March 7, 2012

Bird Guilds


http://dendroica.blogspot.com/
A sprinkling of March snow doesn't sully the spring bird sounds from the woods. During a walk on a March morning it is not uncommon to stop to watch an active chickadee darting from branch to branch, quibbling quietly to its friend, while picking off small seeds from catkins and generally animating the winter life of the woods. In pausing to watch this small charmer one may suddenly notice that the noise is not just coming from the chickadee but also a pair of Tufted titmouse. And in giving pause to watch this two grey haired duo you may see a single Downy woodpecker working its way up the trunk of a bare oak tree, then the bleating, nasal sound of a White-breasted nuthatch joins the fray. “What am I witnessing?” some storm cloud of birds all around me? Winter songbirds including: chickadees, titmice, woodpeckers, kinglets, creepers, nuthatch, blue jays, cardinals, and wrens may travel the woods in loose bands or mixed species flocks. What is known locally, if not scientifically, as a bird guild or a group of mixed species that feed together. Theories on this type of behavior include the safety of many watchful eyes is better than one, the fact that where one bird is eating equates to food for others, as well more complex theories of food dispersal by on species that benefits another. Climatic factors  may also come into play as these groups are often found in opening with southern exposure, out of the wind and catching all that new spring sun. Watch chickadees or blue jays in the woods and spend a few minutes searching for other species in the area. 

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