Bird feeders and squirrels... or why it might be hopeless

Mission Impossible Squirrel from Dan G on Vimeo.

Red-winged blackbirds have returned

Along with the Turkey vulture and the two note call of the Chickadee the arrival of Red-winged blackbirds kicks off spring in all its sweet air, receding snow, and drip filled ponds. Red-wing blackbirds are common across North America and are symbolic of pond and marsh. In the eastern U.S. Red-wing blackbirds winter in large mixed species flocks with Common grackles, Brown-headed cowbirds, Rusty blackbirds, and often European starlings. Found year round as close as New Jersey the arrival of these noisy blackbirds to New England is a sure sign of spring.  

Red-winged blacbirds are aptly named for the well known red “epaulets”, a band of deep red feathers moving to bright orange and fading into yellow. Only the male blackbirds have epaulets and can flare them out when courting a female or announcing territory. The female Red-winged blackbirds are carefully camouflaged in cream and brown stripes making them all but disappear in the reeds and bull rushes in which they nest. Seeing a female red-winged blackbird can be a puzzling event for beginner birdwatchers. In these March days visit any local marsh, pond, or wetland and listen for the distinct, “conk-a-reeeee” song of the newly returned blackbirds, it’s a song that will fill up the warming air all summer long.

Notes from Wildness in the City: the Case for Birding the Patch

Notes from my session, Wildness in the City: the Case for Birding the Patch. As delivered at the 2013 MEES Annual Conference. 

About Alex Dunn

AlexanderJosephDunn@Gmail.com

ADunn@EcoTarium.org

• EcoTarium: www.ecotariumlorg
• Mass Audubon Broad Meadow Brook: https://www.massaudubon.org/catalog/
• The Daily Bird New England: http://thedailybirdnewengland.blogspot.com/

Links, book titles, and references in order from Wildness in the City: the Case for Birding the Patch as delivered on March 6, 2013 at the MEES Annual Conference

Twitch vs. Patch

• Big Year: http://www.amazon.com/The-Big-Year-Steve-Martin/dp/B004LWZWBU/ref=pd_bxgy_mov_img_y
• Big Sit: http://www.birdwatchersdigest.com/bwdsite/connect/bigsit/index.php
• Big Green Day: http://greenbigday.org

From Ecophobia to Topophila

• Last Child in the Woods, Richard Louv
• Beyond Ecophobia, David Sobel
• Topophilia, YiFu Tuan
• Becoming Animal and The Spell of the Sensuous, David Abram
• My Green Manifesto: Down the Charles River in Pursuit of a New Environmentalism, David Gressner

Wildness as adventure + magic

• Urban Explorers, www.Undercity.org
• Alastair Humphreys, http://www.alastairhumphreys.com/
• Microadventures: http://www.alastairhumphreys.com/microadventures-3/
• The Boy Who Biked Around the World, Alastair Humphreys
• S24O by Grant Peterson, http://www.adventurecycling.org/resources/Petersen_S240s.pdf

Finding Patches in the City and Urban Birding

• The Typology of New Public Sites, Graham Coreil- Allen http://grahamprojects.com/pdfs/nps-t.pdf
• David Lindo “the Urban Birder”, http://www.theurbanbirder.com/
• Birders: the Central Park Effect http://www.amazon.com/Birders-The-Central-Park-Effect/dp/B009VRVGLK
• Ebird.org “hotspots map” (you must register to view): http://ebird.org/content/ebird/ 
• Mass Breeding Bird Atlas: http://www.pwrc.usgs.gov/bba/index.cfm?fa=explore.ResultsSummary&BBA_ID=MA2007 and preliminary report: http://www.massaudubon.org/StateoftheBirds/

Resources for Exploring a Patch

• What the Robin Knows, Jon Young and http://whattherobinknows.com/ or http://birdlanguage.com/what-is-bird-language/ecourse/
• Wild Urban Plants of the Northeast, Peter Del Tredici
• Raccoon Nation documentary on PBS, http://video.pbs.org/video/2192070266/  
• The Cloud Collector’s Handbook, Gavin Pretor-Pinney and www.cloudappreciationsociety.org

History of the Field Guide

• John James Auduon
• Alexander Wilson
• Two Little Savages, Ernest Thompson Seton
• Blink, Malcolm Gladwell

A Model for Developmental Bird Watching

•        Jean Piaget (developmentalism): learning occurs in stages that happen at intervals and can be aided by, but not always pushed to by adults and teachers

•        David Kolb (experiential learning): learner must be actively involved in the experience, able to reflect on the experience, possess and use analytical skills to conceptualize the experience, and possess decision making and problem solving skills in order to use the new ideas gained from the experience.

•        George Hein (constructivism): knowledge is created by the learner, not pumped in externally

•        Abigail Housen (aesthetic development) and Visual Thinking Strategies: http://www.vtshome.org/research/aesthetic-development

•        Stage I – From Not Seeing to Seeing (the Spark bird)

•        Stage II – Seeing (the bird feeder)

•        Stage III – From Seeing to Watching (the bird watcher)

•        Stage IV – Observing (The expert aka I love Confusing fall warblers)

•        Stage V – Integration (Ecological thinking)