I like that so many were able to enjoy the Bell's vireo at Pacific Commons Linear Park yesterday, Friday. Thank you all for adding a comment to your checklist, a comment which may help others find and appreciate the bird. In particular, people mentioned the singing. One person mentioned the typical vireo song of "Question? ... ANSWER." That sort of mnemonic is what Merlin is not good at -- yet. I would love it if Merlin users would accept the electronic, computerized, automatonic intelligence and then just seal their lips and listen to what the bird is saying. But I'm an old curmudgeon who learned that the best way to learn birds by their song is to sneak around in the bushes until you find the bird and watch it sing. The more scratches, thirst, and bruises you get, the better you will remember.
The Bell's vireo has a song that I remember in the mnemonic "I throw the ball to YOU ..... you throw the ball to Me." That sets it apart from at least the plumbeous vireo which asks, "ChewEE?" and answers "SURE is." I have no idea what the warbling vireo is saying but it has the same question/answer modality. Maybe others of you excellent birders has sat with a vireo long enough to formulate some sort of English language equivalent of their song. Bring it forth for us.
As for me and Merlin, we have a tenuous peace. He will not be a close friend of mine until he elaborates on what the bird means by the song it is singing. Just knowing what the bird is named is too shallow an interface for me. To the end of understanding bird language, may I recommend "What The Robin Knows," by Jon Young?
Keep Watching.
To add on,
Cornell's Birds of the World entry says
"
Like other vireos, Bell's Vireo is heavily parasitized by the Brown-headed Cowbird (Molothrus ater), and parasitism has exacerbated population declines resulting from habitat loss and degradation in portions of the species' range. Since the Least Bell's Vireo (Vireo bellii pusillus) was listed as Endangered in California in 1986, an upsurge of research has expanded our knowledge of the breeding ecology and demography of the species, particularly with regard to parasite-host interactions, and management to reduce parasitism has resulted in localized increases in vireo populations. Considered a flagship species representative of many low shrub-nesting species, this vireo is increasingly the focus of conservation efforts promoting protection of avian diversity. The species readily colonizes newly available habitat, so efforts to restore or create appropriate habitat is a viable strategy to help maintain its populations."
So it would be great if folks could keep an eye on this little guy to figure out how long it sticks around.
(37.4949427, -121.9818452)
Bill ClarkLivermore, CA
Pronouns: he, him, his
Claude Lyneis
cmlyneis@...
Pam L and I visited McNabney Marsh yesterday looking for possible Red-necked Phalaropes. It was windier and cooler than we expected. No phalaropes there for us. We drove around the hill and checked the Waterbird Way pond. No phalaropes there, either, though we did find a Cinnamon Teal pair.
We looked at the heron rookery in the trees overlooking Mococo pond. There did not seem to be any evidence of nesting. Has this rookery been abandoned? Albert, maybe you will know. Because this pond was a little more sheltered from the wind, we thought maybe phalaropes here? It was not to be.
We did not walk out the Transmontaigne Pipeline trail, often misnamed the Point Edit Trail. We could see water out there from the hill above the north McNabney parking lot. It was too windy and though we did have some nice birds for our efforts, we headed home. There were more than forty Mute Swans in McNabney.
And today I had a male Western Tanager in Heather Farm Park-Walnut Creek.
Hugh B. Harvey
Walnut Creek
One complication this morning was at least three school buses full of elementary kids enjoying the outdoors while I was there.
Anyway, along with the Orange-crowned Warbler, I got photos of a Wilson’s Warbler and a Hutton’s Vireo. Three yellowish birds in one day!
These and photos of an Acorn Woodpecker and Red-tailed Hawk from Saturday are in a Flickr album—
Claude Lyneis
cmlyneis@...
I once saw a video of a pelican downing a pigeon! (a long time ago...)
Maybe they are being forced to look beyond the usual food sources....
Amy Dawson
Oakland
On Monday, May 13, 2024 at 11:11:11 AM PDT, Matt Tarlach <mtar925@...> wrote:
On May 2 and 3 I had a lone Brown Pelican at Waterbird Regional Preserve, (aka McNabney Marsh). To my eye the same 1st-year bird on both dates. I think McNabney is technically brackish but FWIW Ebird tagged the bird as red-dot "Unreported." On both visits I saw the pelican feeding, on what I don't know.
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Matt Tarlach
Walnut Creek
Be on the lookout for other displaced seabirds; I saw a rather lethargic-looking Common Murre near Berkeley Marina yesterday.
On May 2 and 3 I had a lone Brown Pelican at Waterbird Regional Preserve, (aka McNabney Marsh). To my eye the same 1st-year bird on both dates. I think McNabney is technically brackish but FWIW Ebird tagged the bird as red-dot "Unreported." On both visits I saw the pelican feeding, on what I don't know.
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Matt Tarlach
Walnut Creek
FYI
Gerry
Begin forwarded message:
From: California Department of Fish and Wildlife <cdfw@...>
Date: May 10, 2024 at 11:51:10 AM PDT
To: gerry.mcchesney@...
Subject: High Number of California Brown Pelicans Show Signs of Sickness
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Information on Pelican Stranding Event
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Wetlands and Wildlife Care Center
High Number of California Brown Pelicans Show Signs of Sickness
The California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW) has received increased reports of California brown pelicans, a fully protected species, stranded along the coast from Santa Cruz County south to San Diego County, since late April. Central and Southern California wildlife rehabilitation facilities began admitting an unusually high number of sick pelicans as reports were received.
The pelicans exhibit characteristics of emaciation, and some have secondary injuries. CDFW along with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS), wildlife rehabilitation facilities and other state partners are coordinating to assess the ongoing situation.
CDFW is conducting postmortem examinations and testing pelicans admitted to wildlife rehabilitation facilities. Preliminary results indicate that pelicans are succumbing to starvation related problems.
Stranding events have been documented to occur periodically along the California coast in a variety of seabird species. A similar pelican stranding event occurred in spring 2022 with nearly 800 pelicans admitted into wildlife rehabilitation facilities and 394 successfully returned to the wild.
Officials ask the public not to touch, harass, attempt to feed or take photographs with pelicans. Do not attempt to remove any fishing lines or embedded fishing hooks from entangled birds.
CDFW and agency partners will continue to track this stranding event.
How Can the Public Help?
Report an injured or sick pelican:
Report a dead pelican:
- Residents can report dead wildlife to CDFW’s Wildlife Health Laboratory using the mortality reporting form, which helps biologists monitor the event- please include photos if possible.
Support a local Wildlife Rehabilitation Facility:
- Contact permitted facilities intaking brown pelicans directly for how to best assist.
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Persons with disabilities needing reasonable accommodation to participate in public meetings or other CDFW activities are invited to contact CDFW's Accessibility Coordinator in the CRO Office at (916) 902-5577, or send an email to CivilRights@.... Reasonable Accommodation requests for facility and/or meeting accessibility should be received at least 21 days prior to the event. Requests for American Sign Language Interpreters should be submitted at least two weeks prior to the event, and requests for Real-Time Captioning at least four weeks prior to the event. These timeframes are to help ensure that the requested accommodation is met. If a request for an accommodation has been submitted but due to circumstances is no longer needed, please contact the Accessibility Coordinator immediately. |
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| This email was sent to gerry.mcchesney@... from the California Natural Resources Agency utilizing govDelivery. California Natural Resources Agency, 715 P Street, Sacramento, CA 95814 |
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Hello Zac, et. al.,
Last week an immature Brown Pelican was found laying down on the sidewalk path at Lake Merritt. Luckily, with the help of many in the community, we were able to rescue and transport it immediately to International Bird Rescue in Fairfield, CA. It was the 30th pelican received that day with 40 more expected the next day from other rescue facilities.
If you are able to, please donate to International Bird Rescue. The cost to feed so many pelicans all at once is staggering.
Best,
Lyla
Hi Dawn,
Wow, that's amazing! Thanks for sharing. Patterson Pass is truly a long way from the bay, and far more surprising than my report! I'll be curious if there are more inland reports from others.
Zac
Malnourished, hungry, in-bad-shape Brown Pelicans are showing up in Bay Area in unusual places.
Food shortage somewhere, I think.
I heard a news item on KQED this morning about this.
Maureen Lahiff
Hi Zac.
I, too, have had a recent unusual Brown Pelican sighting. On Sun 5-May, Karen Kenney and I observed a Brown Pelican flying over Patterson Pass Rd and the surrounding hills! We also wondered if it had anything to do with the current crisis.
Dawn
During this morning's regular sky watch from my house (near the Albany Library), I was watching circling groups of California Gulls move past, as they often do on breezy days, mostly heading N or NW. But in one group of Callies, I was surprised to see a much bigger bird, wheeling in close formation with a northbound gull flock, an adult Brown Pelican!
I live in a tightly packed residential neighborhood, just under a mile from the closest open bay at Albany Mudflats, with Albany Hill lying between the water and my house. So it's rare to see a Brown Pelican anywhere further from the bay than Highway 80 / the western foot of Albany Hill.
In the almost 20 years I've lived here (with 4 years of regular sky watching and close to 450 ebird house/yard lists), I've never seen a Brown Pelican. I've even tried scoping over the shoulder of Albany Hill (.6 miles away), trying to catch a bird swinging a bit wide from the open water.
Given the current mass starvation event that's going on with Brown Pelicans, and with emaciated birds packing rescue centers or exhibiting unusual behaviors, it did make me wonder whether this might be related in some way? I suppose there's no way to know.
But I'd be curious if anyone else is seeing Brown Pelicans further from the salt water than is usual?
Of course, my neighborhood offers no opportunities to plunge-dive for fish. I have no idea whether a desperate pelican might follow gulls hoping to be led to a food source, whether the bird was making for the Carquinez Straights, or just taking a wander.
A low quality photo of today’s bird is included below.
Yesterday was a global effort to monitor birds so I took the opportunity to focus on a local mini-big day in the watershed, just to see what's May has brought. I ended up with a modest 52 species for 7am to noon with 4 stops in the Sausal Creek Watershed at our traditional monitoring sites (20 years ongoing: we had 63 spp. with all the stops in April's monitoring w/ 6 younger pairs of eyes & ears).
May 11 really began with the aurora at midnight, with our crazy mockingbird still sounding off. At 7:00 Fern Ravine in Joaquin Miller Park had some migrants like western tanager, warbling vireo, siskin, and nesting violet green swallows in the dead tree; lots of purple finch; Wilson's warblers and juncos feeding chicks. At Joaquin Miller Ct. next to Hgwy 13, our traditional black-headed grosbeak spot, 2 pair were gathering nesting material and a Swainson's thrush was singing. At Wm. Wood Park, below Hgwy 580, our traditional hooded oriole spot, made me work but 4 showed up, Onto the estuary at the Fruitvale Bridge where the creek enters the bay, I spied a blue banded pelican. It was a rehab bird injured by fishing gear in 2021 and now loafing on the low tide sand bar. The male peregrine was present. It was noon and I headed home. As I was relaxing at 3:30 after a grueling day, A BALD EAGLE flew over my house carrying a trout, second sighting in a week carrying food! Something is fishy is going here!
Mark Rauzon
Glenview near Park Blvd. on the southeast side of Piedmont
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I was going to write a post with flight results from Thursday/Friday, and that is still below, but first: I made a quick jaunt up Vollmer this morning before a Mother’s Day outing to what ended up being a sky island. It was very warm up there and quite birdy, a multitude of Townsend’s and Hermit Warblers, Warbling Vireos, Tanagers, etc. There was an Empidonax flycatcher singing occasionally from the coyote brush by the rancher’s gate (I’ve also heard portagee gate for these) next to the intersection of the main road and the trail up to summit that I could not see. I don’t really believe in retrospective ID, so I won’t call it anything, but it would be great if someone could take a look. It was not a Western, Hammond’s, or Willow.
Thursday I saw the weather for flight looked good, and normally that would send me to a spot bayside. But considering my project on Mt. Diablo, I went there instead and hoped for a good showing on Grapevine Ridge. The flight was fast and furious from about 7-8, but was completely concluded by 820 or so! On the coast it seems birds were moving until well into the morning, and this probably reflects the large easterly component to the wind pushing the migrants bay/oceanside. Some counts were:
Rufous Hummingbird: 5 ad. Males
2 Pewee
3 Hammond’s/Dusky (one I believe gave a whit upon landing)
8 Kingbird
6 Warbling Vireo
Cliff Swallow: 7
Swainson’s Thrush: 6
Catharus sp.: 1 one thrush that landed briefly looked to me much like the Hermit Thrush that you see moving through the Great Basin during the month of May—large, gray, cold, and blank-faced. They really are quite different looking birds, but the look just too brief.
Waxwing: 97
Siskin: 42
O-c Warbler: 8
Yellow Warbler: 8
Audubon’s: 6
B.t.-gray: 5
Townsend’s: 119
Hermit Warbler: 35
Wilson’s Warbler: 78
Tanager: 148
Grosbeak: 9
Lazuli Bunting: 108
And approx.. 400-500 “passerine sp.”
I made a return visit Friday. Some misc. counts:
Swift sp.: intersected my binoculars while I was watching a Townsend’s Warbler and then was promptly lost. It looked like a Black, but I let it go.
Rufous Hummingbird: 5
Olive-sided Flycatcher: 3
Pewee: 2
Kingbird: 1
W. Vireo: 4
Swainson’s Thrush: 1
Cedar Waxwing: 89
Siskin: 48
Lawrence’s Goldfinch: 14! All pairs or singles westbound
Bullock’s: 1
Yellow Warbler: 12
Audubon’s: 3
Myrtle Warbler: 1 was late and well studied
Townsend’s Warbler: 37
Hermit Warbler: 26
Wilson’s Warbler: 21
Tanager: 64
Lazuli Bunting: 109
And a few hundred “passerine sp.”
I then walked out to Devil’s Pulpit, where it became clear that a serious number of migrants had been deposited on the mountain, including a calling but unseen Gray/Dusky Flycatcher here, but I was running out of time to bird! I made a quick stop at Blue Oak Campground on the way down which far and away exceeded all of my expectations. Walking no more than 200 feet, I counted:
1 well-studied, whitting Willow Flycatcher was my first for upper Mt. Diablo, and is on the early side. There has been an early wave of this species into NorCal this spring it seems.
Hammond’s: 1
Western Flycatcher: 2
Warbling Vireo: 4+
Ruby-crowned Kinglet: 2 singing birds. I believe the late date for the county is two Emilie Strauss had 5/25 at Lake Anza a decade or two ago, so we have a while yet if we are talking about records, but this is still quite late.
R-b Nuthatch: 1 sad lethargic bird.
Swainson’s Thrush: 1
Cedar Waxwing: 2
Siskin: 1
Lawrence’s Goldfinch: 1
O-c Warbler: 2, including one so gray-headed it looked like it was going to be a Tennessee!
Yellow Warbler: 1
Audubon’s Warbler: 1
Myrtle Warbler: 1, carefully studied: seen and heard.
Black-throated Gray Warbler: 1
Townsend’s Warbler: 12
Hermit Warbler: 5
Wilson’s Warbler: 2
Tanager: 2
Bunting: 3
Yesterday 5/11 was not going to be a part of this post, but while I am here:
At Piper Slough there was a Phainopepla!! And a Black Tern cruised by with a squadron of alternate Bonaparte’s Gulls. Good numbers (40) of this species are still over Frank’s Tract and fewer (15) over Little Frank’s. Srikant Char found a Snowy Plover at Clifton that was still there yesterday, just past the parking lot, and on Bethel Island in the tradt’l shorebird field a duetting pair of Virginia Rail could be attributable to a breeding attempt or lateish migrants.
Ethan Monk
Not being on that side of town very often, I stopped at the Petticoat Lane dentist office yesterday which last year sort of hosted a Keel-billed Toucan. The receptionist had not worked there long and did not know about the bird. In the parking lot I found one of the dental hygienists who said that one of her co-workers had fed the bird papaya. A friend and I several times took papaya to the office to lend a hand in that effort.
This hygienist did not know what finally happened with that particular bird. It is hard to say what was the outcome. Using Google I am finding either pay-walls or somewhat incomplete stories. A bird was captured, but it seems to be a second Toucan which was in loose Lafayette.
It was cool to see the Toucan at the time and kudos to the ladies in Walnut Creek Dental Studio.
Hugh B. Harvey
Walnut Creek
The Chatapaloosa continues. I had one Friday morning (5/10) near the Alvarado Park staging area on the north end of Wildcat Canyon. Heard only. It was in the coyote brush on the south/east side of the Bonita Trail at the lower gate, just a couple hundred feet from the main Wildcat Creek Trail.
Yesterday I visited Alvarado Park and it was chock-a-block full of Western Tanagers, easily the most common species there that morning. Also had a MacGillivray's Warbler (heard, and seen as a skulky shadow in some dense vegetation).
Alan Krakauer
Richmond CA
I also "saw" a Yellow-breasted Chat" at Albany Bulb today. Actually, Merlin heard it and I compared it to the sounds on iBird Pro (I am not a "Chat expert"). Unfortunately, I did not see it. Coordinates were: 37.88943° N, 122.32510° W - in the brush near the big Oak tree.
Also, there were two Black Scoters (one definite male) on the North side of the point of Albany Bulb, just west of the two large antenna towers, swimming East towards Point Pinole.
Enjoy the birds, Ed
