Here's Looking at You

Anyone who has trained their binoculars or a camera on a bird knows this scenario: you work your way into a position to view the bird, you raise your optics, as soon as the bird is in your field of view it takes off - like it knows you're looking at it.

Well, that's because it does, according to new research published this week in Current Biology. Auguste M.P. von Bayern and Nathan J. Emery found that hand-reared Jackdaws, a crow found in Europe and western Asia, were highly sensitive to the focus of human eyes and their communicatory function.

The Jackdaw, Corvus monedula, knows
when it's the center of attention.

From the paper:

Article summary
Humans communicate their intentions and disposition using their eyes, whereas the communicative function of eyes in animals is less clear. Many species show aversive reactions to eyes, and several species gain information from conspecifics' gaze direction by automatically co-orienting with them. However, most species show little sensitivity to more subtle indicators of attention than head orientation and have difficulties using such cues in a cooperative context. Recently, some species have been found responsive to gaze direction in competitive situations. We investigated the sensitivity of jackdaws, pair-bonded social corvids that exhibit an analogous eye morphology to humans, to subtle attentional and communicative cues in two contexts and paradigms. In a conflict paradigm, we measured the birds' latency to retrieve food in front of an unfamiliar or familiar human, depending on the state and orientation of their eyes toward food. In a cooperative paradigm, we tested whether the jackdaws used familiar human's attentional or communicative cues to locate hidden food. Jackdaws were sensitive to human attentional states in the conflict situation but only responded to communicative cues in the cooperative situation. These findings may be the result of a natural tendency to attend to conspecifics' eyes or the effect of intense human contact during socialization.

Click here for full article (PDF).

Citation
von Bayern and Emery, Jackdaws Respond to Human Attentional States and Communicative Cues in Different Contexts, Current Biology (2009), doi:10.1016/j.cub.2009.02.062

Jackdaw image from Wikipedia.

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Stepping Out

Dear Feather and the Flower,

You'll probably find out about it elsewhere on the Internets, so let me come clean. The rumors are true. I've been writing with someone else.

It's only platonic, I swear - please know you are still my one and only blog. But I was approached by another blog, we innocently chatted about our shared interest in birds. We hit it off, the attraction was too great to resist; one thing lead to another, and as of today I've published on a different site.

I don't mean to hurt you, but the other blog means a lot to me. And given a chance, I think you would really get along - Round Robin is popular, attractive, intellectually-stimulating, and funny - what's not too like? Give it a try, see what was posted, I think you'll be excited.

Affectionately,
noflickster

ps I know you want the details, so here they are. Our nocturnal flight-call group wrote a piece about nocturnal migration for the Cornell Lab of Ornithology's blog. We are planning to contribute more throughout spring migration, we expect topics will range from when and where to listen, their importance in conservation and other fields, and several tutorials to introduce species so you can explore this frontier of bird watching. Please let me know (on this site) or the Lab know (on Round Robin) about your experiences in listening for nocturnal migrants, if you find the posts useful, and so on - we are looking for feedback! And if you blog, please consider promoting the posts to your readers: we'd like to reach a wide audience and hear comments about experiences across North America.

Now, I'm stepping out to see some birds - so I have something to post here before I get in dutch with my own blog . . . .

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Quiz Bird Answer

Quiz bird revealed, read on to learn its identity.

A headless passerine: who am I?

I photographed this headless-looking bird on a March 20^th trip to the Horseheads Marsh (aka, Holding Point) in Horseheads, NY. Those who guessed correctly narrowed it to one of the "Little Brown Jobs," and nishiki_85 noted the streaked, rusty back and the two white wing-bars, surmising the bird is an American Tree Sparrow.

A little more information here, the rusty cap and a gray face visible.

In addition to tree sparrows there are eight "LBJs" that we might expect in this area at this time of year, some more common than others. Looking carefully you may note the flanks are clean, not streaked, and slightly buffy. This helps eliminate several species: Song, Savannah, Fox, and Vesper Sparrows should all show streaking on the flanks.

Those relatively broad, white wing-bars are helpful, too. They reinforce this bird is not Song, Savannah, Fox nor Vesper, but also eliminate Swamp, White-throated, even White-crowned (I find it wonderfully bizarre those are winter residents at my folks place in Rochester, NY but rare here, 70 miles southeast).

House Sparrows, an honorary LBJ sparrow, do have white in the wings, but a large, single patch rather than two bars.

The only other possible (I wouldn't call it expected, but eBird allows it) sparrow is the Field Sparrow. How to separate these two without seeing the obvious differences, such as face and bill color/pattern? Well, hmmm. First, probability says American Tree Sparrows are much more likely than Field Sparrows, so lean in that direction. Then, wait until it shows its face. Seriously, in looking for differences in the visible parts (back, wings, tail), I'm not sure I could tell.

Gentle readers, how would you tell them apart?

Now you can see it all: bicolored bill, gray face with rusty cap and eyeline,
chestnut and black wings with white wing bars, brownish rump.

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Healthy Competition

eBird has released a new "data out" tool, the eBird Top 100. eBird users can now compare their species list and/or their total checklist submissions with other eBirders.

I'm not much into actively comparing life lists -- they really are measuring who has the opportunity to travel and the luxury to bird exotic places - but this is pretty cool. You can see how your life list (according to eBird) compares across the ABA area, in a particular country, a specific state/province, and so on. You can see how you rank in specific years, or all time.

More meaningful are how many checklists you've recorded. I suspect these indicate how often you collect valuable information that reaches beyond "the game" of birding.

That said, privately I do look. And I'm pleased to see I'm one of the Top 100 eBirders both for checklists entered (41) and species seen (91). I have no doubt I'll be dropping soon, as more and more prolific birders join eBird, as more and more people upload historical checklists, and as those more competitive than me get out and bird more.

My ego may take a hit, but I'll be taking one for the birds, and that's all right.

Check out the functionality on the eBird site.

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Garlic Mustard Survey

There are two types of people, so goes the saying. Those that divide people into two types . . . .

Seriously, if you're among those that can resist the urge to pull up Garlic Mustard this citizen science project may be for you. Personally, I don't think I could leave the plant alone long enough to collect the data they want. We've been stalwartly defending our property from its relentless assault for a couple of years and we're not about to give up now.

That said, the folks at the Global Invasions Research Coordination Network launched a Global Garlic Mustard Field Survey with the goal to "form a broad network of scientists, students and environmentalists from across Europe and North America to fill an important gap in data on native and introduced plant populations."

From their introduction,

It is widely believed that invasive species are larger, reproduce more and reach higher densities compared to their native ancestors. However, there are surprisingly few hard data to support this claim, even for some of the most well?known invaders. One of the most problematic invaders in North America is garlic mustard (Alliaria petiolata), yet without good field data, important questions remain unanswered. Does garlic mustard really grow larger and reproduce better in North American populations than in native European populations? How much variation in performance is there among populations within Europe and North America? Answers to questions like these will ultimately lead to better understanding and management of invasive species.

A worthwhile cause which could yield some fascinating results - but not at the expense of our little plot of land.

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Spring Progresses at Horseheads Marsh

This post should upload as I'm on my way to the Chemung County courthouse to fulfill my civic duty. Yep, I've been summoned for jury duty so I'll be wrapped up for 30 minutes to one month, depending on the how the jury consultants respond to me.

Saturday was tied up with prepping for, hosting, and recovering from our daughter's fifth birthday party (it went well, thank you, especially when I caught one of the parents photographing the Purple Finches at the feeder instead of the kids inhaling strawberry shortcake).

One of many Song Sparrows bursting with song.

Sunday morning I took an hour-long hike at the Horseheads Marsh, strolling slowly down the Railroad tracks with camera at the ready. It was warm, vaguely misty, and completely overcast. Not great for photography, but decent activity and a few "First of the Year" birds. Expected birds were thick, with Red-winged Blackbirds, Song Sparrows, and American Robins serenading from all directions.

One of many (many, many) Red-winged
Blackbirds, staking his territory.

Several Northern Mockingbirds and a pair of American Kestrels made appearances. A few new waterfowl joined the Canada geese and Mallards, including Wood Ducks, Ring-necked Ducks, and both Blue- and Green-winged Teal. The next pool hosted American Wigeon and Hooded Mergansers, along with nearly two dozen Tree Swallows flitting across the water's surface.

Two pair of Wood Ducks flushed as soon as I arrived, circled
for several minutes, before settling in a distant pool.

Last week it was a snipe, this week a somewhat mystery bird took off from the vegetation a few feet off of the tracks. It didn't vocalize, my impression was it was a Green Heron-sized bird, but not a Green Heron. I shot photos instead of observing it, click for larger images.

Wading bird taking flight. Note the clear difference
between the darker wing tips and the paler inner wings.

I'm fairly sure it's an American Bittern, but I wonder
about the darkness on the back - it shows up pretty
dusky in these images. Possible Least Bittern?

I'm reasonably sure it's an American Bittern, which wouldn't be overly unexpected, but the color of the back seems darker than it should be. The size seemed small, too. Then again, Least Bitterns aren't expected for another month or so. American Bitterns, and Green Herons for that matter, aren't expected until mid-April, though Bull's Birds of New York State observes that "early arrivals the last week of March have occasionally been reported."

Thoughts appreciated!


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Pet Parrot Saves a Life

From yesterday's Morning Edition on NPR:

A pet parrot is credited with saving a toddler from choking. Willie's owner performed the Heimlich maneuver after Willie yelled for help, alerting the owner that a little girl she was babysitting was choking on her food. The parrot shouted "Mama, Baby" and flapped his wings until his owner ran back just in time. Colorado's governor is among those honoring Willie as a hero.

I'm reevaluating my decision to keep fish . . . .

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