Rare eagle pays quick visit to condo lawn

Written by Jack Sanders
Thursday, 11 November 2010 14:07

I used to pontificate from time to time about how people never look up. We go for a walk around the neighborhood, in the woods or even on the beach, and our eyes are always looking ahead, or maybe down. In the process, we miss the many interesting creatures — mostly birds — that may be spotted in the trees or in the air.

Well, Jason Kessler of Ridgefield might say the same thing about condominium windows.

Say what?

“As I was sitting at my desk before a window in my suburban condo,” Jason writes, “a burst of panicked chickadee made me look up just in time to see a juvenile Golden Eagle swooping down to grab something off the well-tended lawn, presumably a squirrel.

“I bolted for the door, but the action was over and the bird was gone. The entire episode took about half a second. Pretty darn thrilling.”

The surfer swan, winter finches and nosey bluebirds

Written by Jack Sanders
Thursday, 04 November 2010 11:58

You’d think that a Mute Swan, which is basically a living boat, wouldn’t need an artificial boat to cruise the waters of a local lake. But at least one adventurous swan spotted by Marty Gold of Ridgefield decided to give “sailing” a try.

The swan came across a plastic “surf board” type toy floating on Rainbow Lake on Oct.  17.

“It took some time of looking and poking at the board before first trying to step on the board,” Marty said.

The noisy ‘tree daggers’ of our woods

Written by Jack Sanders
Thursday, 28 October 2010 10:14

If there’s one local bird that generates more “wows” than a big hawk, it’s probably the Pileated Woodpecker. Robin Bates-Mason of New Canaan knows the feeling.

“This afternoon, outside my window, I saw what appeared to be a huge woodpecker on our Norway Maple,” she wrote a couple weeks ago. “It was at least the size of a crow but looked bigger, had a black body, maybe a white chest but its head was bright red with feathers on the top of its head that stuck up a bit.

“Is this a typical bird for our area? I’m in New Canaan and next to the Bristow Bird Sanctuary. I’ve seen lots of woodpeckers but the largest I’ve seen in the past has a bright orange head and is probably half the size of this bird. I am pretty sure that a hawk would not be able to scare the bird we saw.”

The shady side of coffee growing is good for the birds

Written by Jack Sanders
Thursday, 14 October 2010 09:42

Most people — even many birders — don’t realize that drinking the right kind of coffee can help many of our songbirds.

Coffee is either grown under full sun or in the shade of trees. Sun-grown coffee is cheaper and higher-yield, but usually occupies ground that was once forest and itself provides little habitat for birds. Growing coffee under the shade of large trees is not as efficient and costs more, but the product is said to taste better — and provides winter habitats for our migratory songbirds.

Companies like Birds & Beans produce bird-friendly, shade-grown coffees that have gained the official endorsement of the Smithsonian Migratory Bird Center.

Smithsonian reports that “in study after study, shade-grown coffee farms outshone sun-grown coffee farms with increased numbers and species of birds as well as an improved bird habitat, soil protection/erosion control, carbon sequestration, natural pest control, and improved pollination. While sun-grown systems can have higher yields, the shaded farms easily outperform them in sustainability measurements with the trees providing an array of ecological services that offer both direct and indirect ‘income/pay-back’ to farmers and the environment.”

A rare visitor to a rare oasis

Written by Jack Sanders
Thursday, 07 October 2010 11:15

Allen’s Meadow in Wilton is one of the top birding spots in the region, and Mike Warner showed one reason why recently when he spotted and photographed an extremely rare bird there.

“On Sept. 23, I went to Allen’s Meadow to look for a reported Lark Sparrow seen earlier that morning. Tina Green and Penny Solum arrived and we searched for the Lark Sparrow with no luck.

“At the last moment prior to leaving, Tina spotted a bird in the field. She and Penny identified it as a Northern Wheatear. I snapped a few pictures as the bird fed at the fringe of the field grass.

Rare kite loves our coastal voles and rats

Written by Jack Sanders
Friday, 01 October 2010 23:00

The White-tailed Kite that showed up at Stratford at the beginning of August is still there and apparently enjoying him- or herself.

This raptor, the first one ever found in Connecticut, is native to the American Southwest and the West Coast and likes warm, open territory. The Long Island Sound shoreline is certainly open enough, and this summer has been warm enough, so the kite has been having, well, a field day.

Kevin Doyle of Ridgefield has been down at Stratford Point a lot this season, photographing a nest of Ospreys from its creation, egg-laying, hatchings, fledgings, and lately, preparations for migration.  But he’s been “distracted” a bit by the kite’s appearance.

Swirling columns of migrating hawks

Written by Jack Sanders
Thursday, 23 September 2010 13:09

From September, 2010:

“Not sure exactly what I saw today — at about 11 a.m. on the 16th  a large sort of flock of what I think were hawks,” writes Chris Dahm  of Umpawaug Road in Redding. “There had to be a couple of hundred flying in a swirling column northwest of my location on Umpawaug.  I put my binoculars on them for a few seconds.  Definitely large raptor type birds with what seemed like a white-hued tail. They were sort of flying at each other but not too aggressive.  This column continued as it spiraled towards say Ridgefield.  I would say the altitude was 1,000 feet plus.  I have never seen anything like this before — any ideas?”

Chris was probably seeing migrating hawks.

The day after he saw these birds, Luke Tiller at Audubon Greenwich reported more than 1,000 Broad-winged Hawks passed over the hawk-watching location at Quaker Ridge.  This is the season for mass migration of some species of hawks — but not our common Red-tailed, or the smaller Cooper’s and Sharp-shinned, which remain here year round.

Hummingbird observations continue; keep feeding!

Written by Jack Sanders
Thursday, 16 September 2010 11:11

Hummers are leaving, but sightings — and ideas — continue

The hummingbirds have started leaving, but the reader comments about them continue to flow in — with some valuable observations and recommendations.

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Wild birds love wild food; our offerings supplement

Written by Jack Sanders
Thursday, 09 September 2010 13:11

”We sometimes tend to think of our busy feeders as the center of food supplies for the neighborhood birds. The fact is, even frequent feeder visitors get most of their food from the wild. Mike Tschebull of Darien has noticed a great example of a wild food source.

Big baby, odd ‘birds,’ and fussy hummers

Written by Jack Sanders
Thursday, 02 September 2010 13:12

Barbara McMahon of South Salem read the recent column on cowbirds as brood parasites  and was reminded   “of a photo I took last summer of a Black-capped Chickadee feeding a colossal baby. We have several pairs of cowbirds each spring ... One has to admire this parent’s dedication in feeding an ‘adopted’ youngster twice its size.”