An oystercatcher by any other name

The black oystercatcher is not quite correctly named.

It could be called the black limpetcatcher, or the black musselcatcher to be more accurate in terms of what this shore bird eats.

Described as "just plain comical" by Nancy Baron and John Acorn in their Birds of Coastal British Columbia guide book, some researchers are taking this bird seriously.

The Pacific Wildlife Foundation and Parks Canada selected the bird as an indicator species of rocky intertidal community health.

To start that meant learning all about populations and movements to get a baseline measure. It is already known that the species is not threatened. The global population is around 10,000 individuals. Most live in British Columbia and Alaska.

They forage along rocky shores, often in urban settings, making it a good species for measuring the effects of human disturbance. 

This fellow at left was boldly stalking the shores of a beach in Sidney, just north of Victoria. About 100 pairs nest in the Strait of Georgia between Vancouver Island and the mainland.

To get the local population data, many birds were banded. Researchers hope people will report sightings here.

Haida Gwaii oystercatchers have orange or dark blue bands on their left leg.

Pacific Rim National Park birds have white bands with black letters on the right leg.

In the Gulf Islands they have orange bands with black letters.

BC mainland coast oystercatchers have yellow bands with black letters.

If you see a banded oystercatcher, note the band colour and numbers (if visible) and your location.

Clip from Bird Studies Canada

Oldest Known Wild Bird and a New Mother at 60

11 March 2011 – A few weeks ago, the oldest known wild bird in the Northern Hemisphere was spotted at Midway Atoll National Wildlife Refuge in Hawaii. The bird, a female Laysan Albatross named Wisdom, is at least 60 years old; she is also a new mother. 

   Wisdom was spotted with her chick a few weeks ago by John Klavitter, a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service biologist and the deputy manager of the Midway Atoll National Wildlife Refuge. She has sported and worn out five bird bands since she was first banded by U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) scientist Chandler Robbins in 1956. At the time, he estimated the albatross to be about five years old. Robbins rediscovered Wisdom in 2001, when she was at least 50. 

   “She looks great,” said Bruce Peterjohn, the chief of the North American Bird Banding Program at the USGS Patuxent Wildlife Research Center in Laurel, Maryland. “And she is now the oldest wild bird documented in the 90-year history of our USGS Fish and Wildlife Service and Canadian bird banding program,” he added. “To know that she can still successfully raise young at age 60-plus, that is beyond words. While the process of banding a bird has not changed greatly during the past century, the information provided by birds marked with a simple numbered metal band has transformed our knowledge of birds.” 

   Wisdom, Peterjohn said, has likely raised at least 30 to 35 chicks during her breeding life. Almost as amazing as being a parent at 60 is the number of miles she has likely flown. Adult birds average about 50,000 miles annually, so Wisdom has flown at least two to three million miles since she was first banded. That’s the equivalent of four to six trips from earth to the moon and back again, with plenty of miles to spare.

Have you seen this bird?

It's British Columbia's most widespread and abundant warbler.

A small number of these hearty songbirds overwinter on Vancouver Island. A pocket population socks in on Stubbs Island near Tofino, B.C. where a forest of California wax-myrtle provides them with food and shelter. It's the only place the plant grows on Vancouver Island.

The berries are purple, contain a single seed and have a white wax coating. They are unusual in that the fruit ripens late in the fall, providing a bounty of calories in the winter when other plants are dormant. If the bushes were removed, the birds could not stay.

Each time we cut a tree, hack a bush, pull up a plant the little community of organisms that depend on it have to find a new home or source of food. When we need we should harvest. When we don't, we should leave it for the other species that live on this planet.

Amazing tales from nature

I read a lot of comic books as a kid. Well, as an adult too. Giant grasshoppers and runaway tomatoes are imprinted on my brain.

Giant kelp is a real life plant, or algae, that lives up to the comic book hype.

Giant kelp and bull kelp are two characteristic species of algae on this coast. They wash up on the beach when they die and become whips in the sandy adventures of kids walking the shores.

Giant kelp grows an average of 27 cm per day in the spring. It can grow as much as 61 cm in 24 hours. That's two feet!

These tree-like algae form underwater forests where invertebrates, fish, marine mammals and birds find food and shelter. Even grey whales hide from killer whales amongst the stipes.

The popular image of a sea otter (not to be confused with the much more common river otter that is seen in the ocean around southern Vancouver Island) lying on its back, surrounded by kelp with an urchin between its paws illustrates and interesting interrelationship between those three species.

Sea otters were nearly wiped out in this coast in a hunting frenzy for their pelts in the 1800s. When their numbers were reduced, the kelp forests nearly disappeared. This was because the favourite prey of the otters - sea urchins - expanded their populations rapidly once they were free of their furry predators. The urchins eat the kelp and devoured the forests up and down the coasts.

It's one of the classic examples of a keystone species. An animal that may not be the most numerous, or obvious, but if removed from an ecosystem has a big impact.

All species have some function in their environment. Most of the time we do not see it, or understand it or make any decisions based on it.

Scenes from Beacon Hill

   I always think I need to go far into the wilderness to get great nature photos. Part of an afternoon at Beacon Hill Park in Victoria reminded me that I don't.

   Beacon Hill sits between downtown Victoria and the cliffs that face Juan de Fuca Strait. Well-used by residents, the 81 hectare (200 acre) park sports a diverse population of creatures that tolerate urban conditions.

   Besides these commonly seen denizens, hawks and owls lurk in the tree tops and a heron rookery survives despite annual attacks on their eggs and chicks by bald eagles.

   

   This successful outing reminded me that nature is right outside my door. I just need to make time to get out there — and bring my camera.

Clean sweep at Willows Beach

No dead birds were found on my survey today. Whew.

Not really surprising since oil, or oiled animals, from the boat that sank (see previous post below) would have had to come all the way in the Juan de Fuca Strait then hang a left to come up Haro Strait, and weave around some islands to land on Willows Beach.

That's not impossible when you consider the complexity of tides and currents, plus a big Pacific storm last night, but I didn't find anything more alarming than driftwood at the high tide line.

Hats off to the people at COASST (Costal Observation and Seabird Survey Team at the University of Washington) for getting the word out and co-ordinating beach surveyors throughout the Pacific Northwest for a fast response to this incident. I'll be interested to know if people found oil in other locales.

In my experiences with fisheries and forestry, our neighbours to the south tend to do a better job managing and protecting their resources than we do up here. In addition to powerful environmental organizations, the state departments responsible actually do their jobs instead of playing politics. Imagine.

I know that will surprise many Canadians, but our image of ourselves as environmental stewards has never been true. We just had so much natural wealth it took a lot of chipping away at it to reveal that fish, trees and water can disappear. And if we don't change our ways, they will.

This just in

An 80-foot boat sank off Cape Alava in Olympic National Park in the state of Washington last Thursday. That's not far from here, so the people who organize BC Beached Bird Surveys, Bird Studies Canada, have called for volunteers to scour the coasts around Victoria and area for signs of oil or animals in distress due to oiling.

I've been a volunteer beached bird surveyor since last January and have only seen one dead bird in that time. Thankfully. The purpose of the program is to gather baseline data on the incidental oil already washing up on our coast and the impact it has on wildlife. This with the hopes of keeping the moratorium on oil tankers tripping through Georgia Strait, the body of water between Vancouver Island an the mainland.

The vessel in question sank with over 14,000 litres (or 3,800 US gallons) of fuel onboard. I can't picture how much that is, but I do know that one litre of oil can contaminate two million litres of water. Thank you Transportation Tune-Up.

I also know what a beach littered with dead birds looks like.

I came across this die-off of common murres at Pachena Bay near Bamfield, B.C. in 2008. It's what got me started in the Beached Bird Survey.

I hope not to see anything like it when I head out to do the emergency survey this week.

A question of culling

There's been talk lately of culling deer on southern Vancouver Island. In Garden City, it seems, folks are fed up with herds of herbivores chowing down on their pansies and petunias.

While some talk, others have been hunting in the suburbs with crossbows and leaving beheaded deer carcasses behind. 

Wolves and cougars keep populations in check in less urban areas on the Island but cities offer refuge for deer and the open habitat with a wide variety of foilage they prefer. Wolves and cougars that follow them into town get shot on sight.

Besides reducing annuals and perennials, large deer populations remove the shrubs and plants songbirds rely on — especially on islands.

The results of recent research done on the San Juan Islands (where this lovely creature was photographed) suggest that the larger the deer population, the fewer kinds, and numbers, of birds. 

A similar study done on Haida Gwaii in 2005 found songbird abundance 55 to 77 per cent lower on islands where deer lived for more than 50 years, compared to islands with no deer.

Similar problems exist in the Gulf Island archipelago to the east of Vancouver Island.

The researchers state that if deer are not actively managed, local extinctions of native plants and birds will accelerate in the decades to come.

I'm generally not for human interference with wildlife, but humans tend to be the cause of such problems. Animals are introduced to places they may not have colonized on their own because we want to eat them, or look at them.  

And songbirds already have enough to contend with as they are hunted by house cats, lose habitat to development and fly into windows. Migratory bird populations are in sharp decline across North America. Birds will be further threatened by the effects of climate change.

Or maybe we should leave well enough alone since our meddling usually creates more problems.

The price of gold

Here's a lovely and common bird. The American goldfinch is a true North American. Some breed in southern Canada and winter in the southern U.S., others live year round in the central States and northern Mexico.

   They do well in human-dominated landscapes, but I bet many non-birders have never seen one despite the male's bright breeding plumage. Birds go about all kinds of business under our noses. Even keen birders miss them. If you don't know what to look for, or you're just not looking, the rarest of creatures could fly by and never be noted.

Goldfinches are relatively common, so keep your eyes peeled.

That attention-grabbing plumage comes at a price. 

   It's long been know by biologists that lush colours in birds and other animals represent fitness to potential mates. In other words, the stunning bumble bee combination of this goldfinch, says to the more drably coloured female 'hey, my genes are good, if you were thinking of laying some eggs, I'd be your guy.' 

   The idea is that to have such a display, the creature must maintain a good diet to get the nutrients to produce the colour. In other words, a good provider. Additionally, such a brightly coloured animal must be clever enough to evade predators despite wearing what amounts to a high vis. vest. This is the theory of sexual selection. It has lead to the evolution of fantastic colours and bizarre appendages in a wide variety of animals.

Interestingly, the dietary aspect of the theory wasn't tested until 2003 when scientists from Cornell University restricted the food available to a male American goldfinch. They found less carotenoids in the birds' blood and eventually grew rather drab feathers.

In our diet, carotenoids can be found in bright orange and yellow fruits and vegetables and also contribute to human health in many ways.

So, theory proven. Hopefully those hungry little goldfinches got fattened up and returned to their glorious hue after their service to evolutionary science.

Ghost story

Everyone’s had this experience.

You learn of something for the first time – a new word, or food, or person you’ve never heard of before.

Then it starts popping up everywhere. In the Saturday restaurant review, in a conversation overheard on the bus. You wonder how you were in the dark for so long.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not necessarily talking about a new trend. More like something that somehow never hit your radar.

This happened to me with Indian pipe last summer.

This is one of those oddball plants that aren’t really plants. And I’ll admit, I’m not as attentive to the flora of the Island as I could be. The same way I neglect poetry in my literary explorations.

Still, you’d think this freaky, not-quite-a-plant-thing might have come to my attention sooner.

Let’s back up a bit.

I’ve explored the forests of Vancouver Island for nearly 15 years, often in the company of people who do possess a body of botanical knowledge I can only envy.

Yet, the first time I observed Monotropa uniflora (notice how smoothly I slipped in that Latin name) was this summer, reading another nature blog.

Just a couple of weeks later, I was climbing up Mount Galiano and there it was. Ghostly, white nodding pipes. More like a mushroom than a plant. Definitely Indian pipe alternately known as ghost flower, ice plant or corpse plant.

Indian pipe is neither a plant nor a fungi. It's a parasitic myco-heterotroph.

Yikes, what does that mean?

Fungi that are in a mutually beneficial relationship with tree roots act as hosts for this organism that uses hormones to steal the tree's sugars from the fungi.

It does not photosynthesize, as all plants do. The leaf like structures are vestigial, from the days before this plant came up with an easier way to harness the sun's energy than photosynthesizing itself.

The Salish people called Indian pipe wolf's urine because they found it growing wherever wolves marked their territories.

Bird stories

Before I ran off to sell Christmas trees, I had two bird articles published. One was about the Christmas Bird Count in Victoria.

And the other, about hummingbird banding, appeared in the University of Victoria alumni magazine Torch.

Oh Christmas Tree

I know, I've done it again. Promised to return to regular blogging then disappeared. Not health this time, nope, I'm feeling much better. Amazing what adequate oxygen levels do.

No, this time, I was absent due to the need to make a living. I returned to my old standby, flogging Christmas trees. Now, anyone who knows me knows I'm not really a Christmas person. For some reason though, I've always enjoyed working Christmas tree lots – something I did for the first time 19 years ago in Winnipeg.

I guess it's a way of being part of the season that's less painful for me than say shopping, or hosting a dinner for 10. Or maybe it's because I love working outside, doing physical labour and having something tangible to show for my efforts (like cash).

Whatever it is, it's set me up for another few months of the freelance life, and that should mean time to blog, which also produces something tangible.


Happy 2011 everyone.

Valid excuses

I see the first statement of my last post turns out to be a lie. But with good reason. I've been struggling against a real lack of energy for some time and I now know why. I'm severely anemic.

What that means is that I'm lacking oxygen because I don't have enough iron in my red blood cells to efficiently transport that life-giving element. Anemia causes fatigue and mental confusion. Yep, that's been me for, jeez, I'm not even sure how long.

Good to have a diagnosis, even better to practice patience while my body renews itself. Doc says a couple of months before I feel significantly better. Everybody better watch out come early December.

Until then, I'll be gentle with myself. Do what I can do and see about keeping dear readers with some new material from here on the Island.

Like this view from Galiano Island. This would be one of the Gulf Islands, on the Canadian side of the water border. I visited at the end of June to interview a team of hummingbird banders and photograph rufous hummingbirds at the tail end of migration season.

I loved this long, narrow island. This view comes from the top of Mount Galiano. The trees that frame the other Gulf islands in the background are Garry oaks, unique to this region and so endangered that even private land owners need permission to cut any down.

I could go on and on about Garry oak ecosystems, but I've reached my energy expenditure limit for today. Here's a link if you want to learn more.

Sitting pretty

Summer has passed and it's time to get back to business. That means being more faithful about my blogging. When the weather is nice, I want to be anywhere but the computer, but it's good to return and share some captures from my wanderings.

I've been wanting to catch this bird for some time.

The red-breasted nuthatch makes a good noise for a little bird. If you hear a nasally ank, ank, ank in the forest you can be sure there's a small bird spiralling down a tree trunk, head first, somewhere nearby.

That sharp beak pries under bark for insects to eat and also gets used to bang a hole into the tree to live in, the same as a woodpecker.

Nuthatches eat seeds too and will come to feeders, but don't usually perch for long.

Both males and females have an unexplained habit of carrying tree sap to the nest and smearing it around the entrance. Like I said, it's unexplained.

Females lay five to six eggs and the chicks emerge after only 12 days of incubation. They don't stay long in the crowded nest before they fly out on their own. Their main predators are hawks and this bird lives on a property in the North Okanagan where a red-tailed hawk also nests and a smaller unidentified hawk was seen darting about the ponderosa pine and Douglas fir trees.

Holding back

I'd like to tell you the whole story of the osprey, up above the shipyard. The female giving me glaring looks. But I have to withhold while I seek a market for the tale.

I can share some photos. I've had two sessions now and anticipate a third.

And I can tell you this. This osprey pair had three chicks in spring – small, medium and large. Fledging three chicks is rare in raptors. Siblicide is common and it seems quite likely that medium and large kicked their weaker nest mate out some time in July. At the very least their greater size allowed them to keep the fish away from small, so the bird may have simply faded away.

That's life. In this case it's a two-for-one deal. And before you cast human judgements at the adult birds who turn a beak to this. Reproductive investment for a bird that lives a long time and has few offspring comes close some years to costing them their lives. In terms of survival of the fittest and passing on their genes, their best bet is to back the winners.

Sitting on gold

Me and this female osprey nesting at the Esquimalt Graving Dock, a federal ship building and repair facility near Victoria, B.C.

Like the UVic osprey, this pair has chosen a busy place to arrange some sticks on a light standard. They live on an industrial dock where large vessels like cruise ships and ferries get hauled out of the water for welding, painting – you name it, it's happening while this female defends and feeds her young and the male delivers fish and hangs out on a nearby tower.

What struck me immediately about the graving dock, is just how clean it is. The Environmental Services Department takes its work seriously. They keep an eye on all the wildlife that transit through or live on the site. Measures are taken to keep green corridors open for the movement of deer, raccoon and otters. Great care is taken with the many hazardous substances used around the ships, to keep it from poisoning the water or land.

Everyone there seems pretty keen about the osprey and keep tabs on the nest with a security camera. Activities on the nest, used intermittently since 2006, are logged and staff want to do whatever they can keep the site suitable for osprey generations to come.

Meanwhile, I've got a boatload of pictures that I have to sit on until I have a market for them. But I can't resist sharing a few now.

Thanks to the Public Works and Government Service Canada people for putting me up in the air with the osprey.

Living in paradise

One sight from my recent boat trip to the San Juans.

This is the view looking south east from the mouth of Reid Harbour (good name huh?) on Stuart Island.

I grew up in northern Manitoba, and like every landscape, it has its own beauty, but I never get over the combination here of ocean and snow-peaked mountain.


Or the forests that range from temperate rain to dry Mediterranean.

Here's some prickly pear cactus growing on Patos Island where we spent the first night. Cactus. Just a few metres above the Pacific Ocean.

Patos marks the northern limit of the American portion of an archipelago divided by the Canada-U.S. border (drawn in the water). On the Canadian side the chain continues and we call them the Gulf Islands. On the American side they are the San Juans.

The Spanish explorers Galiano and Valdez named this little island Isla de Patos in 1792. It means island of ducks. Coincidentally, I'm posting this in a hurry as I'm off to the Gulf Island Galiano. You can probably guess who that's named for.

But the most breath taking of all. Orcas leaping in the air just outside the marina at Point Roberts, Wash. You know when you see a killer whale breach within the first 20 minutes of the trip, it's going to be a good one.

Campus sweethearts

To say I'm happy with my new camera outfit would be a bit of an understatement. I resisted as long as I could, in loyalty to my old 20D, but I have to admit that five years in digital technology time makes a noticeable difference.

Once my 70 to 200mm lens arrived I practically ran up to the University of Victoria to snap the pair I've been following up there.

These two have opted to nest on a light standard stuck between the soccer pitch and the track and field facility. That means it's a busy place, not only home to the uni athletes, but also the site of competitive sports between people much younger and older than that.

And the funny thing is that the osprey kind of squawk through the commotion. Like they didn't choose to nest in a busy urban environment, for at least the second year running.

The good thing about osprey is that they can fledge chicks just as well from a nest in a grocery parking lot as they can from one over a remote boreal river. In fact maybe the squawking isn't even a complaint (as it sounds to my human ears) but a greeting.

On this day, the fields were empty. Here, the male delivers a fish to his mate, whose posture suggests she's dealing with chicks. Right on schedule.

Birds of a sort

Still waiting on a long lens, I took my new set up out to the navy fleet review on Saturday.
The Canadian Navy celebrates 100 years of service in 2010 and CFB Esquimalt hosted an international fleet review as one of the events.

Fleet reviews are pretty rare and used to be a way of showing one's marine military might. Now it's more of a bragging contest. Victoria hasn't seen a review in more than 50 years.

Coast Guard and navy ships attended from Japan, Australia, New Zealand and the U.S. Canada's Governor General Michaelle Jean inspected and the Snowbirds air demonstration squadron paid a visit.

Many of the eight thousand sailors (hello) from those ships took to the streets of Victoria making for an eventful weekend.

Throw in a couple of cruise ships, Buccaneer Days and the Naked Bike Ride and, well, there was plenty to point a camera at.

I even resisted the temptation to post the much racier picture of the fellow on the right.

Really, the long lens I'm waiting for would have been more suitable for that assignment.

In all other ways my new photography kit performed wonderfully.

Fonder heart

If you're wondering about my absence in the heart of both osprey and hummingbird season, it's because my camera gear was stolen.

This has caused enough hurt to silence me.

Thanks to a system I've always distrusted – thank you insurance – I have a replacement. A bright, shiny, newer, faster model. I have had very little interest in testing it.

Also, I'm still waiting for my big lens to arrive. Then this summer's osprey stories will continue.


And my grief will go away.