Grackles declared as "Near Threatened" in Canada

                                                                                                 Photo by BarrytheBirder

COMMON GRACKLE

(Quiscalus quiscalus)

BirdLife International, the official Red List Authority for birds, has just released its 2018 update and Bird Studies Canada reports that the updated list now declares the Common Grackle as 'Near Threatened'.   This is a shock as the population of this backyard bird now appears to have plummeted by over half since 1970.   The Common Grackle is thought to have thrived from land clearing that European settlement brought to North America.   However the starling's use of agricultural land had led to it being declared a 'pest', which has prompted intensive control measures in some areas, which appear to have led to significant declines in recent decades.   My observation is that the grackles at my backyard feeders, here in southern Ontario, are as plentiful as at any other time in the last 25 years...maybe more so.

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BarrytheBirder

"Air traffic control... we have a problem"

                                                           Photo: Dibyangshu Sarkar / AFP / Getty Images

A Purple Heron (Ardea purpurea) flies over a Little Egret (Egretta garzetta) at the Mangalajodi Bird Sanctuary, which is 65 km. south of Bhubaneswar, in eastern India, near the Bay of Bengal.   The sanctuary is a popular area for spotting migratory birds along with native species.

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BarrytheBirder

A sunflower squabble...

                                                            Photo: Paolino Massimiliano Manue / Alamy

A European Goldfinch (Chloris chloris) struggles with a Eurasian Blue Tit (Cyanistes caeruleus) in the Italian countryside.

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BarrytheBirder

"Excuse me..."

Photo: Ashwini Bhatia / AP

A Himalayan Crow sits on the back of a Himalayan Griffon Vulture (Gyps himalayensis), one of the largest birds of the Himalayas in Dharmsala, northern India.   In fairness, the vulture is young and may not have developed his or her full complement of assertiveness yet.

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BarrytheBirder

Oxpeckers in Kenya...

Photo: Amir Cohen / Reuters

Red-billed Oxpeckers (Buphagus erythrorhyncus) sit on a buffalo at Nairobi Natural Park in Kenya.   They eat bugs and insects on the animal's hide and will also suck blood from small open wounds in the buffalo's skin.

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BarrytheBirder

Eastern Curlew threatened by sand...

                                                                                        Photo: Doug McCutcheon / Alamy

An Eastern Curlew catches prey as it wades through an incoming tide in Cairns, in north-east Australia, on the Coral Sea.   The curlew is threatened by the dumping of sand onto its mudflats habitat.

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BarrytheBirder

"...and a partridge in a pear tree"

Photo: Jose Ardaiz / Fotonatura)

RED-LEGGED PARTRIDGE

(Alectoris rufa)

The Red-legged Partridge is native to south-western Europe, being found from Portugal and Spain, to France, Italy and southern Germany.   It has also been introduced to the UK., Ireland, Algeria, Greece and New Zealand.   Its I.U.C.N. status is 'least concerned'.

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BarrytheBirder

Greater Sage Grouse in Wyoming...

Photo: Tom Koerner / USFWS Mountain Prairie

LOSING PROTECTION

Greater Sage-grouse are seen above at Seedskadee National Wildlife Refuge in Wyoming, US.   Land management plans released last week would open more areas to leasing and allow waivers for drilling pads to encroach into the birds' habitat, undoing protections for the Greater Sage-grouse enacted in 2015 by Barrack Obama.

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BarrytheBirder

A magpie and a moose...

Photo: Tom Koerner / USFWS

A young moose and a Black-billed Magpie have an encounter at Seedskadee National Wildlife Refuge in south-west Wyoming, US.
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BarrytheBirder

A chummy group...

Photo: Gary Meredith

Rainbow Bee-eaters (Merops ornatus) are seen in the Great Sandy Desert of Western Australia.   They are also found in in eastern Indonesian, New Guinea and occasionally in the Solomon Islands.

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BarrytheBirder

Wisdom ... once again

Photo: Madalyn Riley / USFWS Pacific Region

Wisdom, a Laysan Albatross (Phoebastria immutabilis) and the world's oldest known wild bird, incubates her egg on the Midway Atoll National Wildlife Refuge in the North Pacific Ocean.  Wisdom is 68 years old and has returned home to Midway Atoll for over six decades, raising at least 30 to 35 chicks.

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BarrytheBirder

Rain shower brings little flock together...

                                                                                         Photo: Back To Nature / care2 

MAMA CHICKEN UMBRELLA

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BarrytheBirder

Bald Eagles ~ British Columbia ~ lower mainland

Photo by Dave Kemp

"I can't hear you - speak up"

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BarrytheBirder

Royal Society Publishing Photography Competition 2018 winners

 Photo: Kristian Bell / Deakin University 

Behaviour Category Winner

Kristen Bell was the photographer of the two Royal Terns seen above.  A beautiful morning on a Florida beach seemed to prompt the pair to begin an intricate courtship dance.

Photo: Alwin Hardenbol / University of Eastern Finland

Ecology & Environmental Science Category Winner

Bohemian Waxwings (Bombycilla garrulus) gorge on  rowan berries in winter.  The one above came to the trees outside the photographer's office in Finland.

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BarrytheBirder

How did I get so many field guides?

Photo by BarrytheBirder

31 Field Guides & 1 World Checklist

Pictured above is the last bird field guide I purchased. It is the Stokes Field Guide to the Birds of North America which I purchased five years ago.   I now have 31 field guides plus one copy of the World Checklist by Monroe and Sibley (1993), where I have checked off 425 species.   The checklists are by people that range from Roger Tory Peterson to Don & Lillian Stokes and from organizations like the National Audubon Society to National Geographic.   Others are field guides for particular countries such as Australia to Mexico to Venezuela.   Then there are individual species field guides from hummingbirds to hawks.   Interestingly, I have collected the 31 field guides over 31 years, from 1987 to 2018.   There was a time I thought I would go birding all over the world, but now that I am 77 years old I realize that Canada, the US. and the Caribbean will have to do ... no regrets however.   I'm still captivated by birds, even if most of them are in the backyard.   The last few years I thought maybe I should have an online checklist of all the birds I've seen, but now I can't think of a really good reason for doing so.   I can only imagine the looks on the faces of my grandchildren when I hand over a dozen, old, field guides to each of them.   As I was about to sign- off here, I remembered an old field guide that was gifted to me many years ago by a co-worker named Allister Macrae.   He bought it at an auction sale.  It dates back 92 years, to 1926 (see photo below).

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BarrytheBirder

...as the crow flies

Photo:Julien Stratenschulte / AFP / Getty Images

A Carrion Crow (Corvus carone) carrying a large nut flies over barbed wires in Hanover, northern Germany.  There are 34 species of crows around the world.
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BarrytheBirder

No rhyme or reason ... this is sick!

Photo: RSPCA / PA

2  Mute Swans and 5 cygnets shot,
wrapped in plastic bags 
and thrown down bank of a stream.

A family of Mute Swans has been killed in a "senseless" airgun attack, in Benenden, Kent, England.   "It's clear these poor Mute Swans have been shot and killed deliberately - one of the birds was peppered with pellets" an RSPCA inspector said.   "It's absolutely disgusting that someone would purposely target and kill these beautiful birds, and it's heartbreaking that an entire family has been wiped out".   The Guardian newspaper said that the RSPCA is calling for better regulation of air weapons after receiving 884 calls reporting air-gun attacks on animals across England and Wales last year.  The Telegraph newspaper quotes Stephen Knight, a trustee of the Swan Sanctuary in Shepperton,  Middlesex, saying the royal birds are targeted in such attacks because of their relationship to the Queen, who owns all the unmarked swans in England and Wales that swim in open water.   Mr. Knight said: " The reason they pick on swans is because it is widely know that they belong to the Crown, so they are a symbol of the Establishment".   

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BarrytheBirder

I wonder how much plastic these herons swallow?

Photo: Fachrul Reza / Barcroft Images

A siege of herons looks for food among the waste at a landfill in Lhokseumawe, Aceh, Indonesia.   Reports say plastic waste in Indonesia reaches 64m tons per year.

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BarrytheBirder

World population estimated to be over 310 million...

Photo: Vincenzo Pinto / AFP / Getty Images

A murmuration of starlings flies over the Altare della Patria monument in Rome.   Authorities have enlisted falcons to scare off defecatings starlings, as the Italian capital plays host to a growing menagerie of animals including gulls, wild boars and sheep.

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BarrytheBirder

Pretty little thing...

       Photo above: Warren Little / Getty Images

Photo below: Bjorn Christian Torrisson

RED FODY
(Foudia madagascariensis)

A Red Fody, sometimes known as the Madagascar Fody, Red Cardinal Fody or Common Fody is a small bird native to Madagascar and introduced to various other islands in the Indian Ocean.

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BarrytheBirder