Articles

Sep 30 2018

Compact Endothermic Mouse Defrosting Unit (CEMDU)

Author: DakotaBirder • Discussion: No Comments

The calendar is changing over to October, which means fall migration is in full swing.  It’s not a cheery time for a birder in South Dakota!  Winters are long, and bird species and numbers are both WAY down compared to the other three seasons. However, there are a few bright spots!  What “saved” winter for me a few winters ago was the sheer delight in finding a species I’d never seen around southeastern South Dakota.

Up until that winter (3 years ago, 2015-2016), the only place I’d seen a Northern Saw-whet Owl was along the Missouri River near Pierre. Birders there found that they liked to winter in the cedar trees along the river. There are a few areas around my part of South Dakota that also have thick stands of cedar, so I thought I’d spend some time that winter searching for the little guys. It was very discouraging at first.  It’s not easy searching through the thick cedar stands! I started in mid-November, searching for signs…the “white-wash” of their poop that you can find on the ground and branches below a daytime roost, or actual regurgitated pellets.  I DID occasionally find owl-sign, but for a good month…no owls.

Then in late December 2015, I went to Newton Hills State Park. Birders had reported hearing a Northern Saw-whet Owl during a Christmas Bird Count, so I thought I’d leave before dawn, and spend several hours looking.  It was a miserable day…cloudy with a very thick, icy fog, and I got a later start than I had planned. By the time I got there, the sun had already risen, and I was sure I wasn’t going to hear any calling owls. However, the fog was SO thick, that it was still relatively dark and gloomy when I arrived. It was only moments after stepping out of my car that I heard a calling Saw-whet Owl!  I headed in the general direction, and by the time I got close, the owl had stopped calling. I slowly made my way into the cedar thicket, and almost immediately found fresh looking signs that an owl had been there. White-wash on the ground as well as pellets!  I then slowly raised my head, hoping to see an owl sitting in the branches directly above the whitewash.  No such luck!  DAMN….IT.  After spending so much time looking, I was getting frustrated and was convinced I’d never actually find one.  I turned around to head out of the thicket, took about 3 steps, and walked into a commotion just above my head.  Owl!  He was only about 6 feet away from all the whitewash, but in a different spot, and I had accidentally caused him to flush when I walked past.

AAAARRGGGGHHH!!! I was at once both happy that I actually got a glimpse of an owl, but frustrated that I missed seeing him before I got so close he flushed. No photograph. Sigh. I continued the search though, and about 15 minutes later, found another location with whitewash and pellets.  And this time…success!  I looked directly above the whitewash, and staring back down at me from about 10 feet up in the cedar tree was a gorgeous little Saw-whet Owl!

I had a blast the rest of that winter. I found several more in the Newton Hills Area, and also 4 more near Lake Alvin just south of Sioux Falls. Overall that winter I found at least a dozen different Northern Saw-whet Owls!  What was striking was how incredibly tame they were. That first owl on that foggy morning was the only one I saw that winter that actually flushed. Several times I was able to approach an owl and get mere feet away, and instead of flushing, I was typically greeted by a disinterested yawn.

This photo is one of my favorites from that winter. Northern Saw-whet Owls are tiny critters.  Their prey is often small voles and mice, but even those are too much for them to consume in one sitting. They will often catch a vole or mouse, eat half of it, and cache the other half in the nook of a tree branch. They then come back later and retrieve the cache, but in our cold winters, they have to thaw it before finishing their meal.  Thus, I’d read you could sometimes find a Northern Saw-whet Owl “defrosting” a mouse.  One morning I was lucky enough to witness such an event, as this grumpy-looking guy was busy defrosting breakfast when I came across him.

A “Compact Endothermic Mouse Defrosting Unit”!!  One of my favorite memories from that winter. As the weather turns colder here, I’m hoping to again find these handsome little birds this winter.

Northern Saw-whet Owl - Aegolius acadicus

A Northern Saw-whet Owl, defrosting it’s morning breakfast.

Jul 01 2015

Man vs. Bird – Cherry Battle Royale, 2015

Author: DakotaBirder • Discussion: No Comments

We’ve built our house 8 years ago.  While my wife did most of the heavy lifting in terms of planning the inside, I was excited to have a completely blank canvas on which to landscape.  Of course, I had birds on my mind while I landscaped, putting a focus on plants that provided a nice mix of cover and food.

It wasn’t ALL just about the birds, however.  My wife likes roses…hence, I had to have roses somewhere.  For me, I was looking forward to having a garden, as well as having some fruit trees.  I planted a number of serviceberry (Juneberry) shrubs, and while I knew they were edible, the primary reason I planted them was to attract fruit-eating birds.  Cherries, however, are for me!  Cherry pie is, as I’m sure you know, the most perfect food ever created.  I bought 4 cherry trees, 2 dwarf sour (pie) cherries, and 2 full-size Montmorency cherries (the main sour pie cherry).

The trees were quite small when I bought them, and for the first 3 or 4 years, there were only a few cherries.  As they started to get big enough for the expectation of perhaps SOME kind of cherry harvest, we had a big windstorm take down one of the full-size cherries.  Down to 1 Montmorency, and 2 dwarf cherry trees!  About 4 years ago, the trees were still relatively small, but I was able to gather a very modest harvest.  By VERY modest, I mean enough to make 1 cherry pie, and about 2 jars of jam.  That year, given the relatively small number of cherries, the birds probably ate more cherries than I was able to harvest.  Still, it was a success!  Real cherries from my yard!  I anticipated greater harvests as the trees matured!

The last few years have resulted in no cherry pie.  No cherry jam.  No cherry cobbler.  In other words…no cherries, or at least not enough to bother picking.  The problem? We live in South Dakota!  We are always subject to some late, hard freeze or frost. In 2 years, we had extremely warm March weather and the cherries bloomed very early.  That was followed by colder weather that presumably killed the blooms.  Another year it was just a very late, hard freeze that likely did the blooms in.  What would 2015 bring?

We had a rather ho-hum winter, not all that cold, not all that late, and not all that much snow.  Spring and early summer have been fantastic, with plenty of warm, sunny days, periodic rainfall, and most importantly…no very late, killing frost.  The result of the favorable weather? Ever since about mid- to late-May, you could tell that a massive harvest was possible!  All three cherry trees were just LOADED with blooms, followed by growing and ripening fruit that was so abundant, some of the branches were weighed down and almost touching the ground.

Sour Cherry - Jam

Cherries as far as the eye can see! A couple days harvest shown here, made into jam, another harvest made into pie filling, more in the freezer…a bumper crop in 2015 for both man and birds!

As the first of the cherries started to approach ripeness, the first of the American Robins showed up to start munching.  Then a Gray Catbird. Then several of each species.  Occasionally a small flock of Cedar Waxwings would stop by for a cherry desert. NOOOOOOOOOooooooooooo!!! My first ever bumper crop of cherries…was it going to be all for naught?  Man vs. bird…who was going to win!?!?!!?

Well, thankfully for this bird loving man, BOTH bird and man won!  While the Robins and Catbirds are certainly getting their share, there are more cherries than 5x as many birds could eat.  I’ve picked gallon after gallon of delicious pie cherries, often picking side by side with Robins and Catbirds casually munching away mere feet from where I was picking.

Given South Dakota’s weather, I certainly don’t expect this kind of a harvest to occur every year, but it’s been a perfect harvest in 2015 for both man and beast!

%d bloggers like this: