Bicycle helmet bird

White-crowned Sparrow.  Photo by Karl Madsen

White-crowned Sparrow? White-throated Sparrow?

When we lived in BC, we were treated every spring to a flotilla of White-crowned Sparrows passing through the Valley. Since we moved to Naicam, we have had White-throated Sparrows stop by our feeder on their way North. This spring, however, we were treated to both species at the same time scrounging for breakfast in our front yard.

White-crowned Sparrow - if  you're a long-time reader
of my blog, you will have seen this photo before - Dec. 29/10.

It was May 6th that I resumed my kitchen watch after getting out of the hospital and in my bird diary, I noted Purple Finches, Harris Sparrows, White-throated Sparrows and also a Robin in the birch tree. On May 7, I added Pine Siskins, Brewer's Blackbirds, Juncoes, Song Sparrows and yikes, White-crowned Sparrows. White-crowned? I looked again. No, White-throated. But wait, yes, White-crowned as well.

I was excited to see both species side by side to compare them. The White-crowned have puffier heads that the White-throated. This really does make them look like they are wearing bicycle helmets - that's Karl's nickname for them.
The White-throated by a distinctive brilliant white bib under their beak and bright yellow lores - that's the short eyebrow. Their centre white stripe is much narrower than the middle stripe on the crown of the White-crowned! And the WC's beak is pinkier than the WT's.

So now when you see a sparrow with white and black sripes on his head, you will now who he is!

Bluebirds and blue eggs

The other day when I wrote that hearing a chorus of frogs transported me back to my Rutan childhood, it triggered a flood of memories of my earliest "bird" experiences - like the time I discovered blue eggs do not belong to bluebirds.

By observation at Grandma Johnson's and Aunty Tina's I had learned that brown hens lay brown eggs and white hens white eggs. It was logical (to me) to assume, therefore, when we discovered a nest with blue eggs that it must belong to a bluebird. The nest was on one of the beams supporting the bridge north of the elevator. Of course it wasn't really a bridge but a loading platform adjacent to the tracks of the spur line that served the elevator. It had been used by farmers to unload things like coal from a box car spotted there - I vaguely remember this - but by the late '40s, early '50s it was seldom used. But it made a great place to play. It was cool and damp under the bridge even on the hottest summer day and smelled of decay and rot and other delicious cave-like aromas.

Finding the nest with the eggs was a wonderful discovery, almost like coming upon a pirate's treasure. I had once found half an egg shell of that fabulous summer sky color. It was simply lying on the ground, far from a tree, no nest it could have fallen from, and I saved it in my box of secret treasures that included feathers and sparkly stones.

The eggs were still warm when we touched them. Although we hadn't seen her leave, we must have frightened the mother bird from its nest with our noisy entry.

"Bluebird eggs," I announced with authority to my siblings. I was a bossy, know-it-all child. "And we have to get out of here so the mother bluebird can come back. Bluebird of Happiness, you know. And that means if anything happens to those eggs, you won't be happy."

And I shooed the kids out. Bluebird of Happiness? I'd heard that line in a song. As soon as the others were involved in a different game, I snuck back to the bridge and crept silently under to spy on the nest. When my eyes became accustomed to the gloom, I could see a bird on the nest. A bird with a dark head and a beady eye studying me. Not a bluebird. A robin! A robin all black and grey and rusty orange with no hint whatsoever of sky blue!

Dummy, I chided myself. After all, crows eggs weren't black, were they?

I never did confess my error to my siblings.

Morning chorus

I'm hobbling around with a cane these days so most of my bird watching is limited to what I see from the kitchen window or from the front deck and my, it is amazing how much avian activity there is here at the north edge of Naicam.

Up close at the hummingbird feeder suspended from a plant hanger at the edge of the deck, two male Ruby Throats are having a nasty duel - one chasing the other to the birch at the east side of the deck. I can hear a clicking and a clattering of leaves and then one returns to nervously sip nectar. There are four spigots so why must they fight over it? Half a dozen or more Pine Siskins and Goldfinches happily share the niger towers.

Then a Collared Dove is peacefully surveying the morning from the top of the light standard across the street, occasionally emitting its cuk-cooing call when suddenly a robin dive bombs and chases it away, claiming to top spot for its own. The robins are nesting in the spruce in our front yard - they must be on their second batch.

A Yellow Warbler is announcing to the world how sweet life its from somewhere at the top of the birch. I can't see it from where I'm standing but its "sweet-sweet-I'm-so-sweet" song makes my heart happy, too.

Overhead, a Killdeer passes, plaintively calling its name and Tree Swallows and Barn Swallows are performing their aerial ballet catching breakfast on the fly. In the evening the sky is full of Purple Martins but they seem to search for breakfast in a different part of town.

The Rail Trail runs just behind the homes across the street and on the east side of that is a big slough. Through a break in the trees, we can see a portion of the slough from our kitchen window. When Kristin was here from Ontario, she said we have a "lake view." Now over the slough a Common Snipe is diving through the air creating its eerie, haunting wooo-wooo-wooo sound that seems to come from all directions at once.

Closer a Clay Colored Sparrow is buzzing its giant insect sound and then
suddenly all bird sounds around me stop. A Merlin silently streaks by. Don't stop here for breakfast, I pray. And because the birds are quiet I can hear a chorus of frogs serenading from the direction of the Rail Trail. Ah, the sound of frogs - takes me back to my childhood at Rutan!

Young owl at campground

All fluff, no feathers, a young Great Horned Owl takes a serious view of his visitors.
 Photo by Marg Kirk

While we were delighting in the antics of the baby robins in our yard, out friends over at Painted Rock Campground just east of Saskatoon, had a much more impressive baby to watch.

A pair of Great Horned Owls had chosen to set up housekeeping at site 17 in the campground, an evergreen tree very close to the Kirk's house in what my brother Dale described as a pretty sad looking nest. These owls do not build their own nest  but rather lay claim to an abandoned crow or hawk nest - no wonder it's a shabby looking nest. To make sure they have squatter's rights to the nest, they get down to business a month or so ahead of other raptors, just in case a returning hawk might want his old address back.

Incubation period is about 35 days and hatching is in order of laying. Sometimes the last chick to hatch is out of luck if his bigger siblings shove him out of the way when lunch is being served, and ultimately he could end up eaten by his larger nest mates. The male delivers food to the female during incubation and brooding, but as the chicks grow and become more demanding, Momma has to go hunting, too, to keep up with their appetites. Marg (Dale's mother-in-law) says one of the campground residents who works nights, has spotted the owls swooping low over the pasture when he returns home at 4 a.m. Great Horned Owls are nocturnal and do their hunting at night, thus avoiding competition with daytime hunters like hawks.

Young owls, like the one pictured here, frequently move out of the nest on to nearby branches before they can fly. The fledging period takes about three months but even after they try their wings, the parents will continue delivering food for a few more weeks. Marg has photos of this little guy stretched out snoozing on the branch. He has to nap during the day so he's ready to eat when the pizza's delivered at night!

Tennessee Warbler

Tennessee Warbler fuels up at the oriole feeder on our deck. Margaret Madsen photo

If there were an award given to the most enthusiastic bird singer, the Tennessee Warbler must surely be in the running. He exuberantly whistles three notes followed by three higher pitched notes and ending with a long l-o-n-g staccato trill. I have to smile when I watch him sing because as he nears the end of his song, his v-notched tail vibrates with the effort of forcing the last air from his lungs to finish his trill.

John, on the other hand, is not so enamoured of this little singer because he has decided that the green ash outside our bedroom is the perfect place to launch into song and with our bedroom window open, his early morning caroling is enough to waken the soundest sleeper.

This is among the most drab of the warblers. He has an olive back, gray head, thin white eyebrow and white breast during breeding season. The female is duller with a more yellowy wash overall, perfect camouflage to blend in with the color of sunshine on leaves. In the fall, the male looks more like the female.

It was a thrill for me to see the first Tennessee Warbler of the spring stop to sip at the oriole feeder. It was a one-day only occurrence - he must have found a regular diet elsewhere in Naicam.