Brad

I’d like to thank Princeton Press for sending out a new batch of birding books for my review. The first of these is Nigel Cleere’s Nightjars, Potoos, Frogmouths, Oilbird and Owlet-nighjars of the World. That title normally gets abbreviated to Nightjars of the World. I found this beautiful, full-sized, hard-cover book to be a wonderful addition to my library. Nightjars are among the most elusive targets for the bird watcher. In addition to being master of camouflage, they are generally nocturnal. While we might hear the call of the Whip-poor-will in the moonlit night, finding them and getting a good look at them is another matter altogether. Nightjars of the World uses more than 580 photos of the various species of Nightjars from around the world to let the reader get to know the entire order of Caprimulgiformes. By the way, did you know that the nightjar is the origin of the legend of the chupacabra, or mysterious goat sucker? You can read my full review of Nightjars of the World at this link or click the link below to find it at Amazon.com.

Last night, May 11th, at around midnight, I heard a noise from the area on the deck where we have a bird feeder. I though it might be a raccoon trying to get into the feeder. I turned on the deck light, but couldn’t see anything so I got a flashlight and shone it through the window. No movement was visible, but the bird feeders that normally hang on the corner of the deck were gone. Stepping out on the deck with a flashlight, I heard very heavy pounding footsteps galloping off toward the woods. My wife saw a low black shape about the size of a black bear running off. Rather than go out and survey the situation in the dark, we waited until morning.
When we went out to check on things we found three bird feeders from around the yard missing altogether. Apparently, the bear had carried them off. We later found all three about 50 yards from the house about 20 feet off of one of our walking trails. The thistle feeder was crushed, and the mixed birdseed feeder was broken into pieces. We also found claw marks in the deck railing where the black bear had apparently tried to pull itself up to reach the feeders there. Another metal pole used to hold a bird feeder was bent by the bear as it pulled down the feeder there.
I had heard reports of several people throughout southeren New Hampshire losing bird feeders to black bears, but we hadn’t had any here before. To prevent bears from coming after your bird feeders, you can simply take them in at night. This will also prevent them from being raided by raccoons or other nocturnal prowlers.
The same goes for any chicken feeders that you may have outside if you have chickens. We had some covered steel trash cans with chicken feed stored outside near the house, but, fortunately, the bear did not find them. Today, I’ll be putting them into a shed to keep them safe and to avoid tempting any animals overnight.

Now that we’re doing well with our chickens and planning to expand our flock to include enough chickens to provide us with meat as well as eggs, we are also adding more types of birds. I have four Bronze turkey poults in the brooder that I picked up the other day. We hope that they will turn out to be at least one boy and one girl, ideally, one tom and three hens. If so, we’ll hatch the eggs next year and sell most of the poults, but keep a few for the dinner table.

I also picked up 10 Guinea hen eggs for hatching. These will go into the incubator today, and similarly, we hope to hatch out mixed sexes so that we can not only have Guinea hen eggs to eat, but also some to hatch next spring. We’ll sell these, keeping only the best breeding stock. While Guinea hens naturally tend to roost outdoors in trees at night making them susceptible to predation in this neck of the woods, I’m told that if trained from youth to roost inside a closed coop they will retain the habit throuh adulthood. There are just too many things around here that will eat them if they roost outdoors. Bobcats, raccoons and owls can all get up into the trees to take them as they sleep. Another benefit to Guinea hens is that once they reach maturity, they derive about 90% of their food from foraging according to what I’ve been told. They walk around the yard and through the gardens searching for insects and seeds, but leave the plants alone. I couldn’t think of a better insecticide than a group of Guinea hens carefully picking insects out of the garden each day. They don’t generally scratch up the ground like chickens do so they are safe for vegetable gardens and flower beds. They are also said to be very fond of ticks. It is shaping up to be a very bad year for ticks in this part of New Hampshire, at least. Any natural aid in combatting them will be welcome.

Pheasants require annual licenses, inspections and much hassle. While we’d certainly pass any inspections with our set-up, it’s just too much trouble. So pheasants are out for the foreseeable future. Quail are very small and seem as though they might be too much effort for too little return. Perhaps, I’ll change my mind at some point. Geese are just too ornery. they are very efficient as a source of food, but I don’t want anything that aggressive. The roosters are bad enough for those that are accustomed to being around them. My goal is to select roosters with lower levels of aggression as we move forward to lessen the problem overall. They don’t pose a problem for me, but for most people the natural reaction tot he roosters behavior looks like a direct challenge from the rooster’s perspective and results in confrontation.

If I ever get around to expanding the tiny little pond that I put in last summer, then I’d like to add ducks. Duck meat is my favorite bird meat of those I’ve tried and it would be a nice change over chicken and turkey. If I can make it big enough and get the nearby stream to flow through it, I may consider adding an edible fish. The yield would be very low, but I like the idea of using the habitat to its maximum potential as long as it’s there.

Eventually, we’d like to produce all the meat we eat right here on our property.

Raising the different birds is a lot of fun. I’m a big fan of not only eating locally to reduce the greenhouse gas emissions associated with transporting food over long distances, but also of controlling one’s own food supply. There is simply no other way to guarantee the safety of what one eats. i saw recently that only 1% of the fish being imported to the united states is actually inspected and of that 50-60% fails the inspection and is deemed unsafe for human consumption. It is certain that of the fish that isn’t inspected similar percentages are in the same condition, but end up in the supermarket and on the dinner table of unsuspecting families. Fish isn’t the only food that’s at risk. Things like spinach, tomatoes, peppers, hamburger, chicken, eggs, and many other commercially produced foods have caused major outbreaks of serious illness and thousands of deaths in the United States on an ongoing basis. It usually doesn’t even make the national news unless people are dying in multiple states and someone is able to make the connection to the source.

Gardening, raising meat and egg birds, and preserving the food you raise over the winter are the best ways to insulate yourself and your family from that. We are a long way from growing all of our food on our property, but we try to get a little closer each year. It’s also a great way to lower the amount of processed foods, sodium and chemical additives in your daily diet as well.

That’s probably enough rambling for today…

I was lucky enough to be invited by the Jamaica Tourist Board to visit the island and see the amazing bird watching opportunities that Jamaica has to offer. Jamaica has 28 endemic bird species (species that live only in Jamaica) and it is possible to see them all in one trip with a knowledgeable local guide. I missed a couple of them, but the trip was meant to be an overview to get me to see a number of different birding locations in Jamaica rather than personally get me to see as many birds as possible.
I, along with five other journalists who focus on bird watching topics, was put up at two of Jamaica’s finest eco-friendly hotels/ lodges during my stay. Both offer great food and accomodations while maintaining environmentally sound business practices. I enjoyed both Hotel Mocking Bird Hill and Forres Park very much. We were able to find unique birds on the grounds of both places and both were within relatively easy driving distance of some of Jamaica’s top birding habitats (for the experienced local drivers that were provided to us).
Click this link to read more about the bird watching vacation in Jamaica or click here if you just want to see the pictures from the Jamaica trip.

Owls are some of the most fascinating birds to watch. When we find them, they tend to sit still so that we can get a good look at them. Their large eyes and facial markings seem to give them personalities. Owls, as cute as they are, are powerful hunters that belong to the raptor class of birds, like hawks and eagles. Because many of them are nocturnal, it can be difficult for the average person to find owls. Several of the naturalist organizations in the area, however, have talented guides who organize owl spotting trips several times throughout the year. NH Audubon is one such organiztion.

Here’s a helpful guide to identifying three of New England’s owls: the boreal owl, the barred owl and the barn owl. This guide has videos of all three species and links to hear their calls. There is also a small slideshow which includes some pics of the barn owl in flight.

As you may know, I write a column on birdwatching for the Manchester, NH edition of Examiner.com. As a part of that column, I regularly go out into the field and take pictures of birds and various birdwatching locations around New England. I have the opportunity to hang around with many excellent bird photographers (of which I am not one). However, despite my ordinary point and shoot, autofocus digital camera and lack of formal training and experience, I and my readers enjoy the bird photogrpahs that I do take and publish. There are a few basic tips that can help anyone take better bird and wildlife photographs and that is the topic of my latest Manchester Bird Watching Examiner article, called Bird Watching 101: How to Take Better Bird Photos. If you’ve ever wanted to improve your nature and wildlife photography, this article is a good place to start for those just starting out and with only a basic digital camera.

Nature photogrpahy and wildlife photography in particular, is a great family activity that is enjoyable, educational, and eart-friendly. Whether you are going on a birdwatching vacation or just snapping some pics of the birds at your backyard feeder, use these simple tips to get better pics.

There is a new Facebook fan page for the Manchester Bird Watching Examiner. That’s me! If you want to join a fun Facebook group with lots of other people interested in birds and birdwatching, then become a fan today. Fans will also have the opportunity to suggest new articles that may appear in the Examiner and can post questions about birds in the discussion groups to be answered by the Manchester Bird Watching Examiner directly.

Share your bird pictures or videos and join the discussion

The page will also contain links to bird identification guides, ways to attract birds to your yard, birdwatching equipment reviews and more. If you have a bird related blgo or website, or know of an important bird related cause, please join and leave a link in the links section, on the wall, or in the discussion pages.

This year the Great Backyard Bird Count is being held from February 12th, 2010 through February 15th, 2010. People all over the United States and Canada are being asked to help Cornell University’s Lab of Ornithology conduct one of the biggest annual bird counts in the nation. To participate in the Great Backyard Bird Count, all you need to do is spend as little as fifteen minutes watching brids and marking down the species you see along with the highest number of birds of each species that you see at any given time while you are watching. There are convenient online submission forms and complete directions for the Great Backyard Bird Count here. You can spend your fifiteen minutes or more of birdwatching time anywhere within the United States or Canada, including your own backyard. This is a very easy way for the average person to make a real contribution to important scientific studies. Everyone who participates will also be entered into a prize drawing for the many prizes being offered by sponsors like Wild Birds Unlimited and the National Audubon Society. You’ll not only be helping bird researchers, but you could win a Wingscapes Bird Cam, bird feeders, bird identification books, or one of the many other bird-related prizes. Click the link above for more information and a handy list of links to everything you’ll need to participate in the 2010 Great Backyard Bird Count.

The Great Backyard Bird Count is a great way to show your Earth-friendly side by helping bird researchers to map bird populations across North America. It’s fun for the entire family and it’s easy to do, and it takes only as much time as you want to put into it.

Since the spring of 2009, we have been raising our own chickens. We initially bought a dozen day old chicks from a local Tractor Supply Co. store and have since picked up some others from other soutrces. We also lost some to predation. We collect eggs each day from the hens. We’re currently getting about 6-9 eggs per day. This is more than we have ever received to date since the hens were very young during the fall and egg-laying typically declines as the days get shorter during November and December. Around Christmas we added a heat lamp to the coop to help protect the chickens against some extremem cold temperatures. This had the additional effect of providing 24 hours of light each day. About 2-3 weeks after adding the lamp, our egg production went up dramatically. While this also coincides with lengthening days, I think the artificial light was the biggest factor. I’ve also ordered a larger incubator, capable of hatching as many as 42 eggs at once with the automatic egg turner. I plan to hatch out a number of eggs and increase the flock so that we have enough chickens not only for eggs, but also for meat. As we hatch and grow out the new chickens we’ll look to keep the healthiest and best egg-laying hens and the fastest growing roosters as breedig stock and the rest will be butchered (humanely) and will end up on the dinner table. All of our chickens are currently free-ranging or more accurately day-ranging since we close them up in a secure coop at night to keep them safe from the foxes, bobcats, raccoons, weasels, skunks, coyotes, and other predators that live in our neck of the woods. We are quite literally surrounded by forests and live very near a rocky mountaintop that is home to numerous hawks as well. We’ve lost a number of chickens to predators, including seven in one night when we returned home well after dark one evening and hadn’t had a chance to lock up the chickens before we left the house earlier in the day. two were carried off and missing, two were dead, and three more were mortally wounded and had to be euthanized. It was not a pleasant experience. We have not ahd any problem if we lock up the chickens around dusk, and have never had a daytime predation issue, even with hawks flying overhead. If you like to read more about the basic equipment that we had to purchase to prepare for and raise chickens, here is an article I wrote on the subject of Backyard Chicken Basics. It includes a summary of the costs we’ve incurred along with some ways to spend less than we did.

I also recommend the book: Storey’s Guide to Raising Chickens: Care / Feeding / Facilities. I bought and read the 1995 edition prior to getting our first chicks. The 3rd edition has just been released and is now available from Amazon through this link: Storey’s Guide to Raising Chickens, 3rd Edition

Two new birding books ahve been publsihed by Princeton University Press. They are Birds of Eastern North America, a Photographic Guide and Birds of Western North America, a Photographic Guide both by Paul Sterry aan Brian E. Small. Click this link for a complete review of these new birdwatching field guides. I highly recommend both of these books as you will be able to tell from the review. They are a bit bigger than most birding field guides and so they are a little more bulky to carry around, but that leaves more room for bigger pictures to help identify birds.

recently had the opportunity to visit the bird banding research station at the Parker River National Wildlife Refuge on Plum Island. This was my first opportunity to observe mist nets in use and to observe wild birds being tagged. It was a wonderful learning experience and a chance to see wild birds closer than you would in any other circumstance that I can imagine.

The bird banding research station at Plum Island is run by the Mass Audubon’s Joppa Flats Education Center and is closed to the public except by prior arrangement. You can read about the bird banding research station and view a slideshow of birds being caught in the mist nets and processed before being released.

Eduardo del Solar’s newest photographs are being put on public display at the Boston Nature Center in Mattapan, MA. The exhibit is open to the public and contains some incredible bird photography that really captures the essence and personality of such birds as the blue-footed booby, the tropic bird, the ivory gull, and the Galapagos hawk among others. The artistry of the del Solar’s photography is matched only by the technical excellence of his work.  On October 3rd, from 2:00-4:00 PM there will be a kick-off reception with wine and cheese that is open to the public (and free). Eduardo del Solar will mingle with fans and answer questions about the birds and the photography. It’s even more amazing when you consider that the photos in the exhibit were taken in his spare time as he has been a Boston city public school teacher for the last 25 years and continue in that profession today. The exhibit is his third in the Birds of the America series produced for the Boston Nature Center. Follow the link for a sneak preview of some of the photos and for complete information about the show and del Solar.