Shades of things to come....
Monday, April 12, 2010
Rogue's Gallery of Nest Pests
There aren’t many things out here JOTOLR that fall into a category I would call "annoying." And, maybe some think it’s futile or mindless of me to take a stand against massive numbers of birds on an annual basis. Nonetheless, every year, without fail, I do.
Seeing a photo such as this one, strikes terror in my heart! These are Starlings darkening the sky. Yes, I am a dedicated birder. I cultivate wild birds’ attention with never-empty bird baths (made of an old garbage can lid) in the summer, and no cats. ( It’s not that I don’t like cats. I do. In fact, MM and I have had many, but when the last one died a natural death, we never added a cat back, discovering how many birds came to the yard when we hawere cat-less.) But I digress. Let’s have a little frank discussion here. There are three (actually four if I include crows) birds that I consider “invasive.” My objections include their tendencies to overpopulate, their unpleasant, incessant voices, flocking behavior, parasitism, and untidiness. So here we go:
The COWBIRD
Villain number one is the cowbird, considered by the Audubon Society to be the THE number one “brood parasite” of all the birds in this country. For those who don’t know what that means, the Cowbird lays its eggs in other birds’ nests, and gives the job of raising their brood to the host bird, completely wiping out that bird’s potential brood. The poor Vireo, for example, winds up pouring all its energy into the rapacious hatchlings of the Cowbird and its own nestlings die. Sure, sometimes, the host-bird will gather enough strength to do another nest after the cowbird babies have flown, but that’s also not to say the same thing won’t happen again. Now, who am I to question Nature, right? Well… I do question Nature and sometimes she needs a little help.
STARLINGS
Picture all the bird poo left behind (top photo above)! Can’t you just hear the cacophony of their oily, hingey, squeaks and warbles? Think of all the messy nests made from all manner of trash you never knew you had! String, sticks, old paper . Think of the birds you could have had in your yard. Birds that don’t clone massive hoards! Starlings are a non-native species. They were originally imported—legend has it—by a man who wanted to ensure that all the birds mentioned in Shakespeare were here in the U. S. Here are some (mostly unpleasant) facts about starlings from Sialis’s website: http://www.sialis.org/
An estimated 1/3 to 1/2 of returning females nest in the same box or area in consecutive years. That is why it's even more important not to let them nest in the first place.
A starling couple can build a nest in 1-3 days. Both sexes incubate.
• A migrating flock can number 100,000 birds. They roost communally in flocks that may contain as many as a million birds .
• Each year, starlings cause an estimated $800 million in damages to agricultural crops
• About 15-33% of first broods are parasitized (via egg dumping) by other starlings.
• Starlings have an unusual bill that springs open to grip prey or pry plants apart.
• Starlings only molt once a year (after breeding) but the spots that show up in the winter wear off by the spring, making them look glossy black.
• In Starlings, the length of the intestinal tract actually varies depending on the season. It is shorter in the summertime (when birds are mainly eating protein-rich) insect foods and larger in wintertime when they are mainly eating seeds, which are rich in carbohydrates.
My third pest is...the envelope please…..
The ENGLISH SPARROW or HOUSE SPARROW
This bird is simply obnoxious, and eventually creates huge flocks and runs other birds out of nesting spaces. For example, out here, JOTOLR, we want to cultivate Purple Martins in our garden. They are a wonderful bird which consume tremendous amounts of garden pest insects every year. The Purple Martins are beautiful to watch, too, as they soar to catch bugs mid-air, and eventually, we are able to witness their parenting skills as they teach their young to do the same. They are a delight!
We have a Purple Martin house with “rooms” in it for many Martins who, despite their gregariousness in nesting sites, never gather into large flocks.. But before they can nest, every year, we have to drive the House Sparrows out. A couple of times before the Purple Martins get here, I have to climb the ladder, clean out the Purple Martins’ nest box of the debris of messy nest material put in early in the spring by the unrelenting House Sparrows. Again, they make a most annoying screechy sound and they are pure scavengers, eating whatever they can find, including—as the year progresses, fruits and berries. They’re the birds you see all the time in cities (along with starlings), gobbling up discarded food and trash of one kind or another.
Originally, 100 were introduced into this country in 1850 to kill inchworms on trees! (The original 8 pairs died. Unfortunately, an all-too-successful re-importation was carried out in 1851.) They aren’t fussy about diet. In addition to fruits and berries, they consume huge amounts of grain in agricultural areas where it’s grown. Up to 90% of their diet is in seeds, and they gather in huge noisy flocks.
From my experience, there’s only one tool that can discourage all of these alien invaders. It's called a 'bird swatter." Together, my 16 gauge Browning automatic and I keep the local pest population under control so the desirable birds...have a shot.
Seeing a photo such as this one, strikes terror in my heart! These are Starlings darkening the sky. Yes, I am a dedicated birder. I cultivate wild birds’ attention with never-empty bird baths (made of an old garbage can lid) in the summer, and no cats. ( It’s not that I don’t like cats. I do. In fact, MM and I have had many, but when the last one died a natural death, we never added a cat back, discovering how many birds came to the yard when we hawere cat-less.) But I digress. Let’s have a little frank discussion here. There are three (actually four if I include crows) birds that I consider “invasive.” My objections include their tendencies to overpopulate, their unpleasant, incessant voices, flocking behavior, parasitism, and untidiness. So here we go:
The COWBIRD
Villain number one is the cowbird, considered by the Audubon Society to be the THE number one “brood parasite” of all the birds in this country. For those who don’t know what that means, the Cowbird lays its eggs in other birds’ nests, and gives the job of raising their brood to the host bird, completely wiping out that bird’s potential brood. The poor Vireo, for example, winds up pouring all its energy into the rapacious hatchlings of the Cowbird and its own nestlings die. Sure, sometimes, the host-bird will gather enough strength to do another nest after the cowbird babies have flown, but that’s also not to say the same thing won’t happen again. Now, who am I to question Nature, right? Well… I do question Nature and sometimes she needs a little help.
Picture all the bird poo left behind (top photo above)! Can’t you just hear the cacophony of their oily, hingey, squeaks and warbles? Think of all the messy nests made from all manner of trash you never knew you had! String, sticks, old paper . Think of the birds you could have had in your yard. Birds that don’t clone massive hoards! Starlings are a non-native species. They were originally imported—legend has it—by a man who wanted to ensure that all the birds mentioned in Shakespeare were here in the U. S. Here are some (mostly unpleasant) facts about starlings from Sialis’s website: http://www.sialis.org/
An estimated 1/3 to 1/2 of returning females nest in the same box or area in consecutive years. That is why it's even more important not to let them nest in the first place.
A starling couple can build a nest in 1-3 days. Both sexes incubate.
• A migrating flock can number 100,000 birds. They roost communally in flocks that may contain as many as a million birds .
• Each year, starlings cause an estimated $800 million in damages to agricultural crops
• About 15-33% of first broods are parasitized (via egg dumping) by other starlings.
• Starlings have an unusual bill that springs open to grip prey or pry plants apart.
• Starlings only molt once a year (after breeding) but the spots that show up in the winter wear off by the spring, making them look glossy black.
• In Starlings, the length of the intestinal tract actually varies depending on the season. It is shorter in the summertime (when birds are mainly eating protein-rich) insect foods and larger in wintertime when they are mainly eating seeds, which are rich in carbohydrates.
My third pest is...the envelope please…..
This bird is simply obnoxious, and eventually creates huge flocks and runs other birds out of nesting spaces. For example, out here, JOTOLR, we want to cultivate Purple Martins in our garden. They are a wonderful bird which consume tremendous amounts of garden pest insects every year. The Purple Martins are beautiful to watch, too, as they soar to catch bugs mid-air, and eventually, we are able to witness their parenting skills as they teach their young to do the same. They are a delight!
We have a Purple Martin house with “rooms” in it for many Martins who, despite their gregariousness in nesting sites, never gather into large flocks.. But before they can nest, every year, we have to drive the House Sparrows out. A couple of times before the Purple Martins get here, I have to climb the ladder, clean out the Purple Martins’ nest box of the debris of messy nest material put in early in the spring by the unrelenting House Sparrows. Again, they make a most annoying screechy sound and they are pure scavengers, eating whatever they can find, including—as the year progresses, fruits and berries. They’re the birds you see all the time in cities (along with starlings), gobbling up discarded food and trash of one kind or another.
Originally, 100 were introduced into this country in 1850 to kill inchworms on trees! (The original 8 pairs died. Unfortunately, an all-too-successful re-importation was carried out in 1851.) They aren’t fussy about diet. In addition to fruits and berries, they consume huge amounts of grain in agricultural areas where it’s grown. Up to 90% of their diet is in seeds, and they gather in huge noisy flocks.
Friday, April 9, 2010
Moo-ving Forward
Some of the nicest things about being "retired" are not having to wear a watch and not having (mostly) to even know what day of the week it is. I lived all day today as a Thursday, only to discover...it's Friday! Well.....forevermore....!
Such is the life of a senior!
Thank you so much for everything you've shared and given this past week! Thank you for visiting with me Just Off the One-Lane Road.
Keep our coal miners' families in your hearts.
Have a delightful, peaceful weekend.
Welcome to My World! (and The Green Green Grass of Home!)
The Appalachians are the place to be to experience the rhapsody of spring. Aaron Copeland’s Appalachian Spring only hit the high notes.
It’s the indescribable carpet of violets beneath my feet throughout my yard!
It’s the Creeping Flocks shimmering in the aftermath of a rainstorm!
It’s the redbuds boldly announcing their return outside my window!
The colors unfold in a symphony of unbelievable color-play. I have to pinch myself to make sure I’m not in the midst of a dream. But no dream could begin to compare with the reality.
The scene changes daily, even hourly. Woven through the upper canopy the birdsongs are loud and declarative. “It’s here! It’s now! It’s ours!” And, of course who could argue with them!
Ominously, (just to add a little spice of adventure) it's possible we'll get a little frost this evening. But then again….maybe not. The plums are already shedding their petals in a daily storm of no-longer-needed blossoms. There were billions of pollinators visiting those trees in the last few days, so –if this potential dip in temperature kindly leaves quickly—we’ll have plums. The apples are just beginning to bloom. Same with the peaches.
Welcome to my world!
Thursday, April 8, 2010
The Start of Something Big
Of course, it’s only the 8th of April. All the perennials seem almost panicked at the speed with which spring has arrived this year! Taking a stroll out into the blooming yard, I can almost hear the Peonies, Iris, Clematis, all huffing and puffing to keep apace with this miraculous onset of summertime sun and overly warm temperatures!
They’re not alone! MM and I are huffing and puffing, too! Here’s a look at what happens out here just off the one-lane road, when gardening season opens. This is the time for the hefty equipment to chop things down and get serious about planting.
We have baby plants putting on their third leaf; the strawberries arrived yesterday and rather than put them out directly, I have them in leaf mulch awaiting planting after this cool wake-up call sails through, weatherwise, late tonight and tomorrow.
Thankfully, there are some things that don’t need much of anything from us except for a little fertilizer. Some, like the violets, are perennial joys that pop up and almost sing with their beauty! Our yard is “naturalized”…meaning, there are not any formalized beds and to some extent, we make use of pretty “weeds” in certain areas, as well. As the season moves forward I will share the views with you.
And, of course, out here JOTOLR, we grow those “exotic” fruits and veggies that are so expensive in the store—asparagus, rhubarb, pears, hazel nuts, peaches, fresh garlic, raspberries, blackberries and, of course, strawberries! And talk about flavor! Fresh from the garden and oh-so-good!
One thing to point out is our garden FENCE. We have DEER and we have RABBITS. They are both huge pests! The rabbits ate the bark off one of our fruit trees this past winter and it is…after four years of waiting for it to fruit…now dead. So, it is necessary --especially with the garden--to fence these critters out. Our fence is six feet tall. We use poultry netting. This particular fence is needing replacement probably by next year. But for now, it does the job against both rabbits and deer. Air pollution in the form of acid rain makes our fences rust sooner than they would were the air not full of corrosive vapors. So, with the rabbits and deer and the coal-based electricity the gardener is challenged.
Planting time is both fun and demanding. You can see that our garden is quite large. As the season progresses I’ll share with you some of the things we do to make food “happen!” Keep your fingers crossed that we’re touched only lightly by this onset of cold this evening and tomorrow, that it is only a fleeting brush with the residue of winter!
This last photo is of the pear crop now in process!
They’re not alone! MM and I are huffing and puffing, too! Here’s a look at what happens out here just off the one-lane road, when gardening season opens. This is the time for the hefty equipment to chop things down and get serious about planting. 
One thing to point out is our garden FENCE. We have DEER and we have RABBITS. They are both huge pests! The rabbits ate the bark off one of our fruit trees this past winter and it is…after four years of waiting for it to fruit…now dead. So, it is necessary --especially with the garden--to fence these critters out. Our fence is six feet tall. We use poultry netting. This particular fence is needing replacement probably by next year. But for now, it does the job against both rabbits and deer. Air pollution in the form of acid rain makes our fences rust sooner than they would were the air not full of corrosive vapors. So, with the rabbits and deer and the coal-based electricity the gardener is challenged.
This last photo is of the pear crop now in process!
Wednesday, April 7, 2010
Overcommitment and Bits 'n Pieces
OVERCOMMITMENT
I got “sucked” in by all those incredible blooming plants at the discount store yesterday.. For years, I’ve let the hanging baskets…well….hang…! With nothing in them. Shamefully empty. This is the year. I decided to load them up with at least a few colorful Petunias and hope they enjoy our hospitality! Just one more thing on the to-do list, though!
We are enjoying RECORD high temperatures in the mid-80’s F (32 degrees C.). In fact, it was 93 degrees F. (that’s 32 C. for my international friends!) in town yesterday, but this evening will see an “adjustment.” We’re expecting a cold front to move in and ratchet those numbers downward. Undoubtedly, the weather change will create some fireworks in the form of lightning and thunder. Night before last, we had an awesome display. Lots of crash, boom, bang and jagged gashes across the sky. Our Great Pyrenees is a real wolf in sheep's clothing most of the time, but when thunder rolls, he becomes a sheep in wolf's clothing! He has amazing hearing and he wants nothing short of sitting in someone's lap at the first clap of thunder, even if it’s in the next county and we can barely detect it!
In a way, the change in temperature will be a relief. It’s kind of scary when the year goes from January to July instantly! T.S. Eliot called April the “cruelest month.” Indeed it can be. We’ve seen many a late frost—clear up into May, even—completely demolish a burgeoning fruit and veggie crop. Last year was one example, when we had everything imaginable the weather could throw at us, from April onward: cold, rain, sleet, wind, colder cold…it was awful! And, we didn’t harvest any fruit from our trees. So, hope, hope! No cold, now, please!
OUR MINING FAMILIES
Please do not forget the mining tragedy. Massey Energy has gotten away with (literally) murder in the past. They’ve never been held accountable for their actions. The public quickly forgets. Massey’s record is beyond all tolerance. Go to at least one of the links I list below and read the article. The New York Daily News also has an excellent piece today. Please send an email to your Congressional representative demanding action by the Justice Department for a full, open investigation. If companies are found to be negligent, executives should find themselves behind bars. This is an outrage and it has gone on long enough!
NBC Nightly News or NPR
APPALACHIAN BEAUTY
The unfortunate irony of West Virginia was eloquently described by an NBC correspondent last night when he commented on the breathtaking beauty of the Appalachian Spring in West Virginia and contrasted its above-ground splendor with the scourge of the black gold that lies beneath the surface. We continue to rip the heart from the mountains and sacrifice lives, all so we can send coal elsewhere to produce electricity which we waste massively. Every time you leave a light on needlessly, please remember one of these 25 needless deaths. The MSHA Administrator calls them "entirely preventable." And, you know what? Conservation does work. Green energy does work. The coal industry is a ghastly, dangerous business. And Massey Energy is the most profitable of the five largest coal companies in the U.S.. There is another way.
I'll leave you with this morning's Appalachian Sunrise... Peace.
Tuesday, April 6, 2010
Day of Sadness
Day of Sadness
This is a very sad day for all West Virginians.
Our hearts go out to our miners' families.
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