Trumpeters Hanging at the Nature Center

On Friday, some of the naturalists took a stroll down to the lakes at work to check on ice-out conditions. There was almost no ice to speak of. There was, however, a pair of Trumpeter Swans. Two of our volunteers had spotted them earlier in the day and I was excited they were still around. There had apparently been several others further up the lake but we didn't see them. These two are likely just migrating though but I can't help but notice how comfortable and laid back they were. They spent most of their time sleeping and when they did take notice of us like in the photo above you can see the one on the right didn't even bother to stop standing on one leg. They must have felt pretty safe. I also noticed that they were right next to some prime habitat for nesting.

While cleaning up this spring we found a notebook from the first director of the nature center. One spring many years ago, a pair of Canada Geese showed up on this same lake and he was blown away that they decided to nest. He went down every day to check on their progress and write up detailed notes on this wonderful event. It sounds funny now that Canada Geese are so common but at the time it was a big deal.

I'd be pretty excited if these swans nested at the center but I look forward to the day when Trumpeter Swans are not such a big deal.

On a separate note, just a little further up the lake from here the pair of Bald Eagles has returned to their nest. If the Trumpeter's do nest here I wonder if the eagles would go after the chicks?

~Kirk

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Midwest Migration on Radar

Time for another migration update. I took a screen capture of migration last night around sunset. Most of the action seemed to be in the upper-midwest. The east coast was mostly quiet because of a large storm system. I didn't have time to animate the radar loop so I could show it here but you can watch a large version of the loop by following this link. (It will take a while to compile the data when you click that link.)

What we're looking at here in theory is radar returns from birds flying over doppler weather radar stations. The patterns that shows up are circular because the radars are based near major cities and do not cover the entire country. Activity seemed to be very heavy last night in Nebraska and this could be the snow geese moving though.

Are all those doughnut shapes around cities really birds? One way to get an idea is to look at a different radar product. The radar can also show us the relative velocity of the objects being tracked. In other words, are they coming toward the radar or away. If these are migrating birds we should see them all heading north. Check out what was visible last night on the radar in North Platte NE. Everything in blue is moving toward the center and everything in red is moving away. in other words, everything is heading north.


Of particular interest to local Twin Cities readers is that we seem to have not had much migrating in last night. Perhaps tonight that will change. There was a very strong wind out of the south today. I saw my first Trumpeter Swans on the lakes at the nature center. Wood ducks showed up today as well.

~Kirk

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Early Birds - Year List Continued

I thought I'd update my year list for birds in Minnesota. The flood gates are about to open with new migrants showing up. Some have already arrived.

Here's the most recent sightings.

First week in March
• Mourning Dove
I didn't write down the exact date but I finally saw a Mourning Dove. They have been around all year but I never seem to see them right away.

March 11
• Northern Flicker
I'd heard they were around a few days before this and I'd even seen what a though might have been one on the side of the road but on the 11th I finally had a good confirmed sighting.

March 16
• Brown Creeper
This was a fun one. One of our Naturalists, Kelly Amoth, spotted this little guy out the windows of the nature center and we got some great views. I just love these little guys! I was happy to see one this year as they can be elusive.

March 17
• Coopers Hawk
Completely unexpected, I saw a coopers hawk on a telephone line when I dropped my son off at childcare. He subsequently added the phrase "cooper's hawk" to his two-year-old vocabulary.

March 19
• Hooded Merganser
I saw my first hooded merganser of the year in a little farm pond that opened up before all the others.

March 20
• Red-winged Blackbird
The red-winged blackbirds showed up in the south metro a few days before pushing north of the cities. I saw them on a Saturday the 20th in a tiny wetland inside the cloverleaf of hwy 169 and Hwy 62. By Monday the 22 I was seeing them north of the twin cities as well.

March 22
• Eastern Bluebird
I spotted my first Eastern Bluebird of the year sitting on a telephone wire along the quiet country road on the way to work. I spotted many more the next day as well.

March 23
• Bufflehead
• Song Sparrow
• Red-shouldered Hawk
This was a good day for birds! I started out the morning by spotting my first Bufflehead of the year in one of my favorite little ponds along my route to work. It opens early, often has something good to see, and has a wide shoulder so I'm not taking my life into my hands when I pull over. Later in the day, some of the staff at work went on a hike to the farm property we own across the street. We could hear song sparrows and finally got a good look at them. There were also a pair of red-shouldered hawks flying overhead which was nice as I'd been hearing them for a week or more but had not seen them yet. I only count birds I see on my list not hear. I've been hearing the sandhill cranes almost every day now but haven't seen one yet.

March 24
• Common Mergansers
There's a lake with reliable Common Mergansers just down the street from the nature center and sure enough, they showed up. Beautiful birds. Last year some of us took to calling them Commies for short and then decided to just call them Pinkos. So, if you ever hear me talking about Pinkos, I'm talking about Common Mergansers.

Next week things should really heat up with some southerly winds bringing in migrants.

~Kirk

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Live Red-tailed Hawk Nest Cam

Hat tip to Silverbug Studio for pointing out this excellent Red-tailed hawk nest cam. The nest is in Philadelphia, PA on the Franklin Institute building. The camera is very high quality and it is a live streaming video. You can see the bird move around and watch the traffic drive by. If you watch long enough you can also see the hawk come back to the nest with lunch a.k.a. pigeons.

~Kirk

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Flood waters over Harriet Island

I took these screen shots from the Science Museum of Minnesota's Flood Cam.

The first shot is just before sunset on Sunday night. The second photo is one of the first from when the sun came up this morning.

If you look carefully you can see the water has spilled over onto Harriet Island. You can also see the Paddleford boat. They have pulled a barge in front of it so that it won't be damaged by flood debris coming down the river. Birdchick has on location photos of the river over at her blog.

~Kirk

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St. Paul Mississippi Flood Cam

Note: This page is for 2010. for the spring 2011 season click here.

The good folks at the Science Museum of Minnesota have put up a flood cam of the Mississippi River in downtown St. Paul.

I've been blogging about flood prediction in St. Paul so now we get to see what actually happens.

The camera clicks a photo every 15 minutes and automatically adds it to the slide show. The view clearly shows Harriet Island which should go under water soon. The River Forecast Center upped their predicted crest to 19.8 feet. The expected crest is currently set for Wednesday. Harriet Island goes under water at 17.5 feet. My prediction is that Harriet Island goes under water some time on Sunday night. The view Monday morning should be really interesting.

~Kirk

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Moths in the Maple Sap

Every year when it comes time to tap the maple trees I love spending time outdoors. The world is waking up from winter. We hear the first sandhill cranes, the red-shouldered hawks are prowling the woods and calling out on territory. The red-bellied woodpeckers are territorial drumming and making nest holes. This is also when we find the first moths of the year. Every morning we find moths in the sap bags. They can't resist the sweet sap of the maple trees. Some drown but many survive.

This year I decided to find out what species of moth it is that we see every year. I took the above photo earlier this week. It appears to be Straight-toothed Sallow (Eupsilia vinulenta). Though, there are a few very similar species that can only be distinguished under a microscope. I originally had no idea what this moth was. I'm not really an insect guy. I figured it out by discovering a photo of the very similar European species The Satellite (Eupsilia transversa).

The name the Satellite comes from the little spots that seem to orbit like satellites around the larger spot on the fore wings. What a cool name! It is much cooler than "Straight-toothed Sallow."

North American Satellite Moth anyone?

~Kirk

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Spring Migration on Radar

Saturday's Birds and Beers was a ton of fun and there were some great conversations. I spent some time talking with Minnesota Birdnerd about tracking spring migration via radar. We brought up live radar images of Texas on a laptop and you could clearly see that migration was on. In particular, you could see the clear doughnut shape on the radar indicative of flocks of birds taking off at sunset. I wish I had captured the radar loop right then and there to share it because the archived radar data is not available until about a week later. I went into the radar archives this weekend and pulled up the most recent data I could which was for March 5th. It turns out the night of March4-5 was a good night for migration. Check out this animated loop I put together from the data. The loop starts at 1:00 UTC and ends at 17:00 UTC so that corresponds to 7:00 pm on the 4th to noon on the 5th. The doughnut circles start in Texas and then push north.





If you are interested in this sort of thing check this loop of a simply massive migration last April. You can really see what a difference a month makes. We're only seeing the beginning of this.

~Kirk

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Mysterious White Webs Under the Snow

While walking the dog and toddler to the park in the gorgeous 64 degree heat yesterday I noticed all of the lawns in my neighborhood were covered by these white patches on the snow. It almost looked like they were left behind after the snow melted. I wasn't sure what they were at first. They looked like spider webs but I doubted they could be fresh as the spiders aren't that active yet and snow would have crushed the delicate webs. People are seeing this all over the Twin Cities.

I did a little research and discovered these are Snow Molds. The conditions must be just right this year as it is growing everywhere.

Here's a photo of our little back-yard at work. You can see the large pile of snow in the back. All of the faint gray areas that look like frost on the grass are snow mold.
Here's a close up of the mold.

The web-like structure are actually the mycelium of the mold which grows on the blades of the grass. It looks like you would be able to pick it off but it is so delicate it essentially vanishes when you touch it. I was thinking this is Gray Snow Mold but there is a Pink Snow Mold as well that looks gray at first and turns color later. One diagnostic difference is that the Gray Snow Mold forms brownish-orange sclerotia or mycelial masses on the blades of the grass. I looked but could not find any so perhaps this is the Pink Snow Mold. Time will tell. I hope it is not the pink as it tends to cause more damage than the gray.

There is more information available on snow molds from the University of Minnesota's Extension Service.

~Kirk

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Dramatic Vulture Footage

Enjoy this rare glimpse into the predator-prey relationship.



~Kirk

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Interesting Changes to Flooding Prediction in St. Paul

I've been keeping an eye on the spring river following predictions out of the North Central River Forecast Center. They issued new predictions on March 1st. I'm curious when they will update it again as we're now getting the first of the spring rains. Here's what I find interesting. Back on February 16th they issued this graph.



Now, on March 1st they issued this one.


There are some subtle but interesting differences. On the Feb 16th prediction, they estimated the chances of the river reaching minor flood stage (14 feet) to be about 90%. You can see the black line intersects the yellow flood level at the 90% mark in the top graph. The prediction for severe flood level was about 65%.

Now look again at the March 1st prediction. The chances of a minor flood have decreased down to about 82%. That's a 9% degrease. Good news right? Look at the prediction for moderate and severe flooding though on the new graph. Both have increased slightly.

I find it really interesting that the odds of minor flooding have decreased but odds for more severe have increased.

I'm guessing there may be a new prediction on Monday the 15th. Well see what happens to the numbers. I'm betting they go up what with the rain but then again an early and slow thaw may actually help decrease chances of flooding.

~Kirk

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Trumpeter Swan 75A Update

Last November I wrote about a Trumpeter Swan we spotted at work during migration. A flock of swans took to hanging out at one of our lakes. I went down to scope them out and realized that one of them had a band. It took some doing since they liked to stay as far from us as possible but we finally agreed that the band number was 75A. We submitted the information to the banding office and just this week received a response.

Trumpter 75A was too young to fly when banded on August 23, 2004. The sex was unknown. The bird was banded in Wisconsin, about 8 miles north of Stillwater, MN.

That made the bird 5 years old when we saw at and 6 years old now. (In bird terms, all bird turn a year older on January 1.)

I did a quick map of where it was banded and where we spotted it.

This is really interesting because the bird is not far at all from where it was banded 5 years ago. We saw it on Mays Lake which is a private lake bordered by the Warner Nature Center and private property owned by Wilder Forest. We are 5 miles west of the St. Croix River and what this confirms for me is that the trumpeter swans that sometimes hang out on our lakes in the fall are part of the St. Croix River Flyway. Not unexpected since we are so close but cool to have confirmation. We're just far enough from the river to feel disconnected from it at times. It is nice to know that this prime habitat is used as a resting stop for birds following the river. Now then, if they could just spread the word to other waterfowl that would be great.

The Bald Eagles seem to have caught on to the prime habitat at the nature center and successfully fledged chicks at the nature center for the first time since the center opened in the 1960s. We're keeping our eye out for their return and I'll be sure to write about their nesting attempt this season if they return.

~Kirk

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Emerald Ash Borer found in Minneapolis

I'm taking it a little easy on the blogging this past month as waves of ill health take turns hitting everyone at our house. The end of cold season is just one reason I'll be happy to see spring really hit.

The news keeps on coming in no matter my health and just last week the Minnesota Department of Agriculture survey staff reported that they found 8 trees as of in Minneapolis confirmed to be infested with emerald ash borer. The team found both the S-shaped galleries and the D-shaped exit holes.

The trees are located in Tower Hill Park in the Prospect Hill Neighborhood. This is very close to the original infestation in St. Paul so this is likely part of the same incident and not really a new infestation.

"When we found the St. Paul infestation last May so close to the border of the two cities, we knew there was a good chance we'd find it in Minneapolis," said MDA Plant Protection Director Geir Friisoe. "That's why we included Hennepin County in the initial EAB quarantine, even though it had only been confirmed in Ramsey County."

For more information on the find, visit the Minnesota Department of Agriculture website.

~Kirk

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Fighting Emerald Ash Borer Could Harm Birds and Bees

I learned something interesting while reading the City of St. Paul's EAB Response Management Plan. Treating trees for Emerald Ash Borer in Twin Cities could harm bird and bee populations. It all comes down to pesticide use. The city rejected allowing residents to use any pesticide they choose on publicly owned trees because of the potential environmental impact. Also, the city will only allow injection of pesticides into public trees such as those on boulevards by a trained professional and not spraying which is a good thing as far as environmental impact. Residents can treat their own trees with pesticides and the official policy of the city will be that, "City Forestry staff will provide residents available information on EAB pesticides when requested but will remain neutral on whether or not to use." The document does not makes clear what the "available information on EAB pesticides" will be. It could simply be a list that says which ones work or it could include information on the harm they can cause. The fact that they are going to remain neutral on whether or not residents should use them may indicate that they will not tell people about the harmful effects of the pesticides but perhaps I am wrong on this. The same document states that pesticide use is usually not cost effective in the long run and there are environmental risks. I hope they pass that information along to the public as what one person does in the city effects us all.

Most pesticides used to treat Emerald Ash Borer infestations contain Imidacloprid. Imidacloprid is the first pesticide in a new family of pesticides based on nicotine. Nicotine occurs in tobacco plants as a natural insecticide.

The City of St. Paul's EAB Response Management Plan, contains an Appendix A which is an Imidacloprid Fact Sheet. While they do not say where they got the information it is clearly copied directly from the Sierra Club Canada Imidacloprid Fact Sheet. They city fails for not citing their source of the fact sheet. The original can be found online and includes all of the footnotes that are missing from the city's document. [Note to St. Paul: If you are going to rip of someone's work and include it in your document and the text contains footnotes it makes you look dumb to not include the footnotes you are supposedly citing.] Of interest in the fact sheet are the following passages.

"Imidacloprid is toxic to birds and wildlife and mildly toxic to fish. Imidacloprid use has been linked to eggshell thinning in birds[3], reduced egg production and reduced hatching success at exposures of 234ppm in food.[4] It is highly toxic to certain species including the house sparrow[5], pigeon, canary and Japanese quail[6]."

As far as bees are concerned, the report says, "Imidacloprid is an insecticide, so it is not surprising that it is toxic to many beneficial insects such as honey bees to which imidacloprid is highly toxic.[7] The widespread use of imidacloprid has been linked to colony collapse disorder, a phenomenon described by beekeepers, researchers and government officials when entire hive populations seem to disappear, apparently dying out. France has put restrictions on the use of imidacloprid (GauchoT) since the 1990s over concerns for the bee population."

The link between Imidacloprid and colony collapse disorder isn't really clear but caution is warranted.

I know there are bee hives on the St. Paul campus of the U of M for the agriculture fields. Since the fields are essentially right in the hot zone for EAB infestation I wonder how much pesticide has been used in the area and if there has been any affect on the bee colonies?

My concern is that residents who are not experienced in using pesticides will use them incorrectly and in doses that are harmful to the environment in an ultimately futile effort to save ash trees in their yards. Too many homeowners take the "more is better" approach to chemicals and really don't care what labels say.

~Kirk

Footnotes:

[3] U.S. EPA. Office of Pesticide Programs. 1994. Pesticide fact sheet: Imidacloprid. Washington, D.C., Mar. 18.

[4] U.S. EPA. 1992. Data evaluation record: NTN 33893 MRID No. 420553-13. Washington, D.C., Aug. 24.

[5] U.S. EPA. Office of Pesticide Programs. 1994. Pesticide fact sheet: Imidacloprid. Washington, D.C., Mar. 18.

[6] U.S. EPA. Office of prevention, Pesticides and Toxic Substances. 1994. Imidacloprid, acian 6(a) (2) submittals. Memo from A.F. Mciorowski, Ecological Effects Branch, to D. Edwards, Registration Division, Washington, D.C.

[7] .S. EPA. Office of Pesticide Programs. 1994. Pesticide fact sheet: Imidacloprid. Washington, D.C., Mar. 18.

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Roy G. Biv

We don't always remember where we learn things. I know for example, that hot air rises and that a cardinal is red but I have no memory of where or when I learned these things. There is something cool I do remember learning though. When I was just a wee lad my dad taught me the secret to colors. I remember my dad teaching me about a clever fellow named Roy G. Biv. His name spells out the colors of the rainbow. I think it is pretty cool that my dad is the person who taught me the correct order of the seven visible light wavelengths of the electromagnetic spectrum. This was perhaps also my introduction to the power of acronyms.

This winter when my parents asked what they should give my two year old son for a gift I suggested the They Might Be Giants CD Here Comes Science.

To my delight when they gave it to him, it included the following track.



My son loves rocking out to this song in the car every morning. I'm sure my dad would approve where ever he is now. And, by "where ever he is now" I mean checking the internet after a long day of golfing, lounging and going on the waterslide.

~Kirk

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