March 24, 2024: 115 Ring-necked Ducks

Advance notice, this is another long entry.  It was one of those weeks with so much going on - ducks, beavers, snow, timberdoodles - I don't know where to start.  I guess a couple of follow-ups should be first.  One or more Red Crossbills have been hanging around since my first sighting in early March, and one appears to have found itself a mate.  The two stay near each other but the female is less bold so I haven't gotten a picture, but I did get a good look at the male. 

A Red Crossbill in a Red Maple on Wednesday.  (Note the buds!)

Another follow-up goes all the way back to January 21st when I heard Pine Siskins and noted that NH Audubon predicted the pine siskin would be the finch of the year.  I can attest to the foresight of that prediction:  All winter long I heard these these loud and boisterous birds just about everywhere I went, and I'm still hearing them.  I was able to get a recording of both of their distinctive calls so when you're out and about you'll recognize it:

The highlight of my week was an evening visit to Page Pond to see if I could witness the strange mating practice of the American Woodcock, also known as the timberdoodle.  I've seen woodcock during the day on the wet trail just in from the field at Barnard Ridge Road, using its long pointed bill to probe around in wet soil in search of worms and other edibles.  But it's their nighttime courting behavior I was in search of this week, and I knew they might be in that area.

I arrived just after sunset and sat near the edge of the transitional forest between the field and the woods and waited.  It was almost dark when I heard the first nasal "peent" of the woodcock.  Soon I heard a couple more farther away in the field, and then a dark flying object sped right past me and landed in the field perhaps 30 yards away.  I knew it was a woodcock when it started to call:  peent... peent.... peent.  After a couple of minutes of this the bird took flight and I was able to watch it circle around in a large pattern over the field and the small trees gaining altitude higher and higher, emitting a musical burbling song from its wings, until I lost sight of it in the darkening night.  And that was a disappointment, because that's just when it was about to start its crazy decent back to earth.  Supposedly the male woodcock will drop in a twisting, almost deadfall decent, slowing his fall just before he hits the ground, right back where he started.  Apparently this wild behavior impresses the girls.  

I didn't see it land, but knew it had because soon it started again:  peent... peent... peent.  I saw him take flight one more time, but after that it was too dark to see.  But he continued this for another 15 or 20 minutes as indicated by the peenting and burbling that I heard.  I never saw him fly off, but when the music ended I knew he was done.  Did he get the girl?  

Another male was still at it somewhere off in the field, but I was cold and headed home.  I didn't get to witness the fall of the timberdoodle, but I got a pretty good taste of one of the more interesting mating rituals in the New Hampshire bird community.  Next time I'll try in the morning when the day is brightening rather than getting dimmer.  I don't have my own photo of the timberdoodle, but here's one from NH Audubon:

The American Woodcock.   Photo: David Nelson/Alamy

Another exciting event occurred on Friday - that cold, windy day before the storm arrived.  As the sun rose over the lake it revealed a huge flock of ducks all grouped up on the far side of Marion Cove, tucked in behind the lee of the land to get out of the brutal 20 mph wind.  The air temperature was 18 degrees.  It was too dark to see what kind of ducks they were but as the sun rose it became clear they were ring-necked ducks, and there was well over a hundred of them!  

This is only a portion of the flock.

On one count I got 115 and on another 117, but there were even more hidden behind a point of land that I couldn't count.  They must have flown in the day before and sought out the most protected part of the lake to spend the night, and they ended up staying all day.  

Linda observed there were two groups.  One consisted of apparent pairs, a hen and a drake staying close together and behaving calmly.  The other group was a jumble of males and females (more males than females though) that were much more active, especially the drakes.  Our hypothesis is that these birds had not yet paired up and the males were doing their best to convince a female to accept them as their mate.  As the day progressed, warmed, and calmed somewhat, the flock spread out and some came closer and gave us a better look at them. 

When a female or two took flight, many others in this sub-group would follow along after them. 

These ducks will soon continue on their way up to northern Maine and Canada to breed.

While the ring-necked ducks were here the much smaller group of Common Mergansers kept their distance - we saw them far away down the lake.  We also saw one pair of Hooded Mergansers in the cove before the ring-necked flock arrived.  

Male hooded merganser

And the female.

They are a pretty bird; these poor photographs don't due them justice, but the goal of the journal is to document what nature is present.  

We're having a lot of fun watching multiple beavers cruise by every night, sometimes giving us great shows with their tail slaps.   One sight that has not been seen however, is a loon.  None of our loon watchers has seen a single one, which is unusual as the loons usually arrive as soon as there are moderate-size areas of open water, often days before ice out.  Perhaps it's because ice out was so early this year.  We'll have to wait and see when they arrive.  Has anyone from other lakes seen their loons yet? 

My comment a couple of weeks ago that old man winter might not be done with us yet was on target and somehow those ring-necked ducks knew what was coming; we picked up almost two feet of snow yesterday which made for some of the best skiing of the year.

A good late winter snowstorm after a very long dry spell.

After having very few birds at the feeder recently, the Juncos - aka snowbirds - came out in force as soon as the snow started. 

Dark-eyed Juncos line up for their attempt at the feeder.

It may look like a blue-sky day, but this was before sunrise using artificial light.

These are not polite birds like the chickadees are; a dominant bird often jousts with the others to keep them away from the food.

Here they are in action:

I heard a pine siskin calling during a lull in the storm in the afternoon and looked out the window to see one perched on the feeder. I was impressed to see this little finch take on the flock of juncos for jurisdiction over the feeder. 

It confronted every junco that attempted to land including one persistent junco that wouldn't back down. 

Eventually the two of them came to a truce, each taking ownership of an opposite side of the feeder.

It was a busy week at the lake.  This morning, with almost two feet of new snow, the lake has filled up with frozen slush and the ring-necked ducks were nowhere to be seen.  I wonder if the timberdoodles' bills are long enough to probe down through a foot of snow to find their worms!

Sunday, March 23 - Winter's back.

February 25, 2018 - Avian Concussion Protocol

We are less than four weeks from the vernal equinox and it felt like it could be tomorrow with the record warm temperatures throughout New England last week - it was in the 60's in the Lakes Region, and it hit 80 in northern Massachusetts.  The birds certainly thought spring was coming as a flock of titmice were up in tops of the trees singing their spring arias, and the chick-a-dees were sharing their gentle "dee-dee" song of springtime.  I also saw my first purple finch of the year.

Another finch, however, had an unfortunate altercation with a window.  I heard the bang on the window, knew what happened and went out to assess the damage.  What I thought was a poor little goldfinch was sitting on the snow, stunned and motionless.

A stunned finch

I could see it was going through the NFL concussion protocol before getting back into the game.  I checked on her several times over the next 15 minutes and was getting concerned she might not recover.  But on the last check she reacted to my presence and flew off to join her flock with no obvious impairment.  But while she was stationary on the ground I was able to get a good look at it and see it was not a goldfinch, but rather a female red crossbill - the bill was the obvious factor.

Female Red Crossbill (Loxia curvirostra)

The fine elements of its feathers show how it can insulate itself in the winter with tiny pockets of trapped air, and the cross-beak facilitates the extraction of seeds from pine, spruce, and hemlock cones.

I hadn't seen a red crossbill before, so it's a new one for my list.  And I had to look it up, passing by the red crossbill at first, not expecting a yellow bird to fit this name.  But only the male is red;  the female is yellow.  An interesting aspect of this bird is that it will breed at any time of year, even in the middle of winter, if there is a good food supply.  And this winter is certainly a good cone year as indicated by all the white pine cones in the trees last summer, and all the cone shreds seen all winter long on the snow.

White pine cone shreds

Hemlock too

There are scenes like this wherever coniferous trees are present

Still a few whole cones lined up for the next meal

Even with warm weather there's still a good amount of snow around except for open areas with southerly exposure, and fresh snow early in the week and again today helped freshen things up.

Fresh snow shines brightly in the morning sun earlier in the week

And more snow today

Just a couple of days ago things were looking grim and this weekend both the dog sled races and the LRCT ski event at the Castle in the Clouds were cancelled;  today's snow was just a little to late for them.  Let's hope next weekend's Lake Wicwas Association snowshoe tour doesn't also fall victim to the weather (everyone is invited - let me know if you're interested).  If it does, at least we'll enjoy the signs of spring in advance of the coming equinox.

Photo by Linda Powell