Week 8

19 May 2014
Interspersed clouds and sun, mild-ish weather
~58 F

UBNA site changes in vegetation

Overall my site at UBNA has gotten greener since last week. The grasses are now 5 feet or taller, and the cattails that I can see are about evenly divided between green and brown (alive or dead). The cottonwoods have released their cotton-like seeds, which are strewn across the trail and have accumulated in long white lines. The Oregon Ash trees have more leaves out--they're bigger and it's harder to see the opposite branches. There were also bunches of yellow irises that were out and blooming. A photo of my site is to the left. The apple tree is mostly green (leaves) now, instead of white (petals).

As for bird activity, there seemed to be less activity in the air than last time, when there were lots of swallows swooping around in the air--there were still some tree swallows, but not many. I heard and saw lots of crow activity on my way in, as well as robins, but I didn't stop to observe them since they weren't at my site. I heard a bird that sounded a lot like a loon, but I don't think those are native to around here (this was around the pond at UBNA).

For the bird observation we had to do this week, I observed a red-winged blackbird that normally sits on the Oregon Ash near my site. I am pretty sure he's the same one that I have been seeing this whole quarter, so it was neat to observe him for an extended period of time. I got a sense of where his territory is, and it seems to be pretty well situated.

For the first five minutes or so, he was by himself on a lower branch of the Oregon Ash. He chirped a little and I got to hear a conversation between him and another bird in another tree that I couldn't see. This didn't escalate though, and he stayed on the lower branches of the tree. He hopped around a little, still on the lower branches of the tree, and I wondered if this was more of a relaxed time for him, since I think if he were looking out for other birds, he would be perched up higher to see the competition more easily. His chirps were intermittent with about 2-4 seconds in between each one.

Two Oregon Ash trees that seemed to be in
the red-winged blackbird's territory

I was wondering if my presence was affecting any bird behavior, as I was quite close to the tree, but the male seem unperturbed and after a while he hopped up toward the top of the tree, continuing to chirp and sing. Soon a female red-winged blackbird came along to his tree and stayed for about 4-5 minutes, which I took to be a sign that I really wasn't disturbing too much in the environment. She excreted and then flew into the cattails where I presumed her nest was. She only preened herself though and I didn't see any nest-building action, although I'm not sure what that would look like exactly.

The male continued to chirp (one of his calls sounded like a muted beeping smoke detector) and he got responses from at least two other birds. After a little bit, he flew through the cattails and glided down close to the gravel path. For a minute or two he disappeared from view to go to talk to another male bird nearby, probably to confront him. Then later he came back to the tree and landed on the top. His activity started looking more like active watching for other competitors. At one point he flew into the grasses and circled around, again to confront another male red-winged blackbird perhaps.

When he came back, he perched on a nearby tree on an even higher branch. A small bird that I think was an American goldfinch (yellow body with white speculum), came into the red-winged blackbird's tree, and the red-winged blackbird flew down to scare it off. The goldfinch returned though to a lower branch, and the blackbird left it there. The goldfinch sort of hop-fluttered from branch to branch, only resting at each place for a few seconds. It hopped closer to the blackbird, which did not like the intrusion and flew down to chase it away again. Finally the goldfinch made its way to the cattails, and then back into another tree from where it dive-bombed down toward the grass, and then pulled up quickly to land on another branch. Its flight path looked like a jump/fly, like a large bumble bee. Its chirp sounded like a laser.

Towards the end of my observation, the red-winged blackbird circled around the field again and it looked like he landed on some lily pads on the pond--I was wondering if there was a log that he was perched on but it also looked like he was able to hop from lily pad to lily pad.

Overall, this was competitive behavior that seemed mostly to be territory-related (defending). I did not see any feeding behavior nor did I note mate-attracting behavior. No other birds seemed to enter this red-winged blackbird's territory during my observation.