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MASSBIRD for Tuesday, March 25, 2008
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Subject: Iceland "Kumlien's" Fitchburg 3/24
From: Tom Pirro <alurap(AT)verizon.net>
Date: 25 Mar 2008 7:58am
Last evening 3/24 there was 12 gulls loafing on Snow's Mill Pond in Fitchburg,
one of which was a 1st cycle Iceland Gull. The was also a few Common Mergansers
and Common Goldeneyes.
Tom Pirro
Westminster, Ma.
http://tpirro.blogspot.com/
[ << | >> | ^^ ]
Subject: 4 Black Vultures CT 3/23/08
From: <winterwren2(AT)verizon.net>
Date: 25 Mar 2008 9:26am
Subject: eBird Report - Waterford Ct. Beverly Rd. , 3/23/08
Observation date: 3/23/08
Visiting family in CT. After lunch we took a walk around the neighborhood,
and I had 4 Black Vultures together right over their house. Turkey Vultures
also flew by later in the afternoon giving me a great comparison of the field
marks. Hopefully I'll see some in Mass. this Spring.
Number of species: 15
Black Vulture 4
Turkey Vulture 2
Sharp-shinned Hawk 1
Red-tailed Hawk 1
Mourning Dove X
Blue Jay X
American Crow X
Black-capped Chickadee 1
Tufted Titmouse 1
White-breasted Nuthatch 1
American Robin 1
White-throated Sparrow 4
Northern Cardinal 1
Common Grackle 4
American Goldfinch 1
This report was generated automatically by eBird v2(http://ebird.org)
winterwren2(AT)verizon.net
Susan Hedman, Gloucester
"I believe in God, only I spell it Nature." Frank Lloyd Wright
[ << | >> | ^^ ]
Subject: Waterbird Survey Results from Concord
Impoundments, 3/25/08
From: Jason_StSauver(AT)fws.gov
Date: 25 Mar 2008 11:31am
The following species of waterfowl were counted during a recent waterbird
survey conducted at the Great Meadows National Wildlife Refuge â~@~S Concord
Impoundments on Tuesday, March 25, 2008:
Species Amount
Canada Goose 453
Wood Duck 11
Mallard 20
American Black Duck 4
Blue-winged Teal 2
Common Goldeneye 5
Bufflehead 2
Ring-necked Duck 74
Hooded Merganser 7
Common Merganser 1
American Coot 2
If you have any questions regarding management at the Concord
Impoundments, please contact the Refuge biological staff at
978-443-4661 at ext 37 or 24.
-------------------------------------------------
Jason St. Sauver, Bio Intern
Eastern MA NWR Complex
73 Weir Hill Road
Sudbury, MA 01776
978-443-4661 ext. 23
[ << | >> | ^^ ]
Subject: Fw: Bats Perish, and No One Knows Why
From: "Jim Berry" <jim.berry3(AT)verizon.net>
Date: 25 Mar 2008 11:56am
----- Original Message -----
From: "Jim Berry" <jim.berry3(AT)verizon.net>
To: "biomass" <Bio-Mass(AT)yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Tuesday, March 25, 2008 12:12 PM
Subject: Fw: Bats Perish, and No One Knows Why
> more scary info from the NYT on the bat die-offs. this is a fairly
> thorough article, so i'm forwarding it. [I sent it to Biomass, but
> Barbara thought it should go to massbird too.]
>
> Jim Berry
> Ipswich, Mass.
> jim.berry3(AT)verizon.net
>
>
> March 25, 2008
>
> Bats Perish, and No One Knows Why
> By TINA KELLEY
>
> Al Hicks was standing outside an old mine in the Adirondacks, the
> largest bat hibernaculum, or winter resting place, in New York State.
>
> It was broad daylight in the middle of winter, and bats flew out of
> the mine about one a minute. Some had fallen to the ground where they
> flailed around on the snow like tiny wind-broken umbrellas, using the
> thumbs at the top joint of their wings to gain their balance.
>
> All would be dead by nightfall. Mr. Hicks, a mammal specialist with the
> state’s Environmental Conservation Department , said: “Bats don’t fly
> in the daytime, and bats don’t fly in the winter. Every bat you see out
> here is a ‘dead bat flying,’ so to speak.”
>
> They have plenty of company. In what is one of the worst calamities to
> hit bat populations in the United States, on average 90 percent of the
> hibernating bats in four caves and mines in New York have died since
> last winter.
>
> Wildlife biologists fear a significant die-off in about 15 caves and
> mines in New York, as well as at sites in Massachusetts and Vermont.
> Whatever is killing the bats leaves them unusually thin and, in some
> cases, dotted with a white fungus. Bat experts fear that what they call
> White Nose Syndrome may spell doom for several species that keep insect
> pests under control.
>
> Researchers have yet to determine whether the bats are being killed by
> a virus, bacteria, toxin, environmental hazard, metabolic disorder or
> fungus. Some have been found with pneumonia, but that and the fungus
> are believed to be secondary symptoms.
>
> “This is probably one of the strangest and most puzzling problems we
> have had with bats,” said Paul Cryan, a bat ecologist with the United
> States Geological Survey . “It’s really startling that we’ve not come
> up with a smoking gun yet.”
>
> Merlin Tuttle, the president of Bat Conservation International, an
> education and research group in Austin, Tex., said: “So far as we can
> tell at this point, this may be the most serious threat to North
> American bats we’ve experienced in recorded history. “It definitely
> warrants immediate and careful attention.”
>
> This month, Mr. Hicks took a team from the Environmental Conservation
> Department into the hibernaculum that has sheltered 200,000 bats in
> past years, mostly little brown bats (Myotis lucifugus) and federally
> endangered Indiana bats (Myotis sodalis), with the world’s second
> largest concentration of small-footed bats (Myotis leibii).
>
> He asked that the mine location not be published, for fear that
> visitors could spread the syndrome or harm the bats or themselves.
>
> Other visitors do not need directions. The day before, Mr. Hicks saw
> eight hawks circling the parking lot of another mine, waiting to kill
> and eat the bats that flew out.
>
> In a dank galley of the mine, Mr. Hicks asked everyone to count how
> many out of 100 bats had white noses. About half the bats in one
> galley did. They would be dead by April, he said.
>
> Mr. Hicks, who was the first person to begin studying the deaths, said
> more than 10 laboratories were trying to solve the mystery.
>
> In January 2007, a cave explorer reported an unusual number of bats
> flying near the entrance of a cavern near Albany. In March and April,
> thousands of dead bats were found in three other mines and caves. In
> one case, half the dead or living bats had the fungus.
>
> One cave had 15,584 bats in 2005, 6,735 in 2007 and an estimated 1,500
> this winter. Another went from 1,329 bats in 2006 to 38 this winter.
> Some biologists fear that 250,000 bats could die this year.
>
> Since September, when hibernation began, dead or dying bats have been
> found at 15 sites in New York. Most of them had been visited by people
> who had been at the original four sites last winter, leading
> researchers to suspect that humans could transmit the problem.
>
> Details on the problem in neighboring states are sketchier. “In the
> Berkshires in Massachusetts, we are getting reports of dying/dead bats
> in areas where we do not have known bat hibernacula, so we may have
> more sites than we will ever be able to identify,” said Susi von
> Oettingen, an endangered species biologist with the United States Fish
> and Wildlife Service .
>
> In Vermont, Scott Darling, a wildlife biologist with the Fish and
> Wildlife Department, said: “The last tally that I have is approximately
> 20 sites in New York, 4 in Vermont and 2 in Massachusetts. We only have
> estimates of the numbers of bats in the affected sites — more or less
> 500,000. It is impossible for us to count the dead bats, as many have
> flown away from the caves and died — we have over 90 reports from
> citizens across Vermont — as well as many are still dying.”
>
> People are not believed to be susceptible to the affliction. But New
> Jersey, New York and Vermont have advised everyone to stay out of all
> caverns that might have bats. Visitors to affected caves and mines are
> asked to decontaminate all clothing, boots, ropes and other gear, as
> well as the car trunks that transport them.
>
> One affected mine is the winter home to a third of the Indiana bats
> between Virginia and Maine. These pink-nosed bats, two inches long and
> weighing a quarter-ounce, are particularly social and cluster together
> as tightly as 300 a square foot.
>
> “It’s ironic, until last year most of my time was spent trying to
> delist it,” or take it off the endangered species list, Mr. Hicks said,
> after the state’s Indiana bat population grew, to 52,000 from 1,500 in
> the 1960s.
>
> “It’s very scary and a little overwhelming from a biologist’s
> perspective,” Ms. von Oettingen said. “If we can’t contain it, we’re
> going to see extinctions of listed species, and some of species that
> are not even listed.”
>
> Neighbors of mines and caves in the region have notified state wildlife
> officials of many affected sites when they have noticed bats dead in
> the snow, latched onto houses or even flying in a recent snowstorm.
>
> Biologists are concerned that if the bats are being killed by something
> contagious either in the caves or elsewhere, it could spread rapidly,
> because bats can migrate hundreds of miles in any direction to their
> summer homes, known as maternity roosts. At those sites, females
> usually give birth to one pup a year, an added challenge for dropping
> populations.
>
> Nursing females can eat up to half their weight in insects a day, Mr.
> Hicks said.
>
> Researchers from institutions like the Centers for Disease Control and
> Prevention , the United States Geological Survey’s National Wildlife
> Health Center, Boston University , the New York State Health Department
> and even Disney’s Animal World are addressing the problem. Some are
> considering trying to feed underweight wild bats to help them survive
> the remaining weeks before spring. Some are putting temperature sensors
> on bats to monitor how often they wake up, and others are making
> thermal images of hibernating bats.
>
> Other researchers want to know whether recently introduced pesticides,
> including those released to stop West Nile virus , may be contributing
> to the problem, either through a toxin or by greatly reducing the bat’s
> food source.
>
> Dr. Thomas H. Kunz, a biology professor at Boston University, said the
> body composition of the bats would also be studied, partly to determine
> the ratio of white to brown fat. Of particular interest is the brown
> fat between the shoulder blades, known to assist the bats in warming up
> when they begin to leave deep hibernation in April.
>
> “It appears the white nose bats do not have enough fat, either brown or
> white, to arouse,” Dr. Kunz said. “They’re dying in situ and do not
> have the ability to arouse from their deep torpor.”
>
> His researchers’ cameras have shown that bats in the caves that do wake
> up when disturbed take hours longer to do so, as was the case in the
> Adirondack mine. He also notes that if females become too emaciated,
> they will not have the hormonal reactions necessary to ovulate and
> reproduce.
>
> In searching for a cause of the syndrome, researchers are hampered by
> the lack of baseline knowledge about habits like how much bats should
> weigh in the fall, where they hibernate and even how many bats live in
> the region.
>
> “We’re going to learn an awful lot about bats in a comprehensive way
> that very few animal species have been looked at,” said Dr. Elizabeth
> Buckles, an assistant professor at Cornell who coordinates bat research
> efforts. “That’s good. But it’s unfortunate it has to be under these
> circumstances.”
>
> The die-offs are big enough that they may have economic effects. A
> study of Brazilian free-tailed bats in southwestern Texas found that
> their presence saved cotton farmers a sixth to an eighth of the cash
> value of their crops by consuming insect pests.
>
> “Logic dictates when you are potentially losing as many as a half a
> million bats in this region, there are going to be ramifications for
> insect abundance in the coming summer,” Mr. Darling, the Vermont
> wildlife biologist, said.
>
> As Mr. Hicks traveled deeper in the cave, the concentrations of bats
> hanging from the ceiling increased. They hung like fruit, generally so
> still that they appeared dead. In some tightly packed groups, just
> individual noses or elbows peeked through. A few bats had a wing around
> their nearest cavemates. Their white bellies mostly faced downhill.
> When they awoke, they made high squeaks, like someone sucking a tooth.
>
> The mine floors were not covered with carcasses, Mr. Hicks said,
> because raccoons come in and feed on them. Raccoon scat dotted the
> rocks along the trail left by their footprints.
>
> In the six hours in the cave taking samples, nose counts and
> photographs, Mr. Hicks said that for him trying for the perfect picture
> was a form of therapy. “It’s just that I know I’m never going to see
> these guys again,” he said. “We’re the last to see this concentration
> of bats in our lifetime.”
>
> Copyright 2008 The New York Times Company
>
[ << | >> | ^^ ]
Subject: Early AM at Forest Hills Cemetery
From: stuarttwalker(AT)comcast.net
Date: 25 Mar 2008 12:26pm
----INCLUDING text/plain MIME SECTION----
I tried for Jake's redpolls and the Bohemian waxwing early this morning (6:45-8)
but came up short. Consolation prizes were:
Peregrine - a dramatic stoop and subsequent flyby, very close.
Cooper's hawks - a pair, halfheartedly chasing crows.
Cedar waxwings - a large flock, beautiful in the early sunlight (Bigby).
Golden-crowned kinglet - 1 female (Bigby).
Mixed flock of Robins, Juncos, Song and White-throated sparrows, milling around
in Sweetgum seed pods.
Double-crested cormorant, as advertised - great breeding plumes!
Stuart Walker
Jamaica Plain
stuarttwalker(AT)comcast.net
----DELETED text/html MIME SECTION----
[ << | >> | ^^ ]
Subject: Monday, March 24 - North Shore/Concord sites
From: "John Galluzzo" <jgalluzzo(AT)massaudubon.org>
Date: 25 Mar 2008 3:42pm
This is a multi-part message in MIME format.
----INCLUDING text/plain MIME SECTION----
David Ludlow and I birded the entire day on Monday, from sunrise at the =
Boxford State Forest to near sundown at Great Meadows. We found 71 =
species along the way with certain highlights. They included singing =
WINTER WRENS and a singing BROWN CREEPER at sunrise in Boxford; BALD =
EAGLES on the mudflats in Newburyport; a singing EASTERN MEADOWLARK at =
Parker River, as well as two PIPING PLOVERS, two KILLDEERS, one NORTHERN =
SHOVELER, seven HORNED LARKS, one SNOW BUNTING, and a NORTHERN SHRIKE; =
our first TREE SWALLOW of the year, at Cherry Hill Reservoir; and a =
calling RUSTY BLACKBIRD at the parking lot at Great Meadows/Concord.
=20
John Galluzzo<?xml:namespace prefix =3D o ns =3D =
"urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />
Public Program Director
Mass Audubon South Shore Sanctuaries
2000 Main Street
Marshfield MA 02050
<mailto:jgalluzzo(AT)massaudubon.org> jgalluzzo(AT)massaudubon.org
<http://www.massaudubon.org/southshorejournal> =
www.massaudubon.org/southshorejournal
781-837-9400
----DELETED text/html MIME SECTION----
[ << | >> | ^^ ]
Subject: Greater White-Fronted Goose and Possible Greater
White-Fronted GooseX Canada Goose in Sharon 3/25
From: "Will Sweet" <wsweet321(AT)gmail.com>
Date: 25 Mar 2008 4:38pm
Today when I was looking for the Greater White-Fronted Goose in
Sharon, I found something I did not expect. I did see the Greater
White-Fronted Goose, but I also a goose that looked like a possible
GREATER WHITE-FRONTED GOOSE X CANADA GOOSE. The goose had a white
cheek patch like a Greater White fronted goose and the neck, but the
rest of the goose looked like canada goose. Right as I was about to
take a picture my camera ran out of batteries. Ill try to get a
picture tomorrow. I would appreciate it if you/ someone would try to
relocate it and tell me if im right. Other birds in the area were 7
Killdeer, Canada Geese, a Greater White-Fronted Goose, fish crows, and
american crows.
--
Will Sweet
Sharon MA
wsweet321(AT)gmail.com
[ << | >> | ^^ ]
Subject: CT Report 03/25/2008
From: Roy Harvey <rmharvey(AT)snet.net>
Date: 25 Mar 2008 8:46pm
From Kevin Burgio:
3/25 - Storrs, Pumping Station Rd -- 1 male RUFFED GROUSE; drumming
right off road past 1st pumping station.
3/25 - Storrs, HEEP Site -- 1 BROWN CREEPER; near new parking lot
construction.
From Jim Harris:
3/25 - Columbia yard -- 2 BROWN CREEPERS, 5 COMMON REDPOLLS
From Janet Mehmel:
3/24 - Goshen, Hageman Shean Road feeders - - 50+ COMMON REDPOLLS,
some males in breeding plumage.
From Annette Cunniffe:
3/25 -- Greenwich -- pair of BLUE-WINGED TEAL mixed in with Mallards
in small pond on Pecksland Rd. by stop sign and Meadow Dr.
From Ralph Amodei:
3/24-25 - Bridgeport, Seaside Park Pond - 1 drake EURASIAN WIDGEON.
From Donna Lorello:
3/25 - Branford yard -- 1 male Yellow-bellied Sapsucker, 1 Brown
Creeper.
From John Maynard
3/25 - Durham, Greenbacker farm pond, Route 68 -- 2 SNOW GEESE
standing out among flock of 200 CANADA GEESE.
From Peter Hornak:
3/24 - Orange, Turkey Hill School -- 3 BLACK VULTURES.
From Dave Rosgen, w/ Frank Gallo, Rob Van Dyke, & John Eykelhoff:
3/24 - Litchfield, N. Shore Rd. (Bantam Lake, 5 p.m. 'til dark) -- 2
Northern Pintails, 1 Lesser Scaup.
(White Memorial's Pt. Folly Marsh) -- 9 Rusty Blackbirds
From Dave Rosgen:
3/24 - Litchfield, S. Lake St. (White Memorial's Little Pond at noon)
-- 13 Rusty Blackbirds.
White Hall Rd. (White Memorial's Museum Feeders) -- 1 Fox Sparrow
From Tom Cuchara:
3/22 - Hammonasset Beach State Park, Meig's Point -- 7pm, 1 Least
Bittern flew over the marsh, near the end of the big parking lot and
landed about 100 feet from the road that leads to the picnic benches.
Fired off a few record shots. He's hard to find even with
binoculars!!
From Arthur Shippee
3/25 - Hamden, North Lake Dr. -- 1 BROWN CREEPER
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[ << | >> | ^^ ]
Subject: Chatham; Tues., 25 Mar. 2008.
From: Richard Heil <rsheil(AT)comcast.net>
Date: 25 Mar 2008 8:50pm
TUESDAY, 25 MARCH 2008:
CHATHAM, MA (1130-1800 hrs.)
Weather: Mostly clear, NNE winds 4-20 mph, 32-38 F.
Richard S. Heil
'Pale-bellied' Brant (146)
Canada Goose (52)
Mute Swan (5)
American Black Duck (340)
Mallard (21)
KING EIDER (1 ad. male)-Pleasant Bay off Allen Point.
Common Eider (4420): Large flocks off Chatham Light and inside new
cut into Pleasant Bay.
Surf Scoter (10)
White-winged Scoter (20)
Black Scoter (24)
Oldsquaw (14)
Bufflehead (420): Good numbers everywhere, on ponds and bays.
Common Goldeneye (49)
Hooded Merganser (10)
Common Merganser (7)
Red-breasted Merganser (310)
Red-throated Loon (2)
Common Loon (23)
Horned Grebe (4)
Great Blue Heron (7): Scattered, mostly on ponds.
Turkey Vulture (3)
Osprey (2)
Northern Harrier (1f.)
Red-tailed Hawk (3)
Black-bellied Plover (18)
Piping Plover (5)-North Beach, from Chatham Light.
Killdeer (2)
Greater Yellowlegs (7): 6-Forest Beach marsh, 1-Oyster River.
Dunlin (521): 500-Stage Harbor, 21-South Beach from Morris I.
Laughing Gull (6 ads.): Morris I.
Ring-billed Gull (30)
Herring Gull (1200)
'Kumlien's' Gull (2 ads.)-Roosting w/ other gulls, Tern I.
Great Black-backed Gull (150)
Rock Pigeon (12)
Mourning Dove (32)
Belted Kingfisher (1)
Red-bellied Woodpecker (2)
Downy Woodpecker (5)
Hairy Woodpecker (2)
Northern Flicker (6)
Eastern Phoebe (1)-Morris I.
Blue Jay (14)
American Crow (54)
Black-capped Chickadee (116)
Tufted Titmouse (22)
Red-breasted Nuthatch (7): Pitch Pines, 3 sites.
White-breasted Nuthatch (1)
Brown Creeper (1)
Carolina Wren (2): low number.
American Robin (65)
Northern Mockingbird (8)
European Starling (40)
Yellow-rumped 'Myrtle' Warbler (2)
Pine Warbler (1m.)-Singing, Cockle Cove Rd.
American Tree Sparrow (1)
'Ipswich' Sparrow (1)-End of Forest Beach Rd.
Song Sparrow (20)
Swamp Sparrow (2)
White-throated Sparrow (12)
Northern Cardinal (51)
Red-winged Blackbird (70+)
Common Grackle (190+)
Brown-headed Cowbird (2)
House Finch (70)
Common Redpoll (1f.)-Scatteree Rd., by Salt Pond.
American Goldfinch (12)
House Sparrow (25)
Richard S. Heil
S. Peabody, MA
rsheil(AT)comcast.net
This report was generated with the aid of eBird v2(http://ebird.org)
[ << | >> | ^^ ]
Subject: Pepperell/Bolton Flats Birds 3/25
From: Tom Pirro <alurap(AT)verizon.net>
Date: 25 Mar 2008 9:20pm
Birds seen and/or heard from behind the horse track on the west side of the
nashua River in Pepperell this noon. The Basic I Bald Eagle made repeated passes
at a small group of Common Mergansers. The mergs "sat tight" and dove when the
eagle attacked, a few times the eagle hit the water and reached down for a Merg,
that dove, and came up empty. A female Harrier passed through and was harrassed
briefly by a Great Black-backed Gull, a few Am. Crows and blackbirds even the
Kingfisher inspected the harrier.
Species Number reported
Canada Goose 12
Mute Swan 1
Wood Duck 18
American Black Duck 2
Mallard 3
Common Goldeneye 8
Hooded Merganser 35
Common Merganser 20
Bald Eagle 1
Northern Harrier 1
Belted Kingfisher 1
American Crow 2
Black-capped Chickadee 1
American Robin 2
European Starling 100
Song Sparrow 1
Common Grackle 10
American Goldfinch 2
This evening from Bolton Flats, I walked a bit on both side of Rte 119, lots of
Wood Ducks, GW Teal, Mallards but few Geese I was unable to get over to the
pond, well hidden by young trees now.
A flock of 12 Canada Goose passed over headed north, one of them was a small
form and could well have been a Cackling Goose. However I would've liked a
closer inspection to tell if was not a smaller form on the Canada side of the
family.
The Peregrine was an Imm. and put on a nice show carving up the sky, but like
the noon time eagle, down river, it also came up empty.
Species Number reported
Canada Goose 60
Wood Duck 220
American Black Duck 18
Mallard 120
Northern Pintail 12
Green-winged Teal (American) 95
Great Blue Heron 1
Sharp-shinned Hawk 1
Red-tailed Hawk 2
Peregrine Falcon 1
Killdeer 5
American Woodcock 1
Ring-billed Gull 175
Great Black-backed Gull 1
Belted Kingfisher 1
Hairy Woodpecker 2
American Crow 30
White-breasted Nuthatch 1
American Robin 15
Song Sparrow 2
Northern Cardinal 1
Red-winged Blackbird 100
Common Grackle 800
Tom Pirro
Westminster, Ma.
http://tpirro.blogspot.com/
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