Naturally
I grew up with an outhouse. When nature called, it called me to the outdoors because that’s where the outhouse was. And that’s where nature was, so it all worked out. I think about the old outhouse nestled in the woods more often than I ever thought I would. Birding involves eyeballs and ear holes. I walked in the darkness, not to get to an outhouse, but because it was a good night for a walk. I heard an owl call. Does that make me a birder or a bird watcher? I couldn’t watch any birds, so I reckon I was a birder. Folks are free to call themselves a birder, a birdwatcher or a feather fan. A friend tells me that she loves blue jays because when she sees one, she doesn’t need to consult a bird book to identify it. She’s a blue jayer. It’s all good.
BirdCast, produced by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology and partner organizations, uses weather radar to observe and forecast the migratory movements of birds. Go to https://dashboard.birdcast.info and you’ll discover migration forecast maps of bird movements, a dashboard summarizing the stats for birds currently migrating where you are, maps displaying real-time data for bird migration, and local migration alerts to let you know when birds are moving. You can enter your county and be prepared for lots of avian company when a north wind blows. It causes me to giggle.
I was gawking at the leaf color. That wonderful person named Anonymous, who has said about half of everything ever said, said, “Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breath away.” Leaf color leaves me breathless. Mary Oliver, who said things we all wish we’d said, wrote, “The leaf has a song in it.”
As I watched the leaves bring a brilliance to my world, I saw a mourning cloak butterfly flutter by. It’s a large insect with velvety dark red/brown wings with yellow edges, which add to the loveliness of the trees around it. A meadowhawk dragonfly darted past and snatched a small moth from the air.
It was a good day for everyone—except the moth.
The kookaburra in Australia was so loud it could be heard in Africa
I watched an old movie recently, “The Treasure of the Sierra Madre” (1948), starring Humphrey Bogart, where I heard a kookaburra calling in Mexico. That Australian bird has been used as a stock background noise for jungle scenes in films. I’ve heard it calling in Tarzan movies. Tarzan (John Clayton II, Viscount Greystoke) is a fictional character, a feral child raised in the African jungle by great apes; created by Edgar Rice Burroughs in the novel “Tarzan of the Apes” published in a magazine in 1912 and in a book in 1914. Tarzan was the son of a British lord and lady marooned on the coast of Africa by mutineers. When Tarzan was an infant, his mother died, and his father was killed by Kerchak, leader of the ape tribe who adopted Tarzan. Tarzan lived in Africa, but those who watched his movies heard a kookaburra from Australia. The kookaburra was working remotely.
Q&A
“How are pheasant and duck populations doing?” According to the DNR, pheasant numbers in the 2024 Minnesota August Roadside Survey were similar to those in 2023 and 19% above the 10-year average. The statewide pheasant index was 52 birds per 100 miles of road driven compared to 51 birds in 2023. The Minnesota DNR’s 2024 Waterfowl Breeding Population Survey estimated the population for total ducks at 445,000, which was 10% below 2023 and 34% below the 10-year average. The estimate for mallards was 141,000, 37% lower than 2023 and 38% below the 10-year average. The blue-winged teal population was 160,000, 26% higher than the 2023 estimate and 23% below the 10-year average. The population of Canada geese was 106,000, 7% below last year’s estimate and 31% below the 10-year average.
“How many species of birds are there?” The Clements Checklist of Birds of the World shows 11,017 species and the HBW/BirdLife International checklist lists 11,524.
Thanks for stopping by
“Moral certainty is always a sign of cultural inferiority. The more uncivilized the man, the surer he is that he knows precisely what is right and what is wrong. All human progress, even in morals, has been the work of men who have doubted the current moral values, not of men who have whooped them up and tried to enforce them. The truly civilized man is always skeptical and tolerant, in this field as in all others. His culture is based on "I am not too sure." -H.L. Mencken.
“Enjoy the little things in life, for one day you may look back and realize they were the big things.”—Robert Brault.
Do good.
©Al Batt 2024
An Argiope is also called a black-and-yellow garden spider, yellow garden spider, corn spider, scribbler spider, signature spider or writing spider. It’s an orb weaver whose web often has an area with a zigzag pattern called a stabilimentum, which resembles dental floss. This structure’s purpose is up for conjecture. Folklore says that in 1896, one predicted the U.S. presidential election by weaving McKinley's name in her stabilimentum. Photo by Al Batt.
