American avocets hunting

Belding's ground squirrels decide it's time to wake up, even though they may have to poke their way up through snow. Golden-crowned sparrows grab a few final seeds before flying north to breed. And snowy egrets squawk over the best nest sites, while black-crowned night-herons steal sticks for their nests.

The spring mating dance is in full swing. If your camera's been hibernating, it's time to dust it off. The game's afoot!

You may not be able to get to them, but male Belding's ground squirrels fight over females in the high country in May. A female is fertile only for an afternoon, and there's lots of competition between males.

The first thing males do when they wake up in late April is eat (if they can scrape away enough snow to find grass). Females emerge a couple weeks later, after the snow melts over their burrows. They're sexually receptive a few days after. Fights over females may leave one badly-injured male limping away (or dead) while the other copulates. A strong male may mate with several females. But the joke's on him - females mate with several different males. It's all about the best reproductive strategy.

Both sexes eat like crazy during their first month above ground. The female digs a nursery burrow with at least two openings and a grass-lined nest. She gives birth to three to eight young underground in late June or early July.

Bill Grabbers...
By early April, snowy and great egrets are also doing the mating dance. Then they'll squawk over the best nesting sites about 15 feet up in palms, mangroves, willows, even prickly pear in Texas - but black-crowned night-herons may already have snagged the best ones. All three species roost and nest together in loose colonies.

Both parents share 22 days of warming duties over three to six eggs. Great egret, snowy egret and night-heron nestlings are helpless (altricial). And they're hungry all the time. Parents trade off hunting and feeding duty. At first, it's enough for parents to drop food onto the nest for nestlings to find. After a few days, nestlings are strong enough to demand food. The strongest will grab Mom's bill as soon as she lets him for the food she regurgitates. Weaker siblings get crowded out, and may die. I once watched an adult night-heron eat a dead egret nestling.

...And Pacers
Black-necked stilts and American Avocets nest on the ground in marshes. Their eating habits are similar, and they tend to nest near each other. Their youngsters are fully able to feed themselves shortly after hatching (precocial) - they just can't fly until their feathers grow in. So nervous parents watch them in their never-ending circles around the shallows as they hunt. Sometimes parents will fly interference, kipping noisily at real threats (northern harriers) and imagined ones (Mallards). Nestlings tuck under Mom at bedtime, even when they're getting a little too big.

You can tell American avocet females from the males by the curve in their bills. Males like the bird below have a less-pronounced upward curve than females. And if you see an adult stilt or avocet with too many legs, it's sheltering chicks under its feathers.

Click for your chance to capture images of these youngsters!

Who's at the Chickadee Cafe?
I've had a bird feeder up for awhile. I should say a stream of feeders, in the never-ending battle to keep squirrels out of the seed.

I started with a conventional metal seed hopper. I hung it on a shepherd's crook pole, in the shade and out of the way of the gardener's lawn mower.

My local western gray squirrels soon discovered it, even though they had their own feeder on a nearby tree trunk. The greedy little dudes wanted it all, and were willing to go acrobatic to get it.

So I got a 'squirrel-proof' feeder. This marvel had a door closing over the seed when a heavy critter like a squirrel sat on the perch bar. That foxed them for awhile. But I got tired of watching them make the easy jump from the nearby fence to the feeder with its squirrel-tempting smells. So I moved it to a more photogenic spot.

Now I had a great blurred red-green background when feeding birds were sharp. And I could shoot from inside the house.

But the squirrels had figured out how to make the feeder unsquirrelproof. They were hanging off its side and snitching seeds without even pushing on the bar! And they were eating me out of seed real quick too.

(This eastern gray squirrel has 'devil eyes' because I used flash fill - use it only if you really need it!)

I knew I needed to keep the bandits from climbing the pole to the feeder. A baffle would do the trick. But which one really worked? I called up J.J. Cardinal's Wild Bird Store to find out - www.jjcardinal.com. That's where Avis suggested a powder-coated squirrel baffle from Erva Tool. This 17-inch beauty wraps around the pole about four feet off the ground.

For a couple days I watched squirrels shinny part-way up until they realized they couldn't get to the feeder anymore. Then they'd slide off or drop back down. They finally gave up altogether.

Now the lesser goldfinches and chestnut-backed chickadees can eat in peace!

But there's still this problem with spilled seed. Sometimes I get the uninvited cleanup crew sweeping up after messy birds. Oh well...

I've distilled much of what I've learned photographing wildlife up close into a downloadable eBook. Now you can have my field experience on-call whenever you like with Wildlife: Stealth Approach for an Intimate View. Click for a free preview!

I'm very quiet and people-shy. I hang out in the woods with my buddies, eating seeds and insects. I'm mostly gray so I blend in well. Who am I?

Discover Where To Find Young Shore Birds

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