Showing posts with label nuthatch. Show all posts
Showing posts with label nuthatch. Show all posts
Sunday, July 26, 2020
Sunday, July 7, 2019
Thursday, October 4, 2018
Oklahoma Irruptive Species Profile: Red-breasted Nuthatch
yank-yank-yank-yank-yank
One of the smallest songbirds with the classic steel-blue upperparts and orange breast and belly, the Red-breasted Nuthatch is either in your face at feeders, or a distant tease with that nasal call.
A few Oklahoma residents are already predicting an invasion, which may or may not come to pass, but if food is scarce for them already in the northern hinterlands, they could be getting interested in the Great Plains as a possible range expansion vector.
Known for a strong interest in the spruce budworm, this nuthatch can almost smell them for their weight in gold. During the massive budworm infestation of the 1970s in the Boreal Forest wildness, a change was created in forestry over a ten year period that still lasts today with irruptive migrant behavior. Tied in with this species, it also includes the Evening Grosbeak, Black-capped Chickadee, both crossbills, Pine Siskin and more on the tail end of the phenomena. This will be discussed in the next section. For more information, see: https://debhirt.blogspot.com/2018/10/long-term-effects-regarding-late-1960s.html
Red-breasted Nuthatch
Wikipedia
The species has already increased its range in a southward moving by nesting in ornamental conifers, especially in mature forest, which is required for nesting sites in decaying wood. Like its white-breasted cousin and others, this nuthatch is known for hitching backward down trees.
The future of this bird over the next several decades to half century will be in a northerly direction. However, areas with conifers will always win out, be it north or south. Therefore, there will be much more range loss in summer than in the winter.
Known for its friendless and lack of fear toward humans, if one stands still in its favored zone, it will come quite close.
Monday, September 3, 2018
Oklahoma Breeding Bird Species Profile: White-breasted Nuthatch
Yank-yank-yank!
Those are sounds directly attributed to the unusual White-breasted Nuthatch, a boisterous little songbird.
Common in mature deciduous forests, orchards, wood lots, and mixed woods of much of the continent, they are often in mixed flocks of other little songbirds feeding upon insects and seeds found within bark. They like stands with decaying trees for appropriate nest cavities and will even nest under bark. The species will climb up and down the trunk or main limbs backward, which is attributed to the nuthatch clan.
These personable birds use the tools that they are given to the best of their ability. They often wedge seeds in bark crevices to hold them steady, while that sharp little bill goes to work opening their treasure.
Eastern White-breasted Nuthatch
Boomer Lake Park, 2015
All three populations of the US--the Eastern, Pacific, and Interior West--have slightly different dialects, just like many of us do, depending upon what part of the country we hail from. The Eastern's call is low and a hoarse nasal variety, Pacific is highest pitched and thinly nasal, while the Interior West is also high, shorter and rapid. There is also a thinly veiled subspecies within the Interior West version, from the Sierra Nevada and Northern Rocky Mountain region. Its song and calls are the highest pitched with the rapid pattern.
Our birds in Oklahoma are the Eastern subspecies, and they are more often found in the eastern portion of the state. In the western half, they are restricted by necessity to riparian corridors, which is only in local areas.
Knotholes are often used as entrances to their cavities, while the nest is lined with hair, bark strips, and other softer materials. Most cavities are at least fifteen feet high, but I have seen a low, rotted stump used.
These single brooders incubate in the neighborhood of twelve days, and they begin nesting sometimes in February, through the month of March.
Though the pair winters apart, the male sings in winter to attract the female, and they keep in touch throughout the day. The female builds the nest, and both sexes raise the young.
What other birds were around on the same day I photographed the White-breasted Nuthatch?
https://debhirt.blogspot.com/2015/06/pre-summer-fun-in-sun.html
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)